μάλιστα δὲ αὐτῶν... (Apol. 17a)

Greek Learning Greek
1

Hey, textkittens! :sunglasses: (Reference to all you “cool cats” out there!)

I’ve decided to go ahead and start working on the Apology, following Nate’s great example of trudging through without fear. I’ve got the first section translated, but I was wondering about the phrase μάλιστα δὲ αὐτῶν and how it should be understood in this passage. Here’s the text:

μάλιστα δὲ αὐτῶν ἓν ἐθαύμασα τῶν πολλῶν ὧν ἐψεύσαντο…

The only plural that αὐτῶν could be referring to is the accusers of two sentences previously. The immediate substantive that comes before it is neuter singular (οὐδὲν ἀληθές, nothing true). It can’t be that.

Thanks for any help or suggestions!

ἔρρωσθε,
Ἰάσων

2

Hi, Jay!

The commentary by W. Tyler reads αὐτῶν as gen. of possession for ἕν and τῶν πολλῶν as partitive for the same ἕν:

  • I especially wondered at one thing of theirs of the many things which they falsely stated.
3

ὁ Ναθὰν ἔγραψεν·

Hi, Jay!

The commentary by W. Tyler > reads αὐτῶν as gen. of possession for ἕν and τῶν πολλῶν as partitive for the same ἕν:

  • I especially wondered at one thing of theirs of the many things which they falsely stated.

Thanks for that, Nate. Looks right to me! :slight_smile:

4

By the way, Nate, did you notice that in his notes he broke ὅτι into two words: ὅ τι ? :slight_smile:

Jason

5

Not this particular one, but I’ve noticed that his version is somewhat different in certain places
from the one in Oxford’s Platonis Opera (the same one on Perseus).

6

From Complete Ancient Greek: Teach Yourself by Betts & Henry, section 10.1 on page 119:

The neuter singular ὅτι is sometimes printed ὅ τι in modern texts to avoid confusion with the conjunction ὅτι > that, because> . This distinction is not employed in this book; the context should show which is being used.

I like how ὅ τι avoids the ambiguity, but at the same time why can’t we just learn to look at the context for the meaning of ὅτι? We shouldn’t be too lazy, right? I mean, Greek obviously doesn’t have enough challenge for us just as is.

LOL

Jason

7

And the traditional thing (although I don’t know how far back this goes) was to use something that looks like a comma so ὅ,τι vs. ὅτι. Modern Greek still does that, having ό,τι vs ότι (without the breathings).