Cambridge Greek Lexicon, aorist of δαμάζω

Greek Homeric Greek and Early Greek Poetry
1

The Cambridge Greek Lexicon’s entry for δαμάζω says:

δαμάζω, Aeol. δαμάσδω (Theoc.) vb. [δάμνημι] | Only pres. and impf.: for other tenses see δάμνημι.

I’m not sure if I’m just misinterpreting this, or if it’s a plain mistake. Homer has dozens of usages of δαμάζω that seem to me to be clearly aorist, and clearly not δάμνημι. Examples:

ἐπεὶ δὴ πρῶτα θεῶν ἰότητι δαμάσθη - since he was killed after all at the desire of the gods (Iliad 19.9)
ἡμίονον … ἥ τ’ ἀλγίστη δαμάσασθαι - a mule that’s hard to break (Iliad 23.655)

The square brackets in the Cambridge format are for the etymology.

Shouldn’t this say “For pres. and impf. see δάμνημι.”?

Here’s the output of my script that searches the Project Perseus treebank for the Iliad:

$ ./scripts/report_inflections.rb δαμνημι tense=*
present
  δάμνασθαι (2), δάμναται (1), δάμνημ᾽ (1), δάμνησι (4), δαμναμένους (1)
imperfect
  δάμνατο (1), ἐδάμνα (2)
The given lemma is a unique match to: δάμνημι
total matches: 7, total occurrences: 12




$ ./scripts/report_inflections.rb δαμαζω tense=*
perfect
  δεδμήμεσθα (1), δεδμημένοι (3), δεδμημένον (3), δεδμημένος (2)
pluperfect
  δέδμητο (2), δεδμήατο (1), δεδμήμην (1)
future
  δαμάᾳ (1), δαμόωσιν (1), δαμᾷ (1)
aorist
  δάμασε (3), δάμασον (2), δάμασσαν (3), δάμασσας (2), δάμασσε (5), δάμασσεν (2), δάμασσον (1), δάμεν (5), δάμη (5), δαμάσαντες (3), δαμάσαντό (2), δαμάσασθαι (2), δαμάσθη (1), δαμάσσατο (1), δαμάσσεται (2), δαμάσσομεν (1), δαμάσσω (1), δαμάσσῃ (3), δαμάσῃ (4), δαμέντα (5), δαμέντας (3), δαμέντε (2), δαμέντες (8), δαμέντι (2), δαμέντων (1), δαμήμεναι (5), δαμήῃ (1), δαμήῃς (1), δαμασαίατο (1), δαμασαίμεθα (1), δαμασαίμην (1), δαμασθείς (2), δαμασσάμενοί (1), δαμασσάμενος (1), δαμείετε (1), δαμείη (4), δαμείς (9), δαμείω (1), δαμεῖεν (1), δαμῆναι (12), δμηθέντα (2), δμηθήτω (1), ἐδάμασσα (1), ἐδάμασσε (7), ἐδάμασσεν (5), ἐδάμη (2), ἐδάμημεν (1), ἐδάμην (1), ἐδαμάσθην (1), ἐδαμάσσατο (1)
The given lemma is a unique match to: δαμάζω
total matches: 66, total occurrences: 149

If I look at the entry for δάμνημι, Cambridge lists lots of forms that Project Perseus classifies as forms of δαμάζω, and that clearly seem to me to be forms of δαμάζω. For example, they have δάμασσα listed as an epic form of δάμνημι, but that makes no sense to me. It seems like a perfectly regular sigmatic aorist of δαμάζω, which is how Perseus classifies it, e.g., Iliad 16.845 uses δάμασσαν, which Perseus analyzes as v3paia, their code for verb, 3rd person, plural, aorist indicative active.

Is there some reason that I don’t understand why Cambridge would disagree with Perseus on this, or does this just look like a mistake in Cambridge, or am I confused, or…? Cunliffe seems to agree with Perseus. He lists δαμάζω with a dagger, which is his notation meaning that only the forms he lists actually occur – i.e., he’s implying, consistent with Perseus, that δαμάζω is a fictitious dictionary form and the verb doesn’t have a present or imperfect.

