πατήρ long alpha?

Greek Learning Greek
1

I’m a bit out of practice. Is the alpha in the root of πατήρ long? And for the other cases, long also?

Thanks in advance

2

Duplicative post deleted.

3

Welcoome back!

No, the alpha in πατηρ (including other cases) isn’t long. If it had originally been long, it would have changed to η in Attic-Ionic, as did the previous long alpha in μητηρ.

Here’s how long and short alphas (and iotas and upsilons) are indicated in the on-line version of LSJ:

κυ^να_γός

The upsilon is short; the alpha is long.

Sometimes the vowel quantities are shown in brackets.

λύω , poet. imper.
A.“λῦθι” Pi.Fr.85: fut. λύσω > [υ_] > Il.1.29, etc.: aor. “ἔλυ_σα” 18.244, etc.: pf. “λέλυ^κα” Th.7.18, Ar.V.992 (ἀπο-), etc.:— Pass., pf. “λέλυ^μαι” Il.8.103, etc.: plpf. ἐλελύμην > [υ^] > Od.22.186, etc.: aor. ἐλύθην, Ep. λύθην > [υ^] > 8.360, E.Hel.860, Th.2.103, etc.: fut. “λυ^θήσομαι” Pl.Ti.41b, Isoc.12.116, etc., also λελύσομαι > [υ_] > D.14.2, X. Cyr.6.2.37 (ἀπο-): Ep. aor. Pass. λύμην > [υ^]

Hope this helps.

4

Yes, very helpful, thanks!

I’m sure you’re correct, but I’m surprised. Why doesn’t Mastronarde indicate it on his paradigms? He does indicate short for the accusative endings.

http://socrates.berkeley.edu/~ancgreek/paradigmsU/paradigms_U.html

And Smyth doesn’t indicate it either in Section 262.

http://www.textkit.com/learn/ID/142/author_id/63/

How is one supposed to tell? Mastronarde thinks that the acc. ending alpha needs to be indicated as short, but not the root alpha? Why is that?

Thanks!

I just noticed I put this in the wrong forum. Maybe Jeff or somebody can move it? Sorry about that!

5

I think the roots are unmarked in the paradigms because Smyth and Mastronarde are focusing on the inflectional endings. You can always look the word up in a good dictionary to determine the quantity of the root vowel.

If you encounter an alpha in Attic Greek, it will nearly always be short unless it occurs after ε, ι, or ρ.

If you’re reading verse (especially hexameter), you can often figure out vowel quantities from the meter.

Otherwise, in my experience you’ll be right substantially more than 50% of the time if you assume that an α, ι or υ is short. This doesn’t work for Latin, however, which has a higher proportion of long vowels than Greek.

There are some words where the quantity of an α, ι or υ is unknown and can’t be determined–where the vowel is followed by two consonants and the quantity is otherwise unknown (this is sometimes referred to as “hidden quantity”).

6

My Latin teacher taught us the mnemonic (learnt from his Latin teacher): mother is long (i.e. tall), father is short (māter ~ păter). The quantities are the same in Greek (and, mutatis mutandis, in Sanskrit, as well). (In Finnish people are, for some curious reason, said to be long, not tall.)