21st Century Classical Greek -- more on obliques

Book I section 35. Now the Kerkyraeans deal with the treaty violation issue.

λύσετε δὲ οὐδὲ τὰς Λακεδαιμονίων σπονδὰς δεχόμενοι ἡμᾶς μηδετέρων ὄντας ξυμμάχους:

[2] εἴρηται γὰρ ἐν αὐταῖς, τῶν Ἑλληνίδων πόλεων ἥτις μηδαμοῦ ξυμμαχεῖ, ἐξεῖναι παρ᾽ ὁποτέρους ἂν ἀρέσκηται ἐλθεῖν.

[3] καὶ δεινὸν εἰ τοῖσδε μὲν ἀπό τε τῶν ἐνσπόνδων ἔσται πληροῦν τὰς ναῦς καὶ προσέτι καὶ ἐκ τῆς ἄλλης Ἑλλάδος καὶ οὐχ ἥκιστα ἀπὸ τῶν ὑμετέρων ὑπηκόων, ἡμᾶς δὲ ἀπὸ τῆς προκειμένης τε ξυμμαχίας εἴρξουσι καὶ ἀπὸ τῆς ἄλλοθέν ποθεν ὠφελίας, εἶτα ἐν ἀδικήματι θήσονται πεισθέντων ὑμῶν ἃ δεόμεθα.

[4] πολὺ δὲ ἐν πλέονι αἰτίᾳ ἡμεῖς μὴ πείσαντες ὑμᾶς ἕξομεν: ἡμᾶς μὲν γὰρ κινδυνεύοντας καὶ οὐκ ἐχθροὺς ὄντας ἀπώσεσθε, τῶνδε δὲ οὐχ ὅπως κωλυταὶ ἐχθρῶν ὄντων καὶ ἐπιόντων γενήσεσθε, ἀλλὰ καὶ ἀπὸ τῆς ὑμετέρας ἀρχῆς δύναμιν προσλαβεῖν περιόψεσθε: ἣν οὐ δίκαιον, ἀλλ᾽ ἢ κἀκείνων κωλύειν τοὺς ἐκ τῆς ὑμετέρας μισθοφόρους ἢ καὶ ἡμῖν πέμπειν καθ᾽ ὅτι ἂν πεισθῆτε ὠφελίαν, μάλιστα δὲ ἀπὸ τοῦ προφανοῦς δεξαμένους βοηθεῖν.

[5] πολλὰ δέ, ὥσπερ ἐν ἀρχῇ ὑπείπομεν, τὰ ξυμφέροντα ἀποδείκνυμεν, καὶ μέγιστον ὅτι οἵ τε αὐτοὶ πολέμιοι ἡμῖν ἦσαν, ὅπερ σαφεστάτη πίστις, καὶ οὗτοι οὐκ ἀσθενεῖς, ἀλλ᾽ ἱκανοὶ τοὺς μεταστάντας βλάψαι: καὶ ναυτικῆς καὶ οὐκ ἠπειρώτιδος τῆς ξυμμαχίας διδομένης οὐχ ὁμοία ἡ ἀλλοτρίωσις, ἀλλὰ μάλιστα μέν, εἰ δύνασθε, μηδένα ἄλλον ἐᾶν κεκτῆσθαι ναῦς, εἰ δὲ μή, ὅστις ἐχυρώτατος, τοῦτον φίλον ἔχειν.

Subsection 2 has an oblique areskitai.  In the Middle Liddell entry, part III points out that this verb is used to represent a political party voting on a resolution to do something or not. Jowett’s “pleases” is at the top of the entry, but LSJ points to this specific section as an expression of the will of a representative body. You also have the an flipping the focus of areskitai elthein from those being voted for (opoteros) to those doing the voting.

Subsection 3 almost seems to have a conditional, ei plus an imperfective conceptual in base voice, and in the counterpoint clause eirksousi in the imperfective conceptual oblique. On the face of it, this would be one of Goodwin’s conditionals implying nothing about its truth, and he allows for the i.c. in the protasis but only if it is like a promise. That’s not the case here, the Kerkyraeans are saying something more like, when they’re doing this they’re prohibiting us from trying to do something similar to protect ourselves. The subsection closes with another i.c. about the Korinthians unjustly accusing Athins of being unjuct if they were to help the Kerkyraeans.

Jowett moves the opening clause from subsection 5 into the end of subsection 4 which, again, destroys Thucydides’ style. From polla de on is an introduction in subsection 5 to what Mr. T says in subsection 5. Jowett treats it as a summary of everything before subsection 5, which it is not, because prior to subsection 5 the Kerkyraeans have shown the dark side of what is going on, not the advantage helping them would be to Athins.

