Salvete omnes
I’m puzzled by the sentence at line 17 of chapter 30.
Quam ob rem tam raro te video, mi Cornēli.
Is this an example of two correlative words being used in the opposite order than that which we’ve been shown before in this book? Perhaps if someone would offer a translation of the sentence I might understand. Try as I might I’ve not seen what this is intended to mean. I’d be grateful for any pointers as to what is going on here. Mi Corneli is simple enough but as for the rest…
In this instance quam isn’t correlated with tam, but an interrogative pronoun** attached to rem: ‘ob quam rem?’ meaning ‘why?’ Quamobrem is often written as a single word and you can see it introduced with a marginal note a little further on at Cap. XXXI, l. 37.
** I should rather have said interrogative adjective
A splendid reply, thanks. I shall look at the line you mention and expand my line of inquiry in this direction. Excellent (in my best Mr Burns voice).
Terrific! By the way there was an error of terminology in my reply, now corrected.