Why these iota-subscripted words translated as accusative?

Greek Learning Greek
1

In the accompanying booklet of The Great Courses Greek 101, this sentence:

ἐκαίετε τὰς πυρὰς δεινῇ κλαγγῇ;

Is translated as:

Were you burning these funeral pyres > with > a terrible noise?

While I would expected something more like:

(Were y’all) burning these (funeral) pyres (> for > a) terrible noise?

Where the main difference is “with” vs “for”. Being that δεινῇ κλαγγῇ have iota subscripts, I was expecting dative.

Am I missing something or is the booklet mistaken?

2

The book is right. δεινῇ κλαγγῇ is indeed dative, but here it means with a terrible noise. It’s one of the many uses of the dative.

3

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instrumental_case#Ancient_Greek

Wikipedia works as a pretty good comparative grammar.

4

Ahhhh! I get it now. Thanks a bunch!


P.S. Wikipedia does work when one knows what to look for :slight_smile:

5

By the bye, the professor makes one glaring mistake, which you should be aware of. He forgets that medium and passive do differ in future and aorist. This mistake is systematic. Of course errare humanum est.