21st Century Classical Greek -- review 3

Believe it or not, counting reviews, I’ve posted 100 articles on this subject. It’s a terribly long time since I did a review, but here are some important points.

On conditionals, we’ve destroyed what Goodwin wrote. His categories and “future more/less vivid” are copied from Latin studies. They don’t reflect what really happens in Classical Greek and our aspect and modality definitions work far better.

On reported speech, the grammarians’ claims – that it uses the same verb forms as the original speech – work only when you talk about the aspect of verbs, not when you talk about the tense of verbs.

On purpose clauses, we’ve destroyed the distinction between object and final clauses, particularly pointing out that “final” is a meaningless label because such clauses aren’t necessarily at the end of a sentence.

We’ve identified a structure none of the grammarians talk about, the ergative, and the three values of transitivity in Classical Greek:

a)         intransitive passive;

b)         intransitive executive with the i.i.g that is the ergative;

c)         transitive using executive or base voice.

We discussed negation showing the gaps in the old grammars.

We’ve shown that there really is a “due and owing” quasi-imperative use of the impersonal gerundive, and that it tracks with a similar use in Biblical Hebrew.

And I showed how the “boss of Balliol College” was a lousy translator and didn’t understand what Thucydides was saying. His negations are in the wrong place; he moves things around destroying perfectly valid structures. I have gotten to Book III of Thucydides. Jowett does even worse there than he does in Book I, including moving text from one chapter to another. It’s so bad that on Perseus, they won’t give you Jowett on a subsection basis, only on a chapter basis, and in the case I just mentioned, Jowett screws that up. So it’s a good thing we’re learning to understand Thucydides and not Jowett, isn’t it.

Pretty good for only two years of work. 

Knitting -- the yoke's on me

So these tops started with a normal fingering-weight jumper and took some detours.

So the purple one was the first; the yoke is the Selbu Rose and yeah, it didn't turn out very well.

The light blue one turned out pretty well, it's a Fair Isle motif.

The green one uses a vine pattern that I used on a sleeveless top years ago.

The red one has a Fair Isle motif that didn't come out well because I was using up leftovers.

And the dark blue one still needs to have its underarms worked shut; that motif comes from a pattern on DROPS.

I might be making a black one; it will use the Fana star.

I have matching sweaters to wear with all of these so they are good for all but the coldest parts of the year, and for that I have long-sleeve turtlenecks.

Cable on your 300 stitches or whatever to your size 3 24-inch circular needles for the hem and work K2/P2 rib for 8 rounds.

Knit 102 rounds, marking your underarms, center front and back every 10 rounds. (That's why I use yarn. It's lighter and less fiddly and you can still get an accurate count of the rounds you've done.) Stop 7 stitches short of the left underarm and put the next 14 stitches on a holder. (p.s. I usually have the left side of tops where the yarn tail is from cabling on.)

Cable on 108 stitches to a size 3 16-inch circular needle and work 8 rounds of rib. Then work 42 rounds, marking the underarm. In round 43, work past the underarm marker for 7 stitches and put 14 stitches of the underarm on a holder. Then knit the sleeve onto your 24-inch circular needles and knit to 7 stitches short of the other underarm marker, putting the next 14 stitches on a holder.

Work the other sleeve and knit onto the needle with your body. Knit 4 more rounds without decreasing.

On round 5 above the underarm, knit up to the last 3 stitches before the sleeve. K2TOG, K2, slip stitch, K1, PSSO. Knit to 3 stitches short of the other side of the sleeve, slip stitch, K1, PSSO, K2, K2TOG. Knit to other sleeve and repeat.

On round 6 knit to the sleeve, K1, slip stitch, K1, PSSO and repeat in reverse at the other side of the sleeve. Do the same for the other sleeve. For the rounds up to the motif, you will decrease every row in each sleeve.

Now you have a choice. On round 8 and every third round, you can K2TOG before and after the sleeves like you did on round 5, as well as doing the decrease on EVERY round on the sleeves. 

Or you can wait until round 10 and every fifth round to do the K2TOG. 

At some point you have to plan your yoke. I recommend that the yoke motif be no more than 15 stitches high. The highest ones I used were 13. Once you know how wide the motif is, you know how many stitches you need in the last round before you start working it. 

So the motif on the dark blue top is 15 stitches wide to allow for a stitch between motifs, and 13 high. It could have been 15 if I had worked a white round before and after but I didn't.