2

Hi Ben, there’s no error in the Cambridge lexicon here. Just to check: is it that you can’t see how e.g. aor. δάμασσα (which has no ν in it) could come from pres. δάμνημι (with a ν in it)? If so, that wouldn’t be the right way to think about verbs: non-present forms are not derived from the present (which is often a “weird” form).

(Zooming out from this particular verb: the order of lessons on the verb in a textbook might lead someone to think that the present is the “basic” form, but often that’s not the case, especially verbs having a punctual (rather than durative) meaning: these often have nice simple root aorists, whereas the present is built up as a more complex form with all sorts of suffixes, infixes etc.: see Sihler s. 448.)

Coming back to the verb in question: δάμνημι comes from a disyllabic verb stem δαμα-, tracing back to a root δαμ-. Note there’s no ν in there. You can see how the aorist is formed from the disyllabic verb stem δαμα-. Now the present uses the suffix -νη-/-να- (if you check Sihler s. 454(2), you can see how this is basically a ν infixed into the verb stem before the laryngeal, with subsequent sound changes). That’s why a verb with a pres. δάμνημι can have an aor. δάμασσα, in line with the Cambridge lexicon.

I went off to check the usual references for you on this νη-/-να- suffix, and they actually discuss this very verb which is helpful. Start with Chantraine vol. 1 (a go-to for Homeric morphology) s. 139:

Un autre type de présents athématiques est constitué par les thèmes en -νη- (grec commun -να-) au singulier de l’actif alternant avec -να- au pluriel de l’actif et au moyen … Meillet a montré qu’il s’expliquait par l’insertion d’un suffixe nasale dans > une racine dissyllabique > … > δάμνημι à côté de ἐδάμασσα> , δαμάτωρ …

See (for English) the earlier Monro s. 17 covering the same suffix, with the additional note relevant to your query:

It is to be observed also that Presents in -νημι are often found along with forms in -αζω and -αω : > δάμ-νημι, Attic δαμάζω > …

https://archive.org/details/grammarofhomeric00monruoft/page/18/mode/1up?view=theater

The origin of this suffix in Proto-IE is discussed by Sihler in s. 454(2) (explaining the present form with ν and aorist form without it), and there’s a useful explanation of the potential remote history of δάμνημι itself in s. 453.

I’m not sure why Cunliffe arranges the morphology in a slightly different way to the scholarship set out above, but I hope this shows that the Cambridge lexicon has not made a mistake here.

Lexicographers can err (hence the interest of lots of us on this forum when a new lexicon comes out), but computer parsers often err in my experience. I always think it’s better to dig beneath the surface form and figure out how it’s built, so that you are on more solid foundations, rather than rely on a parser.

Cheers, Chad

3

Hi Chad - Thanks for your reply, that’s very helpful. It’s good to know that this is a somewhat regular formation, which I can try to program into my brain for use with other verbs that follow the pattern.

It may not have been obvious from my post, but none of what I was describing had anything to do with computer parsers. The Perseus treebank was constructed by humans. My script is just accessing that human-constructed treebank. So it does seem to me that Cunliffe and the Perseus folks are at least making a different choice than the Cambridge editors as to how to present/describe this.

I understand that aorist forms are not derived from present forms. However, all three of these dictionary/database editors have chosen to describe these words under two different lemmas. In the case of the dictionaries, I assume that describing them under two different head words is just a user-friendliness choice, so that people who see one form will be able to find it without having to realize that it’s related to some other canonical form.

But what still doesn’t make sense to me at all, and still looks to me like an error, is that Cambridge describes δαμάζω as only having a present and an imperfect, which is the opposite of reality. One could describe it as a verb that only has a present and an imperfect, or one could, as you suggest, say that the verb is δάμνημι and that it has all tenses, of which some look like δαμάζω. But I don’t see any reality in which one could say that δαμάζω has only a present and imperfect; those are the two tenses that don’t look like δαμάζω.

I realize that it’s probably hard to understand what I’m describing in my original post. Here are images of the two entries:

It looks to me like what happened was this. One of the editors decided that the main head-word should be δάμνημι, that this entry should cover both the forms that look like δάμνημι and those that look like δαμάζω, and that δαμάζω should then be only a brief entry that mainly serves as a cross-reference to refer the reader to δάμνημι. All well and good. But then I think someone simply made a mistake in the entry for δαμάζω, and where they should have written “All tenses except for pres. and impf..; for pres. and impf. see δάμνημι,” they instead got the description flipped around.

