This is the summary and the abstract of our contribution in the proceedings of the Delbrück-confe... more This is the summary and the abstract of our contribution in the proceedings of the Delbrück-conference, but we cannot post the entire article here. In this article, we investigate Delbrück’s analysis of the cases by discussing the case ending -φι in Homer. He himself treated the issue on three occasions and stated that this case form remained insufficiently and unsatisfactorily explained. Initially, he argued that the original meaning was the instrumental-comitative, expanded with locative and ablative functions and the original number was the plural. Later, however, he assumed that the ending could also be used for the genitive and the dative. As Mycenaean had not been discovered at his time and he could therefore not have included it, we focus in our analysis solely on -φι in Homer and only refer to Mycenaean sparingly. First, we provide an overview of the scholarship on Homer, distinguishing between the scholars writing before the decipherment (including Delbrück) and the ones after it. In a second step, we determine our corpus by discussing some passages with uncertain transmission (αὐτόφι versus αὐτόθι and Ἰλιόφι κλυτὰ τείχεα). We then provide the figures and proceed to the actual analysis. We start with number, animacy and concreteness, then discuss the case usages - locative, instrumental, object marking - and the use of the forms with prepositions. After that, we take a closer look at the distribution of the forms and their co-occurrence with genitive and dative forms in the same sentence and the same syntagma. At the end of the article, we analyse the instances for which more than one interpretation is possible. Our analysis shows that the suffix is numerus-indifferent and that instances with an unambiguous plural are relatively uncommon, that the suffix appears almost exclusively with inanimate entities, is used predominantly with concrete elements, has often instrumental and locative meaning, but can also be used as an ablative and is very common with prepositions (more than half of the instances). Our findings differ from what Delbrück himself noted in two respects, namely the lack of animacy and the lack of plural meaning, and from the data in Mycenaean in three respects, namely the mostly singular meaning of the suffix (in Mycenaean, the suffix is almost exclusively used in the plural), its common use with prepositions and with the ablative and locative-directive functions (these two uses are very rare in Mycenaean). They also make the interpretation of the ending as a simple oblique case marker or a simple poetic tool less likely and shed new light on the original function and the origin of the ending and its use in Proto-Indo-European (PIE) and other Indo-European languages, but that discussion cannot be performed in the current article.
This is the summary and the abstract of my contribution in the proceedings of the Delbrück-confer... more This is the summary and the abstract of my contribution in the proceedings of the Delbrück-conference, but I cannot post the entire article here.
In this article, I provide an overview and analysis of Berthold Delbrück’s contributions to the field of verbal morphosyntax in Homer, discussing the following issues: the use of the moods, the differences between them, (apparently) special uses and the “rise” of the indicative; the use of the modal particles (MP) in epic Greek; the injunctive and the augment in (Vedic and) Homeric Greek; the use and interaction of tense and aspect; the origins of the “Ionic-epic” iterative forms in -σκ-; the origins of subordination, parataxis and hypotaxis. In my analyses, I first describe his findings, compare them to earlier scholarship at the time, then contrast and / or expand it with later scholarship, pass my “judgement” on them and finally apply them to disputed passages. It goes without saying that an extensive discussion of (the bibliography of) all these issues cannot be performed here (for this, the reader is referred to other works). I hope that the article will show that, while Delbrück was not always the πρῶτος εὑρετής, he was nevertheless the first to provide an in-depth analysis for many syntactical issues and that most of his observations have been confirmed. In some cases, alternative explanations were also possible (this applies to the use of the aspect of the verba dicendi, the origin of the iterative forms, the use of the injunctive in Greek and the origin, use and meaning of the augment).
