Here is a review problem from Louise Pratt’s Eros at the Banquet, p.281.
ἡγοῦμαι Σωκράτη ἐρωτικώτατον φιλοσόφων τότ’εἶναι.
Trial translation: I think Socrates was the most amorous of philosophers in that era.
Aren’t the main verb (ἡγοῦμαι) and the infinitive (ειναι) in present tense? I read this as an instance of the present infinitive having imperfect force in indirect statement, due to the adverb τότε, which I translated “in that era.”
(If you have Mastronarde, see page 168.)
“… an imperfect indicative in a direct statement becomes a present infinitive in an indirect statement.”
In this case, the imperfect indicative in the direct statement would be ἦν, and would be transformed to εἶναι.
The τότε helps preserve the original imperfect tense.
Many thanks for firming up my guesswork, katalogon!
I want to point out a distinction between tense and aspect in this example.
Aren’t the main verb (ἡγοῦμαι) and the infinitive (ειναι) in present tense?
The finite verb, ἡγοῦμαι, is in the present tense, yes.
The infinitive, εἶναι, should not be said to be in the present tense, however.
It is an infinitive formed from the present stem and thus has present-stem aspect.
The finite verb, ἦν, in the direct statement, is in the imperfect tense, and also has present-stem aspect.
The essence of a direct-to-indirect statement transformation is that the resulting infinitive in the indirect statement must have the same tense-stem (and voice) as the finite verb in the direct statement.
Thus ἦν → εἶναι preserves the present-stem aspect.
Also,
ἐστί(ν) → εἶναι would preserve the present-stem aspect.
But important not to think of εἶναι as having either present or imperfect tense.
My understanding, and I think Goodwin makes this point, is that εἶναι has tense in indirect discourse but (only) aspect elsewhere.
To say “he wishes he will be”, all that matters is aspect: βούλεται εἶναι, even though it’s a future statement.
But to say or think “he says he will be”, you need the future infinitive, φησὶν ἔσεσθαι. The tense is what matters, with the present and perfect infinitives doing double duty for imperfect and pluperfect.
With the infinitive, however used, the aspectual force applies whether it be in the prolative use, in an indirect command or an indirect statement.
He’s using highly non-traditional terminology. He defines future as predictive aspect instead of tense, and aorist as stative aspect. What he seems to call tense in that article is the division into primary (present, future, perfect) and secondary (imperfect, aorist, pluperfect). He calls these “present” and “past”.
Okay. There is sense to this and especially sense in pointing readers to Abbott and Mansfield’s nice presentation.
Still, his quoted statement does not come to grips with or illustrate the central division of Greek infinitive use: in Greek, dependent infinitives show up almost exclusively as aorist or present, denoting completed or uncompleted state, with context determining time elements. In contrast, indirect speech infinitives take the whole range, and always reflect the tense (traditional) of direct speech instead of the aorist/present that you see in dependent use.