I have reached the point in the Anabasis (2.5.22) where Tissaphernes feigns concern for the Greeks’ welfare and explains: εὖ ἴσθι ὅτι ὁ ἐμὸς ἔρως τούτου αἴτιος τὸ τοῖς Ἕλλησιν ἐμὲ πιστὸν γενέσθαι, καὶ ᾧ Κῦρος ἀνέβη ξενικῷ διὰ μισθοδοσίας πιστεύων τούτῳ ἐμὲ καταβῆναι δι’ εὐεργεσίαν ἰσχυρόν. Without Hewitt and Mather I would never have made sense of this; even so I am left wondering about ἰσχυρόν.
Here’s the translation from the Perseus page: “The reason for this, be well assured, was my eager desire to prove myself trustworthy to the Greeks, so that with the same mercenary force which Cyrus led up from the coast in the faith of wages paid, I might go back to the coast in the security of benefits conferred.” This seemingly applies ἰσχυρόν to ξενικὸν (στράτευμα), and the sense is that with Cyrus the troops were going on trust, but now they have benefits to be grateful for.
The Russian translation : “Да будет тебе известно: причина этого – мое горячее желание заслужить доверие эллинов. Я хотел бы, чтобы наемные войска, с которыми Кир пришел сюда, полагаясь на них потому, что он выплачивал им жалованье, совершили обратный поход со мной, оставаясь надежными в силу оказанного им благодеяния” makes Cyrus the one who was trusting, and now Tissaphernes keeps the force faithful by his good works. This way ἰσχυρόν must go with ἐμὲ.
In either version, the sense of ἰσχυρόν is not “strong” but “confident” or “convinced,” which seems odd. But what I am really after is not a translation but the syntax.
I’d have thought the only syntactical difficulty here was the articular infinitive with ερως. The rest seems unproblematic: ᾧ .̣.. τουτῳ …, all nicely balanced: Cyrus up διὰ μισθοδοσίας πιστεύων, me down δι’ εὐεργεσίαν ἰσχυρόν. ἰσχυρoν goes with εμε. I don’t see anything odd about “strong”: his military strength is due to his paying his mercenaries well (thereby retaining their allegiance).
The English translation evidently takes it the same way.
[Posted independently of Joel, who needs to amend his ungrammatical εὖ ἴσθι ὅτι … ἐμὲ καταβῆναι δι’ εὐεργεσίαν ἰσχυρόν]
I’d have thought the only syntactical difficulty here was the articular infinitive with ερως.
I was going back and forth on that after I wrote my first post, and was also editing it back and forth (now restored to the original). Since he’s explaining the αἴτιος τούτου (following the question raised in the previous sentence, not quoted), it just means, “ὁ ἐμὸς ἔρως [ἐστὶ] τούτου αἴτιος, [ὢν applying to ἔρως] τὸ τοῖς Ἕλλησιν ἐμὲ πιστὸν γενέσθαι”? And then, what follows the καί, I understood as a statement of fact dependent on the ἴσθι.
EDIT
[Posted independently of Joel, who needs to amend his εὖ ἴσθι ὅτι … ἐμὲ καταβῆναι δι’ εὐεργεσίαν ἰσχυρόν]
We’re editing our posts too fast to talk. A peril of internet discussion boards. It’s that “καὶ” instead of a “ἵνα” or “ὡς” something that makes me think he’s left the realm of desires, and dropped into a statement of “I will do this”.
You’re right that my quoted ὅτι is misleading with the switch from direct to acc. + inf.
All this takes us further away from Zembei’s post, my reply to which I think was sufficient, and I hope he agrees.
But as to the earlier part of the sentence, it goes:
εὖ ἴσθι
ὅτι ὁ ἐμὸς ἔρως τούτου αἴτιος (εστι), (Joel’s ὢν doesn’t come into it),
then τὸ τοῖς Ἕλλησιν ἐμὲ πιστὸν γενέσθαι (articular infintive, accusative) elucidating ὁ ἐμὸς ἔρως,
and then και adding a second infinitive (καταβηναι) in syntactical parallel with γενεσθαι.
In this second part the relative clause (ᾧ ανεβη … πιστευων), along with its correlative demonstrative (τουτῳ), intervenes before ἐμὲ καταβῆναι. See my first post above. Then it’s obvious why εμε is repeated.
The sentence is an unusually awkward one for Xenophon, whose syntax is usually perfectly straightforward. What makes it awkward is first the articular infinitive explicating “my eros”(!) and secondly the lengthy continuation of that by means of the second infinitive. It’s easy enough to understand, harder to analyze. Perhaps the extravagant language and its contorted syntax reflect Tiss’s affected earnestness.
We have Tissaphernes in Thucydides too, discussed in a previous textkit thread which worked its way through Thucydides.
That old double dealer (otherwise known as that lying bastard) makes an appearance in Xenophon’s Hellenica as well. This is what happens when Agesilaos makes a truce with him:
ὁ μὲν δὴ Τισσαφέρνης ἃ ὤμοσεν εὐθὺς ἐψεύσατο: ἀντὶ γὰρ τοῦ εἰρήνην ἔχειν στράτευμα πολὺ παρὰ βασιλέως πρὸς ᾧ εἶχε πρόσθεν μετεπέμπετο. Ἀγησίλαος δέ, καίπερ αἰσθανόμενος ταῦτα, ὅμως ἐπέμενε ταῖς σπονδαῖς.
Indeed, that which Tissaphernes had sworn, he straightaway forswore: instead of maintaining the peace, he set about summoning a large army from the King in addition to that which he had before. Agesilaos, however, although aware of these actions, continued to honour the truce.
Thanks for clearing up my confusion, and for the interesting discussion of further points. I never come here without learning more than I had expected to.
Soon my march will take me into Anabasis III, and I got Huitink and Rood’s commentary (Cambridge, 2019) to enlighten me on along the way, but I’m sure there will be more questions (easy ones!) for you guys too.