I have to translate this into English, “οἰ σύμμαχοι, ἐπεὶ εἰς τὴν τῶν ᾿Αθηναίων χώραν ἦλθον, καὶ αὐτοὶ ἐνόσησαν.”
I was wondering if position alone of αὐτοὶ tells me if it goes with σύμμαχοι or ᾿Αθηναίων?
Or do I need to take the second step of deciding who it is who gets sick?
Think about what και means here, Does it just mean “and”?
And think about what is happening. The allies marched into Athenian territory, where the plague was raging. You got that much, didn’t you? What happened to the allies when they entered the plague-ridden territory?
So far I am thinking καί could be translated “even” or “also,” but I could be wrong.
It makes sense that the allies became sick, but it could go the other way. Remember the Black Death?
I was mainly wondering if there was something about the position of the word. It is a very short phrase. I could not tell if it was in the attributive or predicate position.
You need to follow the grammar and pay attention to the cases.
οἰ σύμμαχοι, ἐπεὶ εἰς τὴν τῶν ᾿Αθηναίων χώραν ἦλθον, καὶ αὐτοὶ ἐνόσησαν.
This is another example of where you are trying to guess what the answer is and imagine all sorts of complicated answers and possibilities. Always remember that M. is most often only asking you do to what is simple and obvious. You always have to work out the grammar first! Translation is the last thing to do.
Revise the use of αὐτός on p. 101-2 of M. You will see at the bottom of p.101
“When used in agreement with a noun in any case, or when used in the nominative in agreement with the subject pronoun implied in the personal ending of the verb, it is emphatic or intensive. In this use it must be in predicate position (outside the article-noun group).”
As to the background Hylander’s response is perfectly clear.
Are you happy with how to translate “καί” now?
Is the author saying that if αὐτοί has the same ending as another noun, that it is in predicate position?
Lukas originally wondered whether αυτοι could refer to the Athenians, “and they themselves”.
That’s not a natural reading of the Greek. To express that idea, Greek would use και ουτοι or και ουτοι αυτοι instead of just και αυτοι.
But I think Lukas’ puzzlement was understandable.
The important points:
και is not always a connective equivalent to “and”. It can be adverbial equivalent to “also” or “too”.
In the oblique cases (genitive, dative and accusative), αυτος is used as a simple personal pronoun, but not in the nominative case. In the nominative case, αυτος is an “intensive” pronoun.
Smyth sec. 325d:
. . . To express the personal pronouns of the third person we find usually: ἐκεῖνος, οὗτος, etc., in the nominative . . . , and the oblique forms of αὐτός in all other cases.
Predicate position: outside the article + noun phrase.
What do you do when you do not have a definite article?
In this sentence, you do have a definite article: οἰ σύμμαχοι. αὐτοὶ is not inside the article + noun phrase. That shows that its use here is as an intensifier.
Atrributive position: οἰ αὐτοὶ σύμμαχοι = the same allies
Predicate position: οἰ σύμμαχοι αὐτοὶ = the allies themselves
As I mentioned above, αυτος in the nominative is generally not used as a simple personal pronoun (i.e., he, she it, they).
So if αὐτοὶ in this sentence referred to the Athenians, you would need a pronoun signalling that αὐτοὶ did not refer to the original subject of the sentence, namely, οἰ σύμμαχοι. That would be ουτοι, which could be intensified with αυτοι to make it perfectly clear: i.e., ουτοι αυτοι ενοσησαν. That would mean the Athenians became ill.
But in the absence of ουτοι marking the shift from the original subject, αυτοι refers back to οἰ σύμμαχοι, and και is not to be taken as a coordinating conjunction, “and”, but instead adverbially, “too”.
One other point: you need to understand the rules, but then internalize them, so that you will eventually be able to read without picking each sentence apart. Read the sentence several times thinking about how it fits together, until the way it expresses its meaning becomes natural to you.