This article investigates the co-occurrence of iterative forms in-σκ-, unaugmented and augmented ... more This article investigates the co-occurrence of iterative forms in-σκ-, unaugmented and augmented verb forms in Iliad 24. I first give an in-depth overview of the scholarship on the origin (§ 2) and meaning (§ 3) of the suffix. Second, I describe how I determine my corpus of metrically secure forms (§ 4). As the transmission of the text is not always secure, I restrict myself to those forms where the presence or absence of the augment is guaranteed by the metre. Third, I discuss in great length the previous scholarship on the origin and meaning of the augment (§ 5), focusing particularly on the theories by Lazzeroni and Willi, before proceeding to the actual analysis of the passages in Book 24 where iterative forms, unaugmented and augmented forms co-occur, including the forms ἔσκε and ἦ(ε)ν. I argue (§ 6 and § 7) that (a) the iterative suffix marks repeated actions and is different from the unaugmented forms without suffix, (b) that the forms with suffix can be used to contrast the repeated actions of one (group of) protagonist(s) with that of the other(s), (c) the augmented forms convey emphasis and highlighting and (d) the unaugmented forms describe the background and scene setting or appear in negated sentences that refer to past actions that never occurred and can never happen anymore in the future. At the end I also mention the exceptions to the rules.
In this article I analyse the use of the augment in the Apologoi (Books 9 to 12 of the Odyssey). ... more In this article I analyse the use of the augment in the Apologoi (Books 9 to 12 of the Odyssey). I first explain why I have chosen this work and these books. Second, I describe my methodology in analysing and determining my corpus. As the transmission of the Homeric poems has been problematic, I decided to work only with the forms that are secured by the metre and I therefore describe which morphological rules, metrical laws and bridges render the augment in a form secure (or not). Based on that corpus, I proceed to the actual analysis. In analysing the data I compare the previous (morphological, syntactic and semantic) observations on the augment to the data of the Apologoi. My findings show that the explanation of the augment as a foregrounding device is largely confirmed, but that there are nevertheless exceptions.
In this article, I will address the use of the modal particle (MP) with the subjunctive in the ma... more In this article, I will address the use of the modal particle (MP) with the subjunctive in the main clauses in the Odyssey. I choose this feature, because this is a usage that is unknown to Attic and even in Ionic this is extremely rare. I first explain how the corpus was obtained, as the forms described as “future indicatives” in the grammars of Classical Greek descend either from the Indo-European desiderative and will be called “future-desideratives” here, or are metrically equivalent to the subjunctive of the sigmatic aorist, and as in the vast majority of cases, the distinction between desiderative and aorist subjunctive cannot be made, these forms are catalogued as “future-subjunctives”. In a second step, I discuss some of the textual issues that could arise in determining whether or not the MP was in fact attested. Thirdly, I outline a working hypothesis, outlining that the MP refers to single and specific action close to hearer and speaker and is only allowed with the epistemic modality (as in Allan’s 2013 framework). Fourthly, I provide the fact and figures and then, I start with the actual analysis. I find that there are no “future-desideratives” with an MP in the Odyssey and that only a very limited number of (future-)subjunctives are used with an MP in the main clause. This is due to the fact that most of these forms have a desiderative, voluntative and/or exhortative meaning, which are all three incompatibles with the use of the MP. Besides the passages where the rules seem to be observed, I also discuss those in which the rules seem to have been violated, there are different variants attested or more than one interpretation possible
In their recent discussion of the (alleged) Graeco-Anatolian Sprachbund Domenica Romagno listed t... more In their recent discussion of the (alleged) Graeco-Anatolian Sprachbund Domenica Romagno listed three and Michele Bianconi four possible morpho-syntactic isoglosses between Anatolian and Greek (Romagno 2015: 436-440, Bianconi 2015: 149-160). In this extensive article, I address one of them: the use of a modal particle (MP henceforth) to indicate potential, futurative and counterfactual meaning (in the terminology of Classical Philology the term "irrealis" is used), in Greek this is ἄν and in Hittite man. By focusing on the Homeric evidence I will show that the assumption of a Sprachbund is not supported by the evidence. For my analysis I focus on epic Greek, and use Iliad 16 as basis, and when that book does not have sufficient instances, a corpus of 5267 verses from the Iliad (books 1, 5, 9, 11, 16, 22, 24). After pointing out some general problems in equalling the Hittite and Greek "modal particles" (§2), I will show that the MP had deictic and emphatic value in epic Greek and was used predominantly in speeches, and did not convey modal meaning (§3), that a sharp distinction between possibility, remote possibility and unreality cannot be made in epic Greek, that the optative was the original mood in the counterfactual and potential constructions, that it was the mood that communicated the notion of (remote) possibility and contrafactitivity and that the use of the indicative mood was an inner-Greek innovation that had not yet been completed at the time of epic Greek (§4).
