Hdt 3.14

Greek Learning Greek
1

Hi!

I have a question about Herodotus 3.14, and it’s where Psammenitus is watching his daughter go into slavery. The words which puzzled me are the following (underlined):

στείλας αὐτοῦ τὴν θυγατέρα ἐσθῆτι δουληίῃ ἐξέπεμπε ἐπ᾽ ὕδωρ ἔχουσαν ὑδρήιον, συνέπεμπε δὲ καὶ ἄλλας παρθένους ἀπολέξας ἀνδρῶν τῶν πρώτων, ὁμοίως ἐσταλμένας > τῇ τοῦ βασιλέος> .

The translation says:

”He dressed the daughter of the king as a slave and sent her out with a pitcher to fetch water, together with other girls from the families of the leading men, dressed like the daughter of the king.”

What puzzled me must have been the omission of ”daughter" in the greek text. I don’t know how to infer that from the context, but probably I missed the clue in the word ”ὁμοίως”. Anyway, I found the idiom of leaving out ”daughter” confusing. My question is: how are you supposed to know that τῇ refers to the king´s daughter.

2

In Homer, what was to become the article in Attic mostly functions as a demonstrative. In Herodotus, you see both the article and the demonstrative usage.

τῇ τοῦ βασιλέος is basically demonstrative ἐκείνῃ. But that τοῦ βασιλέος following may betray some influence from the article usage. You could almost imagine a θυγατέρι at the end, right?

3

The clue is in the feminine singular article τῇ. “Dressed like the ‘feminine singular one’ of the King.” To whom else can it refer in the context?

4

Thanks for the replies!

jeidsath: Yes.

Barry Hofstetter: That’s true.