I think that it was a good question too. If we didn’t have the ἐπεὶ (and attendant punctuation), but rather:
οἰ σύμμαχοι εἰς τὴν τῶν ᾿Αθηναίων χώραν ἦλθον καὶ αὐτοὶ ἐνόσησαν
I think that this could have indicated a subject shift in the right context, even without οὗτοι. Subjects shift more freely in Greek. Examples:
ἀλλ’ ἄλλοι μενέουσι κάρη κομόωντες Ἀχαιοὶ
εἰς ὅ κέ περ Τροίην διαπέρσομεν. εἰ δὲ καὶ αὐτοὶ
φευγόντων σὺν νηυσὶ φίλην ἐς πατρίδα γαῖαν·
καὶ οἱ τῶν Μήδων δ’ ἱππεῖς ὁρῶντες ταῦτα ἤλαυνον εἰς τοὺς ἱππέας τοὺς τῶν πολεμίων· οἱ δ’ ἐνέκλιναν καὶ αὐτοί.
ἐπειδὴ ὁ λόγος οὕτως αἱρεῖ, μὴ οὐδὲν ἄλλο σκεπτέον ᾖ ἢ ὅπερ νυνδὴ ἐλέγομεν, πότερον δίκαια πράξομεν καὶ χρήματα τελοῦντες τούτοις τοῖς ἐμὲ ἐνθένδε ἐξάξουσιν καὶ χάριτας, καὶ αὐτοὶ ἐξάγοντές τε καὶ ἐξαγόμενοι, ἢ τῇ ἀληθείᾳ ἀδικήσομεν πάντα ταῦτα ποιοῦντες
ἀλλ᾽ ἄλλοι μενέουσι κάρη κομόωντες Ἀχαιοὶ
εἰς ὅ κέ περ Τροίην διαπέρσομεν. εἰ δὲ καὶ αὐτοὶ
φευγόντων σὺν νηυσὶ φίλην ἐς πατρίδα γαῖαν:
νῶϊ δ᾽ ἐγὼ Σθένελός τε μαχησόμεθ᾽ εἰς ὅ κε τέκμωρ
Ἰλίου εὕρωμεν: σὺν γὰρ θεῷ εἰλήλουθμεν.
This is Iliad 9.45 ff. αὐτοὶ does not mark a subject shift here – it refers back to the subject of the previous sentence, namely, κάρη κομόωντες Ἀχαιοὶ! καὶ αὐτοὶ here is emphatic, and αὐτοὶ is not a simple personal pronoun. There’s an anacoluthon or rather an aposiopesis after εἰ δὲ καὶ αὐτοὶ. “But the other Acheans will stay at least until we sack Troy. But if they too . . . then let them flee with their ships to their homeland.”
οἱ δ’ ἐνέκλιναν καὶ αὐτοί. – The subject shift is marked by οἱ δ’, indicating that the subject of ἐνέκλιναν is not οἱ τῶν Μήδων δ’ ἱππεῖς but rather refers to τοὺς ἱππέας τοὺς τῶν πολεμίων. καὶ αὐτοί does not mark the subject shift – it’s predicative to οἱ δ’!
ἐπειδὴ ὁ λόγος οὕτως αἱρεῖ, μὴ οὐδὲν ἄλλο σκεπτέον ᾖ ἢ ὅπερ νυνδὴ ἐλέγομεν, πότερον δίκαια πράξομεν καὶ χρήματα τελοῦντες τούτοις τοῖς ἐμὲ ἐνθένδε ἐξάξουσιν καὶ χάριτας, καὶ αὐτοὶ ἐξάγοντές τε καὶ ἐξαγόμενοι, ἢ τῇ ἀληθείᾳ ἀδικήσομεν πάντα ταῦτα ποιοῦντες
καὶ αὐτοὶ ἐξάγοντές τε καὶ ἐξαγόμενοι, – there’s no a subject shift here: it’s just a parenthetical afterthought that includes those who are ready to assist the escape with the escapee in the subject of δίκαια πράξομεν. Socrates is concerned for their moral well-being, too:
“. . . there’s nothing else to consider other than . . . whether we will be acting justly in granting favors and paying money to those who are ready to assist my escape from here – those who are ready to assist in the escape just as much as those of us who would be escaping – or whether in truth we will be committing injustice if we do all these things.”