Studia Linguistica Universitatis Iagellonicae Cracoviensis, 2022
In epic Greek both the optative and the indicative (the so-called “modal indicative”) can be used... more In epic Greek both the optative and the indicative (the so-called “modal indicative”) can be used in contexts where the degree of realization is uncertain or even impossible, while in Attic Greek only the indicative is used. In these two articles I discuss whether there is a difference between the optative and the modal indicative in these contexts and/or if it can be determined which was the original mood. As there are about 1500 optatives and 250 modal indicatives in Homer, it is not possible to discuss them all and, therefore, I focus on the passages in which aorist forms of γιγνώσκω, βάλλω and of ἴδον appear, and those conditional constructions in the Odyssey in which the postposed conditional clause is introduced by εἰ μή with either a “modal” indicative or optative. The corpus comprises 100 forms (80 optatives and 20 indicatives), but in each example I also address the other modal indicatives and optatives in the passages, which adds another 50 forms to the corpus. In this part (part 1) I address the optative. First, I provide an overview of the research on the optative in Homeric Greek, discuss the different suggestions for the co-existence of the optative and indicative in these uncertain and/or unreal contexts, explanations which can be summarized into two categories, those assuming that the indicative replaced the optative and those arguing that both moods were original, but had different meanings. Then I explain why this corpus was chosen, prior to the analysis that focuses on two elements, namely the temporal reference (does the mood refer to the past or not) and the degree of possibility (is the action described likely, pos¬sible, remotely possible or unlikely/impossible). Initially I consider the optatives with a past reference, then the optatives that could be interpreted as remotely possible or unlikely/impossible (“irrealis” in the terminology of Classical Philology) and conclude by discussing two passages that have been reused in the epics in different contexts with different protagonists and, consequently, with different modal meanings for the same forms. The conclusion of the first part of the article is that the optative was at the most unreal extreme of the irrealis-continuum and could initially refer to the present and future, as well as the past, but that the instances in which there was an exclusive past reference were (very) rare.
This article addresses the augment use in Book 10 of the Iliad (the so-called Doloneia). As most ... more This article addresses the augment use in Book 10 of the Iliad (the so-called Doloneia). As most scholars assume that this book is not genuinely Homeric, but a later addition to the Iliad, it could serve as a test case to see if the explanations I provided elsewhere for the augment use are valid for later works as well or if the author(s) of these later works use(s) the augment as a metrical tool. I distinguish between forms that are metrically secure (type A), forms that can be determined by internal reconstruction and comparison (type B) and forms that are insecure and undeterminable (type C). The A and B forms are subjected to a syntactic, semantic and pragmatic analysis. For the syntactic analysis, I investigate the clitic and the reduction rule. For the semantics, I start from observations on the augment use by various scholars who stated that the augmented forms refer to recent past actions, close to speaker and hearer, and that the augment highlights the more pivotal elements in the story or that is a kind of evidential marker indicating that the speaker or narrator vouches for his statement by claiming that he has “witnessed” the events himself; the absence of the augment would mean that the speaker has no direct knowledge of it and/or does not want to make an emphatic statement about it). The analysis shows that the augment use in Iliad 10 can indeed be explained by these semantic and pragmatic factors, whereas a metrical explanation would require a much more random distribution.