I worked 41 rounds above the underarms. In round 42, I worked K3, slip, K1, PSSO. Then I had 15x plus 2 stitches, and I decreased by those 2 stitches on opposite sides of the first round of the motif.

When I was done with the motif I had 255 stitches.  The neck is 132 stitches around. I had to take out 123 stitches. On round 56 I switched to a 16-inch circular needle and worked K3, slip, K1, PSSO, which got me down to 191 stitches. Round 57 was plain knitting. Round 58 was a repeat of round 56 and left me with 143 stitches.

I worked a mid-back elevation in round 59: K14, wrap, turn, P28, wrap, turn, K47, wrap, turn, P66, wrap, turn, K85, wrap, turn, P94, wrap, turn, and knit to end of round.

Work round 60 above the armpit taking out stitches if you are still not down to 132.

Work 6-8 rounds k2/p2 rib for the neck. Close the armpits using kitchener stitch from the outside and weave in your tag ends.

If you want long sleeves, you could work a round of your motif above the cuffs if you can fit at least two repeats in the stitches there.

This is sort of like the faux set-in sleeves I did for the Breton jumper, but it decreases faster so you don't have to take out as many stitches once you finish the sleeves. 

21st Century Classical Greek -- a contrast between certainty and definiteness

Book I section 34.  The Kerkyraeans continue to put their case.

‘ἢν δὲ λέγωσιν ὡς οὐ δίκαιον τοὺς σφετέρους ἀποίκους ὑμᾶς δέχεσθαι, μαθόντων ὡς πᾶσα ἀποικία εὖ μὲν πάσχουσα τιμᾷ τὴν μητρόπολιν, ἀδικουμένη δὲ ἀλλοτριοῦται: οὐ γὰρ ἐπὶ τῷ δοῦλοι, ἀλλ᾽ ἐπὶ τῷ ὁμοῖοι τοῖς λειπομένοις εἶναι ἐκπέμπονται.

[2] ὡς δὲ ἠδίκουν σαφές ἐστιν: προκληθέντες γὰρ περὶ Ἐπιδάμνου ἐς κρίσιν πολέμῳ μᾶλλον ἢ τῷ ἴσῳ ἐβουλήθησαν τὰ ἐγκλήματα μετελθεῖν.

[3] καὶ ὑμῖν ἔστω τι τεκμήριον ἃ πρὸς ἡμᾶς τοὺς ξυγγενεῖς δρῶσιν, ὥστε ἀπάτῃ τε μὴ παράγεσθαι ὑπ᾽ αὐτῶν δεομένοις τε ἐκ τοῦ εὐθέος μὴ ὑπουργεῖν: ὁ γὰρ ἐλαχίστας τὰς μεταμελείας ἐκ τοῦ χαρίζεσθαι τοῖς ἐναντίοις λαμβάνων ἀσφαλέστατος ἂν διατελοίη.

The first conjugated verb in this section is in oblique modality. Why? You should know by now.

The Kerkyraeans use a personal gerundive about a mitropolis treating a colony well. They’re not pointing to any specific colony that honors a mitropolis that treats it well. It’s an introduction to the contrast with how Korinth has treated Kerkyraea. The estrangement is expressed in a conjugated verb, than which it gets no more definite, no more certain, but it is not in executive voice, so the estrangement was not a deliberate act of Kerkyraea, and Korinth has no business punishing people if their acts are not deliberate. In fact, this situation being Korinth’s fault, Korinth cannot be justified for attacking Kerkyraea.

Jowett translates douloi as “servants” but the Kerkyraeans are actually claiming that the Korinthians are treating them like slaves, or at best like people who have contracted out their services exclusively to one employer. The latter is cognate to the concept of the eved in the Bible.

Subsection 2 comes out too wordy in Jowett; Thucydides is more elegant. “that injustice is patent: submitting the case about Epidamnus rather to war than to impartiality being willing to submit the claim.”

Jowett’s translation of the final statement is terrible. It’s “he who changes his purposes the least out of the habit of obliging others takes the steadiest [road] if he would habitually accomplish [his ends].”

Notice that final epistemic, conjugated in progressive conceptual.  On the one hand it’s definite; on the other it’s uncertain. The parallel of the two progressives is lost in both Jowett and Smith. But then they believed in tenses and knew nothing about aspect.

The Kerkyraeans have two more arguments to make, and then we will get to the Korinthians’ objections. It’s an interesting contrast in style and grammar.

