Does the content of the oath/wish have to be in a negative tone or there are examples where
it’s positive?
Interesting that τοισίδ’ actually refers backwards to the previous sentence, rather than to a following
statement as usual. It does seem to function as indirect object of ὅρκιον.
I was wondering why it was necessary in the second answer in form of an oath to include
two words for foot. Apparently it’s a common phrase in Euripides.
Well, not always but curses are indeed included under this category. (Smyth 1814b)
Nate,
RE: “negative tone” and “two words for foot” I don’t know the answers .
Here is a more complex sample with a future optative in the apodosis:
Aesch. Septem contra Thebas 550-552
{Ετ.} εἰ γὰρ τύχοιεν ὧν φρονοῦσι πρὸς θεῶν,
αὐτοῖς ἐκείνοις ἀνοσίοις κομπάσμασιν·
ἦ τἂν πανώλεις παγκάκως τ’ ὀλοίατο.
H. W. Smyth trans.
Eteocles
[550] If only they would get from the gods what they wish for,
because of those unholy boasts of theirs,
then surely they would perish in utter ruin and misery.
protasis εἰ … τύχοιεν
apodosis τἂν … ὀλοίατο
future optative ὀλοίατο
C. Stirling Bartholomew
What is the reason of using future optative here? I’ve read in Smyth that fut. opt. in
conditional sentences is suspicious but I cannot find the section at the moment.
Future optative was only used in indirect discourse to represent future indicative. (Smyth 1862)
Nate,
Future optative appears to be a strange thing. This isn’t indirect discourse, it is dialogue. No one is being quoted. Cooper says that the future optative “shows the natural temporal sphere of the realization of a wish.” (v3 2:54.11.0.B p2444). This a bit troublesome since there isn’t supposed to be any temporal element in the non-indicitive moods, according to the present terminology non-indicitive finite verbs are “aspect only.” And to make things worse, the future isn’t considered an aspect by the most vocal aspectologists. So what is a future optative? Anyone want to venture out into unknown territory?
C. Stirling Bartholomew
Why do you say ὀλοίατο is future optative? It looks aorist to me.
Interesting. Smyth does state in the section I quoted in my last post that the future optative in indirect
discourse (after secondary tenses) retains its tense as it stands for the indicative. So a future optative
after an aor. ind. verb of saying/thinking would mean that relative to the ind., it occurred afterwards.
I have a question regarding the morphology of this future optative. ὄλλυμι is the present ind. act., from
ὀλ-νυ-μι. The pres. ind. mid. is ὄλλυμαι The future ind. mid. is ὀλοῦμαι (ὀλέ-(σ)-ο-μαι). (LSJ)
Doing a morphological search via Diogenes in the TLG yields these results:
ὀλοίμαν/ὀλοίμην fut. opt. mid. 1st sg.
ὀλοίμεθα fut. opt. mid. 1st pl.
but
ὀλοίατο fut. opt. mid. 3rd pl.
Where did the alpha come from? 3rd pl. supposed to be ὀλέ-(σ)-οι-ντ-ο » ὄλοιντο (recessive
accent for some reason) and Perseus does find it to be the fut. opt. mid. 3rd pl. as well.
The morpholigcal search also found it to be aor. opt. mid. but in the Epic and Ionic dialect.
Again, 2nd aorist mid. according to Smyth is -ωλόμην with part. ὀλόμενος.
2nd aor. opt. mid. 3rd pl. then would be ὄλοιντο as above.
The morpholigcal search also found it to be aor. opt. mid. but in the Epic and Ionic dialect.
Again, 2nd aorist mid. according to Smyth is -ωλόμην with part. ὀλόμενος.
2nd aor. opt. mid. 3rd pl. then would be ὄλοιντο as above.
Yes, epic forms are common in tragedy. Homer often has -οίατο for -οιντο. (I think because the nu was syllabic in PIE, so it can have different reflexes in different environments.) ὀλοίατο here is definitely aorist optative, not future.
Thanks, Damoetas. I wasn’t aware of this ending. Smyth notes in 465f it
was still being used in prose until 400B.C.
This commentary suggests reading line 551 after 552, that if they got from the gods
what they wished for us, they would utterly perish with (dative) their unholy boasting.
It seems to strengthen the apodosis better, rendering their boasting useless should the gods will it.
I’ve found this sentence in p.43 of Syntax of the moods and tenses of the Greek verb (1890).
Smyth calls this construction – εἰ + fut.ind. » fut.ind. – the emotional future condition (§2328).
Here it is indirect speech dependent on secondary tense verb so both protasis and apodosis
are turned into fut.opt., but we often find the original ind. instead.
