# Thucydides: 3.37

**URL:** <https://www.textkit.com/t/thucydides-3-37/30780>\
**Category:** Specific Text Questions\
**Created:** [July 15, 2025, 2:11pm UTC](https://www.textkit.com/t/thucydides-3-37/30780 "2025-07-15T14:11:50Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
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**Author:** ![simonb](https://www.textkit.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/s/e19b73/32.png) [@simonb](https://www.textkit.com/u/simonb)\
**Post date:** [July 15, 2025, 2:11pm UTC](https://www.textkit.com/t/thucydides-3-37/30780/1 "2025-07-15T14:11:50Z")

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… μηδὲ γνωσόμεθα ὅτι χείροσι νόμοις ἀκινήτοις χρωμένη πόλις κρείσσων ἐστὶν ἢ καλῶς ἔχουσιν ἀκύροις.

I am stuck but perhaps not on ‘καλῶς ἔχουσιν ἀκύροις’. I understand the sentence and can translate it but I am having a hard time explaining the last three words so I am kind of fudging it in my head but the meaning seems clear:

[and] if we do not recognize that a city-state making use of inferior but inviolable laws is stronger than a city-state with good but powerless laws.

I am taking ‘καλῶς ἔχουσιν’ together, with ‘ἔχουσιν’ as a dative plural + adverb; and dative because it is a comparative clause that refers back to ‘νόμοις … χρωμένη’. So then I have this in my head …

“ἢ [νόμοις] καλῶς ἔχουσιν ἀκύροις”  
“than a city making use of laws doing well but powerless”

Does this compute? Make sense? Or am I off my rocker here?  
I think what is throwing me a little is my commitment to translating “καλῶς ἔχουσιν” as to actually mean “with laws that are good”

Thanks!!!

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**Author:** ![truks](https://www.textkit.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/t/e47774/32.png) [@truks](https://www.textkit.com/u/truks)\
**Post date:** [July 15, 2025, 2:55pm UTC](https://www.textkit.com/t/thucydides-3-37/30780/2 "2025-07-15T14:55:47Z")

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ἔχω + an adverb means ‘to be in a certain way or state’ (basically like ‘to be + adj.’ in English). So here, these are laws that _are good_, yet do not hold authority.

See ἔχω in LSJ at sense B.II for this idiom.

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**Author:** ![simonb](https://www.textkit.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/s/e19b73/32.png) [@simonb](https://www.textkit.com/u/simonb)\
**Post date:** [July 15, 2025, 4:33pm UTC](https://www.textkit.com/t/thucydides-3-37/30780/3 "2025-07-15T16:33:28Z")

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So you agree that ‘ἔχουσιν’ is dative plural: thank you!

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**Author:** ![Strepsiades](https://www.textkit.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/s/a88e4f/32.png) [@Strepsiades](https://www.textkit.com/u/Strepsiades)\
**Post date:** [July 17, 2025, 7:46am UTC](https://www.textkit.com/t/thucydides-3-37/30780/4 "2025-07-17T07:46:12Z")

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> Does this compute? Make sense?

Yes, but what’s being compared are two cities. Maybe the sentence is more understandible if we add in a few words which were elided:

μηδὲ γνωσόμεθα ὅτι χείροσι νόμοις ἀκινήτοις χρωμένη πόλις κρείσσων ἐστὶν ἢ καλῶς ἔχουσιν [ἀλλὰ] ἀκύροις [νόμοις] [χρωμένη πόλις.]

“χείροσι νόμοις” and “καλῶς ἔχουσιν [νόμοις]” are both objects of χρωμένη.

a) πολις χρωμένη χείροσι νόμοις ἀκινήτοις  
κρείσσων ἐστὶν ἢ  
b) [πολις χρωμένη] καλῶς ἔχουσιν [ἀλλὰ] ἀκύροις [νόμοις]

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**Author:** ![mwh](https://www.textkit.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/m/6f9a4e/32.png) [@mwh](https://www.textkit.com/u/mwh)\
**Post date:** [July 17, 2025, 12:41pm UTC](https://www.textkit.com/t/thucydides-3-37/30780/5 "2025-07-17T12:41:57Z")

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Yes that’s a useful way to look at it, except I wouldn’t say there’s anything elided. ἀκινήτοις and ἀκύροις are predicative. Without them it would mean “a city with worse laws is better than one with good ones,” but those predicative adjectives make it mean “a city with worse laws that are inflexible is better than one with good ones that have no authority.”

“inviolate” and “invalid” as translations of ἀκινήτοις and ἀκύροις captures something of the word-play.