21st Century Classical Greek -- oblique use

 Book I section 33.  The Kerkyraeans continue to put their case.

‘γενήσεται δὲ ὑμῖν πειθομένοις καλὴ ἡ ξυντυχία κατὰ πολλὰ τῆς ἡμετέρας χρείας, πρῶτον μὲν ὅτι ἀδικουμένοις καὶ οὐχ ἑτέρους βλάπτουσι τὴν ἐπικουρίαν ποιήσεσθε, ἔπειτα περὶ τῶν μεγίστων κινδυνεύοντας δεξάμενοι ὡς ἂν μάλιστα μετ᾽ αἰειμνήστου μαρτυρίου τὴν χάριν καταθήσεσθε: ναυτικόν τε κεκτήμεθα πλὴν τοῦ παρ᾽ ὑμῖν πλεῖστον.

[2] καὶ σκέψασθε: τίς εὐπραξία σπανιωτέρα ἢ τίς τοῖς πολεμίοις λυπηροτέρα, εἰ ἣν ὑμεῖς ἂν πρὸ πολλῶν χρημάτων καὶ χάριτος ἐτιμήσασθε δύναμιν ὑμῖν προσγενέσθαι, αὕτη πάρεστιν αὐτεπάγγελτος ἄνευ κινδύνων καὶ δαπάνης διδοῦσα ἑαυτήν, καὶ προσέτι φέρουσα ἐς μὲν τοὺς πολλοὺς ἀρετήν, οἷς δὲ ἐπαμυνεῖτε χάριν, ὑμῖν δ᾽ αὐτοῖς ἰσχύν: ἃ ἐν τῷ παντὶ χρόνῳ ὀλίγοις δὴ ἅμα πάντα ξυνέβη, καὶ ὀλίγοι ξυμμαχίας δεόμενοι οἷς ἐπικαλοῦνται ἀσφάλειαν καὶ κόσμον οὐχ ἧσσον διδόντες ἢ ληψόμενοι παραγίγνονται.

[3] τὸν δὲ πόλεμον, δι᾽ ὅνπερ χρήσιμοι ἂν εἶμεν, εἴ τις ὑμῶν μὴ οἴεται ἔσεσθαι, γνώμης ἁμαρτάνει καὶ οὐκ αἰσθάνεται τοὺς Λακεδαιμονίους φόβῳ τῷ ὑμετέρῳ πολεμησείοντας καὶ τοὺς Κορινθίους δυναμένους παρ᾽ αὐτοῖς καὶ ὑμῖν ἐχθροὺς ὄντας καὶ προκαταλαμβάνοντας ἡμᾶς νῦν ἐς τὴν ὑμετέραν ἐπιχείρησιν, ἵνα μὴ τῷ κοινῷ ἔχθει κατ᾽ αὐτοὺς μετ᾽ ἀλλήλων στῶμεν μηδὲ δυοῖν φθάσαι ἁμάρτωσιν, ἢ κακῶσαι ἡμᾶς ἢ σφᾶς αὐτοὺς βεβαιώσασθαι.

[4] ἡμέτερον δέ γ᾽ αὖ ἔργον προτερῆσαι, τῶν μὲν διδόντων, ὑμῶν δὲ δεξαμένων τὴν ξυμμαχίαν, καὶ προεπιβουλεύειν αὐτοῖς μᾶλλον ἢ ἀντεπιβουλεύειν.

The opening phrase basically means, let yourselves be persuaded that this is a finer opportunity than many of the rest… Jowett misses the nuance of persuasion entirely.

The bolded phrase in subsection 2 is not really a conditional. It’s the ei tis idiom I talked about before. Click on hin after the ei and you will see that it’s not from eimi, it’s a pronoun.

Notice the purpose clause in subsection 3. The verbs are, first, a progressive eventive indicative ekhthei, which ought to be something there is evidence against, if this is the main verb of the clause. It is not. The mi negation applies to stomen; The phrase using ekhthei actually is adverbial for the manner in which or the reason for which stomen happens.

Stomen is an imperfective conceptual oblique in executive voice; the Kerkyraeans use oblique to promote this projected action. Amartosi is the same thing. This is the second thing that the Kerkyraeans want to promote: allied, the two polises can hit Korinth before Korinth can act. Jowett misses this concept of striking first, which Thucydides repeats at the start of subsection 4.

The obliques in this section talk about very real possibilities if either Kerkyraea or Athins tries to stand alone against such powerful polises. Sparta can get at them by land, Korinth by sea. It’s a double whammy.