ASPECT FLAVOR => eventive conceptual
Imperfective ksunegrapse ksuggrapso
Progressive
Perfective
Now copy the following => εἶμι
<= and paste into Wiktionary. Make sure you have the entry for “be”; this spelling
is also used to represent “come, go”. Memorize the conjugation. This is a
high-frequency verb in almost every language that has it, even in aspectual
languages.
Why “even”?
By and large, aspectual languages do
not use “be” in equational sentences. There are like two exceptions in Jewish
Torah, which has over 5800 verses and nearly 80,000 words.
I’m having you memorize this now
because of its frequency, and also because there’s an example in this beginning
section of War that helps me expand the table.
It also affects grammar in a major
way.
The example in this section is ᾖσαν and,
as you can see from Wiktionary (also the Word Tool on Perseus), it is labeled
as “imperfect tense”.
What is the definition of imperfect
tense? You’ve been taught all your life that it’s an action which is
interrupted by another.
Thucydides never uses it that way.
“War” runs to 8 books, averaging
over 100 sections each, averaging over 4 subsections per section, something like
15,000 words. And Thucydides never uses “imperfect tense” the way every grammar
book in history says it should be used. (The closest he gets to one action
interrupting another doesn’t use progressive aspect at all.)
Let’s fix that.
Isan is our first progressive
aspect verb, and it is eventive despite meaning “be”. It’s there because Thucydides
uses a verbal derivative that requires a series of events to bring it about; I
will talk about that derivative a few posts from now.
The function of progressive aspect
is to identify actions that progressively create a habit or situation. In the
eventive, it focuses on the actions. In the conceptual, it focuses on the habit
or situation. Do not think of the habit or situation as a result; they are
always treated as a stage in a process. Aspectually, a result is permanent, and
that uses perfecive.
And now I have explained why “present
tense” can be used in past contexts. “Present tense” is our progressive
conceptual. It’s about a habitual action or one that is part of a situation. So
there goes a paragraph or two in Goodwin’s grammar that we don’t need because
the explanation is meaningless in our paradigm.
Here’s our table:
ASPECT FLAVOR => eventive conceptual
Imperfective ksunegrapse ksuggrapso
Progressive isan eisi
Perfective
Now let’s look at Goodwin’s claim
that the progressive forms can mean “attempt”. It’s another thing I haven’t
found in Thucydides. But the concept of attempting to do something can mean
repeating an action multiple times. The lack of result in contexts that use
progressive may have led to the idea that this form is used to mean “attempt”.
There may be other Greek authors that more clearly use it in contexts that fit
the connotation of attempt. But by and large it’s not inherent in the progressive
aspect. There is an actual verb for “attempt” but LSJ doesn’t cite to any uses
in Thucydides. Doesn’t mean they’re not there, just means LSJ uses other
sources.
The problem, which I will state over
and over, is that existing grammars rely on sources that mistakenly read
meaning into morphology. We will get rid of several concepts that claim meaning
is inherent in the morphology, when I can show that it derives from expressed
or implied context.
Context is king. Make this your
mantra.
By the way, while doing something
over the weekend, I found a version of Goodwin that is not locked. When you
have it open, you can use CTRL F and search on things like “conditional”, then put
your own bookmarks in this to get to it quickly when I discuss it on the blog.
You can also put postits on the file to show what Goodwin got wrong and what’s
right.
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