εἰ δέ τινα φεύγοντα λήψοιτο,
προηγόρευεν ὅτι ὡς πολεμίῳ χρήσοιτο.
but he declared that if he caught any one trying to get away,
he should treat him as an enemy. (Walter Miller, 1914)
Nate,
I have read this post several times. The first sentence stumps me since I can’t figure out what the referent is of the demonstrative pronoun “this sentence” what/which sentence?
I probably should have written “the following quote from Xen. Cyrop. 3.1.3”. My apologies.
[/quote]
I probably should have written “the following quote from Xen. Cyrop. 3.1.3”. My apologies.[/quote]
Nate,
I thought perhaps that was what you meant but I couldn’t find the quote on the linked page.
My problem, not yours. Been a horrible week, my mind is wasted.
thanks,
CSB
I hope it gets better. Didn’t have an overly cheerful week myself.
The quote from Xen. is in section 128 at the bottom of the page.
Another rather complex example from Plato’s Apology 29b-c with future optative in protasis (ἂν is
in parenthesis and is ignored by most translations) but future indicative intact in the apodosis. It’s
dependent on secondary tense saying verb ἔφη (or I guess you could also say the participle λέγων
stands for the imperfect). The passage deals with the possible, already expected outcome of
his trial, a death sentence, and how he feels about it. I’ll add my humble attempt at translating it:
πρὸ οὖν τῶν κακῶν ὧν οἶδα ὅτι κακά ἐστιν, ἃ μὴ οἶδα εἰ καὶ ἀγαθὰ ὄντα τυγχάνει
οὐδέποτε φοβήσομαι οὐδὲ φεύξομαι· ὥστε οὐδ᾽* εἴ με νῦν ὑμεῖς ἀφίετε Ἀνύτῳ ἀπιστήσαντες,
ὃς ἔφη ἢ τὴν ἀρχὴν οὐ δεῖν ἐμὲ δεῦρο εἰσελθεῖν ἤ, ἐπειδὴ εἰσῆλθον, οὐχ οἷόν τ᾽ εἶναι τὸ
μὴ ἀποκτεῖναί με, λέγων πρὸς ὑμᾶς ὡς εἰ διαφευξοίμην ἤδη [ἂν] ὑμῶν οἱ ὑεῖς
ἐπιτηδεύοντες ἃ Σωκράτης διδάσκει πάντες παντάπασι διαφθαρήσονται,…
So, in preference to evils which I know are bad, that which I do not know whether
it even happens to be good I neither fear nor flee. Consequently (I shall not cease
from my conduct) even if you acquit me now because you disbelieve Anytus, who
said that either I shouldn’t have come here in the first place, or that once I did, it wouldn’t
be possible to avoid killing me, by telling you that if I survived now, all your
children would be utterly corrupted in pursuing Socrates’ teaching,…
I am tempted to read the second part of the second line below as a conditional statement even though the syntax isn’t what you would probably find in a grammar under conditional statements.
Aesch. Agamemnon 542-543
{Χο.} τερπνῆς ἄρ’ ἦστε τῆσδ’ ἐπήβολοι νόσου,
{Κη.} πῶς δή; διδαχθεὶς τοῦδε δεσπόσω λόγου.
“How so? If it is explained to me, then I will understand this statement.”
Conditional statements can appear in a wide variety of “surface structures.”
H. W. Smyth’s trans. “How so? Teach me, and I shall master what you say.”
But their is no command to teach, and the agent of instruction is only vaguely inferred
placed completely in the discourse background by the passive participle διδαχθεὶς.
Smyth’s rendering attracts too much attention to the notion of agency.
C. Stirling Bartholomew
Interesting. I know some Greek passive constructions are often rendered into active ones
in English but I’m not sure whether this is one of them.
There is Robert Browning translation (1889) which not only retains the passive meaning of the
participle, but also its antecedent aspect:
How now? instructed, I this speech shall master.
This commentary by T.W. Peile (1844) suggests two possible readings (placing in both the interrogative
mark at the end of the line) that I don’t quite understand. (It’s section/line 524 in this edition.)
Might be of interest to you and others.
Nate,
What difference would ἂν make in the translation?
CSB
Nate,
The chorus leader has propounded a riddle and the response is in two parts, an interrogative πῶς δή; “How so?” and a statement with a condition "if instructed I will understand ." The translation could put these together as “How will I understand without at teacher?” see Acts and the Ethiopian ὁ δὲ εἶπεν· πῶς γὰρ ἂν δυναίμην ἐὰν μή τις ὁδηγήσει με;
Never the less, the surface structure doesn’t contain all of these elements and editors placed a stop after πῶς δή;. That which is inferred but not present explicitly is made explicit in the translation. This is unavoidable in Attic Tragedy.
CSB