ἔοικα γοῦν τούτου γε σμικρῷ τινι αὐτῷ τούτῳ σοφώτερος εἶναι,
ὅτι ἃ μὴ οἶδα οὐδὲ οἴομαι εἰδέναι.
I’m going back a bit before continuing, and I wanted to ask why the negation in the relative clause is μή.
If it were a definite participle, i would know that it represents a general condition in place of subjunctive + ἄν,
that is, “that which i do not know (if in general i do not know something), i am (always) not even thinking that i do”.
But here it is indicative, and not after an indefinite relative pronoun (ἅτινα), so we can’t say that this is what
dictated the negation choice.
My commentary says that it is by attraction to the infinitive, but – and please correct me if I’m wrong –
doesn’t an infinitive in indirect speech retain the original negation of οὐ (assuming it was a ‘regular’ indicative of course)?
If I say:
ἔφη· “οὐκ οἶδα τί λέγω” » he/she said: “I do not know what I should say.”
it’ll become in indirect speech:
οὐκ ἔφη εἰδέναι τί/ὅτι λέγῃ/λέγοι » he/she said that he/she did not know what he/she should say.
Thanks.