τῶν τις

Greek Learning Greek
1

Herodotus 1.185.2:
πρῶτα μὲν τὸν Εὐφρήτην ποταμὸν ῥέοντα πρότερον ἰθύν, ὅς σφι διὰ τῆς πόλιος μέσης ῥέει, τοῦτον ἄνωθεν διώρυχας ὀρύξασα οὕτω δή τι ἐποίησε σκολιὸν ὥστε δὴ τρὶς ἐς τῶν τινα κωμέων τῶν ἐν τῇ Ἀσσυρίῃ ἀπικνέεται ῥέων.

What disturbs me is this sandwiching τις between the article and the noun, which I had already encountered before twice or thrice in Herodotus in τῶν τις Λυδών. I don’t remember seeing this in Greek before. Is this a Ionicism, a mannerism of Herodotus’ or something that I’ve just missed until now?

2

Ionic, apparently. See Smyth 1155:

[*] 1154. A word or group of words standing between the article and its noun, or immediately after the article if the noun, with or without the article, precedes, is an attributive. Thus, ὁ σοφὸς ἀνήρ, ὁ ἀνὴρ ὁ σοφός, or ἀνὴρ ὁ σοφός (cp. 1168).

[*] 1155. This holds true except in the case of such post-positive words as μέν, δέ, γέ, τέ, γάρ, δή, οἶμαι, οὖν, τοίνυν; > and τὶς in Hdt.: τῶν τις Περσέων one of the Persians 1. 85. In Attic, τὶς intervenes only when an attributive follows the article> : ““τῶν βαρβάρων τινὲς ἱππέων” some of the barbarian cavalry” X. A. 2.5.32.

3

Thanks!

4

hi, you also see the same thing in aristotle, to designate an individual rather than a species - except here, unlike the herod e.g.s, it agrees in case with the art and noun because it’s attributive - eg categories 1b:

τῶν ὄντων τὰ μὲν καθ’ ὑποκειμένου τινὸς λέγεται, ἐν ὑποκειμένῳ δὲ οὐδενί ἐστιν, οἷον ἄνθρωπος καθ’ ὑποκειμένου μὲν λέγεται τοῦ τινὸς ἀνθρώπου, ἐν ὑποκειμένῳ δὲ οὐδενί ἐστιν· τὰ δὲ ἐν ὑποκειμένῳ μέν ἐστι, καθ’ ὑποκειμένου δὲ οὐδενὸς λέγεται, ἐν ὑποκειμένῳ δὲ λέγω ὃ ἔν τινι μὴ ὡς μέρος ὑπάρχον ἀδύνατον χωρὶς εἶναι τοῦ ἐν ὧ ἐστίν, οἷον ἡ τὶς γραμματικὴ ἐν ὑποκειμένῳ μέν ἐστι τῇ ψυχῇ, καθ’ ὑποκειμένου δὲ οὐδενὸς λέγεται, καὶ τὸ τὶ λευκὸν ἐν ὑποκειμένῳ μέν ἐστι τῶ σώματι, ἅπαν γὰρ χρῶμα ἐν σώματι, καθ’ ὑποκειμένου δὲ οὐδενὸς λέγεται· τὰ δὲ καθ’ ὑποκειμένου τε λέγεται καὶ ἐν ὑποκειμένῳ ἐστίν, οἷον ἡ ἐπιστήμη ἐν ὑποκειμένῳ μέν ἐστι τῇ ψυχῇ, καθ’ ὑποκειμένου δὲ λέγεται τῆς γραμματικῆς· τὰ δὲ οὔτε ἐν ὑποκειμένῳ ἐστὶν οὔτε καθ’ ὑποκειμένου λέγεται, οἷον ὁ τὶς ἄνθρωπος ἢ ὁ τὶς ἵππος, οὐδὲν γὰρ τῶν τοιούτων οὔτε ἐν ὑποκειμένῳ ἐστὶν οὔτε καθ’ ὑποκειμένου λέγεται· ἁπλῶς δὲ τὰ ἄτομα καὶ ἓν ἀριθμῶ κατ’ οὐδενὸς ὑποκειμένου λέγεται, ἐν ὑποκειμένῳ δὲ ἔνια οὐδὲν κωλύει εἶναι· ἡ γὰρ τὶς γραμματικὴ τῶν ἐν ὑποκειμένῳ ἐστίν.

