21st Century Classical Greek -- more miscellany

Book I section 53. I’m going to kill off another old concept and point out more of Jowett’s transpositions and other failings.

ἔδοξεν οὖν αὐτοῖς ἄνδρας ἐς κελήτιον ἐσβιβάσαντας ἄνευ κηρυκείου προσπέμψαι τοῖς Ἀθηναίοις καὶ πεῖραν ποιήσασθαι. πέμψαντές τε ἔλεγον τοιάδε.

[2] ‘ἀδικεῖτε, ὦ ἄνδρες Ἀθηναῖοι, πολέμου ἄρχοντες καὶ σπονδὰς λύοντες: ἡμῖν γὰρ πολεμίους τοὺς ἡμετέρους τιμωρουμένοις ἐμποδὼν ἵστασθε ὅπλα ἀνταιρόμενοι. εἰ δ᾽ ὑμῖν γνώμη ἐστὶ κωλύειν τε ἡμᾶς ἐπὶ Κέρκυραν ἢ ἄλλοσε εἴ ποι βουλόμεθα πλεῖν καὶ τὰς σπονδὰς λύετε, ἡμᾶς τούσδε πρώτους λαβόντες χρήσασθε ὡς πολεμίοις.’

[3] οἱ μὲν δὴ τοιαῦτα εἶπον: τῶν δὲ Κερκυραίων τὸ μὲν στρατόπεδον ὅσον ἐπήκουσεν ἀνεβόησεν εὐθὺς λαβεῖν τε αὐτοὺς καὶ ἀποκτεῖναι, οἱ δὲ Ἀθηναῖοι τοιάδε ἀπεκρίναντο.

[4] ‘οὔτε ἄρχομεν πολέμου, ὦ ἄνδρες Πελοποννήσιοι, οὔτε τὰς σπονδὰς λύομεν, Κερκυραίοις δὲ τοῖσδε ξυμμάχοις οὖσι βοηθοὶ ἤλθομεν. εἰ μὲν οὖν ἄλλοσέ ποι βούλεσθε πλεῖν, οὐ κωλύομεν: εἰ δὲ ἐπὶ Κέρκυραν πλευσεῖσθε ἢ ἐς τῶν ἐκείνων τι χωρίων, οὐ περιοψόμεθα κατὰ τὸ δυνατόν.’

Learn κῆρυξ in Wiktionary. Also see White, page 222, section 743 for similar declensions.

Heralds were under the protection of Hermes and carried a caduceus to show it. Sending these people out without a caduceus made whatever they said suspect since they had no symbol of being official messengers.

At the start of subsection 2, what flavor of progressive is adikeite? Is it a habit or does it imply a series of actions? Give me your comments with why you picked the flavor you did. Do they also apply to istasthe later in the subsection?

And why is this labeled causal in Word Tool? There’s a history behind that. In old grammars you will find the term factitive which straddles the boundary between transitive and causal. It’s totally useless in this situation, however, for the use of isasthe can be translated reflexively. So I am never going to use the term factitive again. You understand that causal is a meaningless category because every verb has uses which are not causal, just as every verb which can be translated in the sense of fearing may have other meanings that don’t fall into that category.

Notice luete later in this subsection which is progressive of some flavor: Jowett translates it as a future tense even though it doesn’t have the sigma imperfective infix. One of Goodwin’s uses for progressive is “attempt”, and that may have been what Jowett was thinking. But earlier in the subsection Jowett says that the Korinthians think the Athinaians have already violated the treaty. The only way luete could be taken in a future sense is as a progressive eventive, repeated actions violating the treaty. This comes pretty close to the imperfective use that I talked about some time ago, the one that mirrors Hebrew ehyeh asher ehyeh, but choosing an eventive designation covers all different actions that violate the treaty.

Jowett fails to translate euthus in subsection 3: the Kerkyraeans immediately cried out kill them.

He also reverses the conditionals at the end of subsection 4. The Athinaians offer the carrot “we won’t touch you if you sail anywhere else” and then say “but if you attack our allies we won’t suffer it to the extent possible.” Jowett also fails to translate this as a negative.