Again, καὶ αὐτοὶ is not a subject shift – it’s emphatic and intensive, and the emphasis that the moral issue applies as much to the persons ready to assist in the escape as to the prospective escapee is intensified by the tight connective τε καὶ. There’s a slight disconnect, in that the assistants in the escape would be receiving, not paying, money and favors.
I’m sorry, but it isn’t helpful to the OP to cite examples that are not pertinent and in fact actually illustrate the opposite point.
Joel’s rather unnatural made-up sentence, οἰ σύμμαχοι εἰς τὴν τῶν ᾿Αθηναίων χώραν ἦλθον καὶ αὐτοὶ ἐνόσησαν, could only mean “The allies came into the land of the Athenians and fell sick themselves.” καὶ there would have to mean “and”, coordinating the two verbs, and there could be no change of subject. Subject shifts in Greek are regularly marked (οἱ δὲ often performs this function, as in Joel’s second quote). [Edit: See Hylander above for more. — PS. Joel has added a third quotation to his post, again misguidedly.]
As to the original sentence. οἰ σύμμαχοι, ἐπεὶ εἰς τὴν τῶν ᾿Αθηναίων χώραν ἦλθον, καὶ αὐτοὶ ἐνόσησαν, I trust the meaning is now clear to all: “The allies, when they came into the land of the Athenians, fell sick themselves too.”
English would tend to say “When the allies came …, they …”, but that’s English idiom not Greek (there was a thread on this feature of sentence organization).
And English doesn’t need to say “themselves too,” for either “themselves” or “too” would be enough to convey the meaning, but Greek needs both, καὶ αὐτοὶ.
I endorse and underline this. There is a lot of material in Mastronarde and I try to frame my responses using this textbook. Often Lukas has simply not revised the material sufficiently or understood it.
It’s obvious from the above that he has not, for example, really grasped the difference between “attributive” and “predicative”. Mastering what is there is more important than introducing other material.
Don’t be too hard on Lukas. Mastronarde is a dense, highly concentrated and difficult textbook. It’s designed for mature students in a classroom setting. I’m sure that using it without a teacher to whom questions can be directed, and who can intervene orally when students flounder, as all of us did in the initial stages from time to time – or with Textkit as a teacher – is a struggle. Lukas is asking legitimate questions about Greek – and that’s what this site is here for.
And I likewise endorse and underline Hylander’s comment. It can sometimes be helpful to give other examples, but not misguided and misleading ones, as Joel’s were. It was his unfortunate post that precipitated my own (which crossed with Hylander’s), in hopes of staving off misunderstanding. I then felt free to enlarge a little on the translation of the original sentence, even if that went a bit beyond what Lukas himself needed.
But enough post mortem. I’m happy to leave Lukas in Seneca’s dedicated hands, with or without extra elucidation from Hylander.
EDIT. Again crossed with Hylander. Enough from me!
I am sorry if my contributions to this thread were a bit terse. In no way do I want to deter Lukas from asking questions. His questions are of course legitimate and the only way to make progress is to ask questions! I have already set out my view that they are best answered with reference, in the first instance at least, to his textbook and possibly a grammar. It doesn’t help students to introduce complications when there are some fundamental misunderstandings in the material already presented.
Learning Greek on one’s own is not easy as Hylander says and using Mastronarde’s austere text is a daunting task. Lukas is to be commended for his diligence and for the progress he is clearly making. I had thought that, taking all my replies over several threads to Lukas, I have been supportive and encouraging, that at least was my intention.
I hope that Hylander and MWH will still offer their ever helpful and accurate advice.
I’ve exhumed my copy of Mastronarde, which was interred in the clutter, so I’ll try to help when I can. I didn’t use Mastronarde: in fact, I probably started learning Greek before he did. Crosby and Schaefer was the text we used.