5

I might be wrong about this, as I don’t understand very well Aristotle’s technical writing here, but is seems to me that this is bit different. The way I see it, this belongs to the ability of Greek to turn anything into a noun by putting an article before it. Like starting with τὶ λευκὸν “something/somewhat white”, creating the concept τὸ τὶ λευκὸν “the abstract idea of whiteness”, or something like that.

6

There seem to be at least three different idioms. Aristotle’s which Cooper[1] calls a “philosophical sense” where τις functions as an attributive adjective meaning “individual” or “particular”.

The idiom in Herodotus[2] where τις occurs after the article followed by the partitive genitive is distinguished from Attic. In Herodotus τις can stand alone between the article and the genitive. In Attic there must be another modifier with τις.[3]

[1] Attic Syntaxv v1 p548, 1:51.16.0.f
[2] Syntax, v3, p2039, 2:47.9.8.i
[3] Attic Syntax, v1 p199, 1:47.9.20

7

I suppose what the phenomenon shows is that for Herodotus the των+noun combination cohered less closely than in Attic and later Greek. Which doesn’t seem too surprising, consistent as it is with the historical shift in use from pronoun to article. ἐς τῶν τινα κωμέων is a little more notable than τῶν τις Περσέων on account of the preposition—not strong enough (unlike τῶν) to support the enclitic on its own. (The Aristotelian use is of course a red herring.)

8

hi, sorry didn’t mean to derail the conversation with a red herring with the aristotle e.g. - was just giving a different e.g. of definite + indefinite + noun (even though it is a different usage altogether because it doesn’t stand alone but is attributive as i mentioned). i found it weird when i first read it and this post reminded me of it.

in addition to what mwh says below there seems to be something else going on in these herod e.g.s which is bizarre for me. i’m used to the standard word order (using Dover’s terminology):

P, connective Q’s, M, non-connective Q’s …

so if you take this quote from plato protag 310C, you’d divide it up as:

ὁ // γάρ τοι // παῖς // με …

normally indefinite pronouns are non-connective Q’s. so in the quote above an indefinite would belong in the 4th slot with με.

what’s bizarre about the first few indefinites that I looked up in herodotus in light of this post is the indefinites instead seem to be living - at least some of the time, in the CONNECTIVE Q’s slot, ie in the 2nd slot above with γάρ τοι , BEFORE the M παῖς rather than after it.

eg i looked up the τῶν τις Λυδῶν e.g. mentioned in paul’s first post above. look where the indefinite is (normally I’d expect it after the M Λυδῶν, not merely because the article and noun should cohere but also because the non-connective Q should belong after the M, not before it:

71.2 παρασκευαζομένου δὲ Κροίσου στρατεύεσθαι ἐπὶ Πέρσας, τῶν τις Λυδῶν νομιζόμενος καὶ πρόσθε εἶναι σοφός, ἀπὸ δὲ ταύτης τῆς γνώμης καὶ τὸ κάρτα οὔνομα ἐν Λυδοῖσι ἔχων, συνεβούλευσε Κροίσῳ τάδε· οὔνομά οἱ ἦν Σάνδανις.

τις seems to turn up in the same place in other hits in book 1 of herod, eg:

187.2: "τῶν τις ἐμεῦ ὕστερον γινομένων Βαβυλῶνος βασιλέων ἢν σπανίσῃ χρημάτων

when i searched through other hits though in book 1, i couldn’t see a clear simple pattern emerging. e.g. in clauses beginning εἰ there seems to be a different pattern…

and so i wonder if what’s behind this is, not just that the indefinite can slip into the art plus noun combo in herod - ie that the coherence is not as strong as in attic - but that something else is also going on with the word order position generally of the indefinite pronoun in herod. just a thought, i haven’t really dug into it. cheers, chad