Hello all. I wish to ask for some input/guidance on a particular matter. I am still ploughing ahead with the Cambridge JACT series for learning Greek. I know others have suggested getting a new edition of the work but that is a matter of money, etc. Shall continue for now, anyway. I am glad to have text to accompany the grammar.
I am slowing but not quitting. My question is about a verb form in Section 5-F, namely: a future indicative middle form
:
ολοφυρεισθε (first ‘o’ has no breathing and the iota has a circonflex, can’t find diacritical marks easily). This form appears in the 5th last line of the text for 5-F.
I am trying to see this form as follows: The stem ends in rho (that might be already wrong). But with the stem ending in rho, one will lengthen the following vowel, which is eta. This becomes ‘ei.’ I got what I think is relevant information from grammar paragraphs 12 and 24 in the JACT grammar.
I am thinking now that I don’t actually know the stem for this verb. I don’t know how to incorporate the ‘sigma’ which is usually the suffix added to the stem, to give a future form.
And I just checked an online dictionary and found this future form, 3rd person pl.: ὀλοφυροῦνται
I’m starting to think I am lost. The ‘rho’ has to be involved somehow. I am going to send this post, in good faith. If anyone sees a way to help me sort this out, thank you in advance! One thing, among others, is I will review how (what I call here) the contract verbs affect the different verb forms so much. My apologies for not being sure about my trouble. One can see JACT grammar point 63 for the possible information about ‘rho.’
EDIT: the title I gave may be 100 percent wrong. I cannot edit the title.
The future of ὀλοφύρομαι is ὀλοφυροῦμαι. The sigma which characteristically marks the future has been swallowed up through a series of sound changes: -έσομαι ⟩ -έομαι ⟩ -οῦμαι. As you can see, the -ε- added inbetween the -ρ- (a liquid) and the tense-marking -σ- served to obviate the phonologically awkward -ρσ-; and -εσο- was finally reduced to -ου-. This is all quite regular.
Most people learn Greek without knowing this sort of stuff, but it’s helpful if you’re interested in the development of the language.
I’m glad you’re using the JACT books. They’re very good.
If you look at the third column of the vocabulary on page 70 you will see
" ὀλοφυρ-εῖσθε = 2nd pl. fut. (contr.) of ὀλοφύρ-ομαι" So that should have cleared up any confusion.
How contract verbs form the future is explained on page 66 (iii).
As far as I can see the explanation offered by Michael is not in the edition you are using. In the second edition it does talk about futures without σ but only refers to the stems ending in λ, μ, ν, ρ and doesn’t explain how the σ was lost. My students were interested why and I explained as best I could.
Verbs ending in -ιζω also form the future in this way. this is well explained in the second edition.
I understand why you are carrying on with the first but the second edition is a substantial improvement on the first. I will send you a pm.
Sigma does tend to get swallowed up. We see this especially in futures (-σω) and in weak aorists (-σα), but only under certain phonological conditions (i.e. in accordance with “rules”).
(1) An s sound is phonetically problematic after liquid and nasal consonants (λ, ρ and μ, ν, in Greek). So φαίνω, for example, does not form future φαίνσω or φάνσω (the stem is actually φαν- not φαιν-); instead it inserts an -ε- between the ν and the σ and then drops the sigma: φανέσω ⟩ φανέω ⟩ φανῶ (like ποιέω ⟩ ποιῶ), cf. μαχόμαι fut. μαχέσομαι ⟩ μαχοῦμαι. And the aorist eliminates the -σ- in ἔφηνσα and becomes simply ἔφηνα.
(2) νομίζω could form future νομίσω (reduced from -ίζσω) but drops the -σ- and compensates for the loss by becoming -ιέω ⟩ -ιῶ (again cf. ποιέω ⟩ ποιῶ). This is the so-called “Attic future” (though it’s not exclusively Attic).
So what look like weird exceptions and irregularities actually reflect normal morphological behaviour. There’s no need to master all this if it’s too complicated, but it does help make sense of things.
I should have said I no longer have the JACT books, so I can’t refer to them. So thanks to seneca for giving appropriate page refs.
@mwh - Your comments here concerning σ are really helpful to me
I’ve been working through the Cambridge Grammar of Classical Greek, and while the sections on historical developments of vowels and consantants in chapter 1 of CGCG has made it much easier for me to understand things like 3rd declension noun endings, the coverage in CGCG is sometimes too concise for me to understand why certain vowel/consonant changes occurred in classical Greek.
So please keep your insights flowing in this area!
Thanks Mitch. I’m sorry to say I don’t have CGCG, but I have used it and admire it, so very refreshing after the indigestible Smyth.
I’m mainly interested in Greek and Latin literature, but of course the workings of the languages are interesting in themselves, though I’m no expert there.
