Demosthenes: On the Crown

Greek Learning Greek
1

πρῶτον μέν, ὦ ἄνδρες Ἀθηναῖοι, τοῖς θεοῖς εὔχομαι πᾶσι καὶ πάσαις, ὅσην εὔνοιαν ἔχων ἐγὼ διατελῶ τῇ τε πόλει καὶ πᾶσιν ὑμῖν, τοσαύτην ὑπάρξαι μοι παρ’ ὑμῶν εἰς τουτονὶ τὸν ἀγῶνα, ἔπειθ’ ὅπερ ἐστὶ μάλισθ’ ὑπὲρ ὑμῶν καὶ τῆς ὑμετέρας εὐσεβείας τε καὶ δόξης, τοῦτο παραστῆσαι τοὺς θεοὺς ὑμῖν, μὴ τὸν ἀντίδικον σύμβουλον ποιήσασθαι περὶ τοῦ πῶς ἀκούειν ὑμᾶς ἐμοῦ δεῖ (̔σχέτλιον γὰρ ἂν εἴη τοῦτό γἐ,) ἀλλὰ τοὺς νόμους καὶ τὸν ὅρκον

The bolded bit is pretty weird. I’ve never seen anything like it. Seems to involve quite a lot of hyperbaton. I’m guessing the basic word order was something like this:

περὶ τοῦ πῶς ὑμᾶς δεῖ ἀκούειν ἐμοῦ

2

Yes, that’s right: “concerning how you ought to listen to me.” I wouldn’t really call that hyperbaton; nothing is removed very far from the thing it modifies. It’s just that πῶς ἀκούειν is fronted a little bit, as these are the most salient words in this part of the sentence.