21st Century Classical Greek -- Summary 7, conditionals

Conditionals are statements with a protasis, the “if” clause, and apodosis, the “then” clause, describing the consequences of an action that may be contrary to fact or uncertain.

1.                  Many conditionals have the formula ei…an, “if…then”, but these are not the only particles used in conditionals.

2.                  The particle can be suppressed without eliminating that clause.

3.                  Either protasis or apodosis may be suppressed; what it would say can be deduced from the context.

4.                  The protasis is negated with mi, “if there is any situation in which X does not happen”, and the apodosis with ou “in every case fitting the protasis, Y does not happen.

There are three types.

1.         Indicative. The speaker makes a statement of certainty introduced with ei, “if”. When the speaker knows facts contrary to the truth of this statement, the apodosis begins with an. If the apodosis is not marked by an, the speaker implies nothing about fulfillment of the protasis, at least within the conditional ; this gives the conditional a sort of narrative tension that makes the audience interested in the context which may show whether it was carried out.

2.         Oblique. The speaker may use ean to introduce the protasis which expresses something probably true but for which there is no evidence. Because there is no evidence, an imperfective (default verb form) conceptual (action not known to have taken place) is used in the apodosis.

3.         Epistemic. The speaker uses ei with the epistemic in a protasis he does not want to imply is true because he has no evidence. The apodosis uses an plus the epistemic, naturally enough, because the speaker can’t sign up to any specific result if he can’t sign up to the truth of the “if” clause.

The old categories of conditionals were copied from Latin and don’t cover all the possibilities, as well as being confusing and the “rules” internally contradictory. The above condenses about 12 pages of Goodwin into 1 page.

In Book III 57.1 I found a conditional using the imperfective conceptual. I have repeatedly said that the IC is a promise. Does that work here?

εἰ δὲ περὶ ἡμῶν γνώσεσθε μὴ τὰ εἰκότα （…）, ὁρᾶτε ὅπως μὴ οὐκ ἀποδέξωνται ἀνδρῶν ἀγαθῶν ….

First note that there is no an in the apodosis, so there is no claim that the protasis will be carried out. The protasis is in base voice, so the decision (gnosesthe) would not be a deliberate act. It’s hard to conceive of promising to do something that is not going to be done deliberately. The point seems to be that in this context, the verb means “judge”, but it lets the judges off the hook as far as acting with prejudice.

The apodosis is progressive conceptual (orate, you’ll see…), the situation that will come about, that is, for good men like the Athinians it will [probably, an oblique] be unacceptable that the Plataeans be blotted out.