4

Hi Ben, I’ll give a few more thoughts on this:

The way I read the two Cambridge lexicon entries together is that, put simply, they see δαμάζω as an alternate first principal part for the verb δάμνημι. The other principal parts are ranked under δάμνημι, which is consistent with the Homeric scholarship I cited above. The two entries represent the same verb, just with two variants for the first principal part (the -αζω variant not appearing in Homer however according to Cambridge).

The first principal part given for δάμνημι can’t explain forms such as ὁσσίχον ἐστὶ τὸ τύμμα καὶ ἁλίκον ἄνδρα δαμάζει (Theoc. 4.55): the Cambridge lexicon is basically saying that there an alternative first principal part in -αζω from which pres. and imperf. forms can be formed.

Searches through Homer (as per your first post above) are not going to help you for the Cambridge lexicon’s δαμάζω entry. Check out the author abbreviations in the δαμάζω: none of them are Homer. Cambridge only refer to Hom. in the δάμνημι entry.

Cheers, Chad

5

Hi Chad - Interesting to see that Theocritus does use the form δαμάζει. Thanks for pointing that out.

Sorry, but I can’t make sense of the rest of your most recent post, however.

6

Hi Ben, ah OK, apologies for being unclear.

If you want to check out other examples of the first principal part δαμάζω used to form the present and imperfect in other authors beyond Theocritus, check out the authors mentioned in the δαμάζω entry. Let me give a few examples from a quick TLG search:

Xen. Mem. 4.3.10: πάντες δὲ τιθασεύοντες καὶ δαμάζοντες τὰ χρήσιμα τῶν ζῴων εἴς τε πόλεμον καὶ εἰς ἄλλα πολλὰ συνεργοῖς χρῶνται.
E. Alc. 980–81: καὶ τὸν ἐν Χαλύβοις δαμά-/ζεις σὺ βίᾳ σίδαρον,
E. Her. 374: ἱππείαις ἐδάμαζον
Plut. Philopoemen 9.9.4: τὰ δὲ στάδια πώλων δαμαζομένων
Hes. Th. 865: οὔρεος ἐν βήσσῃσι δαμαζόμενος πυρὶ κηλέῳ
etc.

Notice that:
(1) these are the same authors as are cited in the Cambridge lexicon δαμάζω entry,
(2) they are all present/imperfect, and
(3) they are all clearly formed from the first principal part δαμάζω, rather than δάμνημι.

(That’s why I simply don’t get what you mean when you say above “But I don’t see any reality in which one could say that δαμάζω has only a present and imperfect; those are the two tenses that don’t look like δαμάζω.” Check out the quotes above: they do look like they come from δαμάζω rather than δάμνημι, and that’s what the Cambridge lexicon is saying).

You quote Homeric sources in your original post, but this I think is what might be leading to difficulty: the Cambridge lexicon entry for δαμάζω does not refer to Hom. anywhere, and I’ve just confirmed this with a TLG search: can’t find any hits in Homer for δαμαζ-. The authors who come up for δαμαζ- are those cited by Cambridge under the δαμάζω entry (and other later authors falling outside the ambit of the lexicon’s chosen canon).

For all other forms of this verb, the Cambridge lexicon puts them under the δάμνημι entry, and I don’t see any error in this (it’s consistent with the scholarship that I cited above).

That was the gist of what I what I was saying; I’ll leave it there. Perhaps if you have further queries on this, worth discussing with the Cambridge lexicon team?

Cheers, Chad

7

The issue with Perseus is just that Perseus’ parsing is following LSJ, which categorizes every ambiguous form under δαμάζω rather than δάμνημι.

The actual facts are clear: Homer never uses δαμάζω but only δάμνημι (or δαμνάω) for present stem, so the δαμάζω of later Greek is likely an analogical derivation from the first aorist ἐδάμασ(σ)α already used by Homer (if LSJ’s quotations are representative, Homer exclusively uses first aorist for active and middle but second aorist for passive). The choice of a headword is just LSJ’s Attic bias vs. Cambridge’s Homeric bias.