In this article, I discuss the use and absence of the augment in the 3 rd singular forms ἔδωκ(ε)(... more In this article, I discuss the use and absence of the augment in the 3 rd singular forms ἔδωκ(ε)(ν) and δῶκ(ε)(ν) in the Iliad. This article is a continuation of earlier research into the augment in other epic works (Odyssey, Hesiod, the Homeric Hymns and the Epic Cycle) and other verbal roots (such as ἔθηκε / θῆκε and ἔειπε / εἶπε), but as all these works and verbs have their own semantics, I decided to perform individual investigations, the data of which are then compared and contrasted with the data of the entire Homeric works. In order to have reliable data that are not influenced by the transmission, I only use the metrically secure forms. First, I list the criteria to determine whether or not a form can be considered secured by the metre (metrical bridges, caesurae, and permitted and prohibited elisions) and then apply these rules to all instances of ἔδωκ(ε)(ν) and δῶκ(ε)(ν) in the Iliad. Once the corpus has been established, I analyse the forms and the passages in which they occur. In my analysis I check if they agree with the previous syntactic and semantic observations that have been made for the use and absence of the augment (Drewitt-Beck's clitic rule, Kiparsky's reduction rule and the distinctions between speech and narrative, foreground and background, and remote and recent past). Occasionally, the data of the corpus were too small to allow for a judgement, but in those instances, to decide on the issue, I compared the results obtained in my investigation to the data of the entire Iliad and/or Odyssey. The current investigation does indeed confirm the findings of earlier research, namely that the use of augmented and unaugmented forms is not governed by chance or the metre, but by syntactic and semantic factors. As a final caveat it has to be added, however, that some exceptions do remain and that none of the rules quoted above is absolute.
In this article I address the use of the optative (appearing alone or in in contrast with the sub... more In this article I address the use of the optative (appearing alone or in in contrast with the subjunctive or indicative) in Iliad 2,1-493 (the part before the Catalogue of Ships starts). This part of the book describes Agamemnon’s (failed) attempts to rouse the army and Odysseus’ intervention to restore the damage caused by Agamemnon’s blunder(s). In these lines there are about 110 subjunctive and optative forms, and they provide a small but reliable corpus of instances in different constructions and are therefore sufficient to serve as basis for an investigation and can be used to check if results acquired in other investigations can be confirmed or refuted. As the optative is the mood with the widest array of uses (from the unreal to the almost-certain-future), I focus on the passages in which the optative is used, either alone or in contrast with the subjunctive or indicative.
This is the summary and the abstract of our contribution in the proceedings of the Delbrück-confe... more This is the summary and the abstract of our contribution in the proceedings of the Delbrück-conference, but we cannot post the entire article here. In this article, we investigate Delbrück’s analysis of the cases by discussing the case ending -φι in Homer. He himself treated the issue on three occasions and stated that this case form remained insufficiently and unsatisfactorily explained. Initially, he argued that the original meaning was the instrumental-comitative, expanded with locative and ablative functions and the original number was the plural. Later, however, he assumed that the ending could also be used for the genitive and the dative. As Mycenaean had not been discovered at his time and he could therefore not have included it, we focus in our analysis solely on -φι in Homer and only refer to Mycenaean sparingly. First, we provide an overview of the scholarship on Homer, distinguishing between the scholars writing before the decipherment (including Delbrück) and the ones after it. In a second step, we determine our corpus by discussing some passages with uncertain transmission (αὐτόφι versus αὐτόθι and Ἰλιόφι κλυτὰ τείχεα). We then provide the figures and proceed to the actual analysis. We start with number, animacy and concreteness, then discuss the case usages - locative, instrumental, object marking - and the use of the forms with prepositions. After that, we take a closer look at the distribution of the forms and their co-occurrence with genitive and dative forms in the same sentence and the same syntagma. At the end of the article, we analyse the instances for which more than one interpretation is possible. Our analysis shows that the suffix is numerus-indifferent and that instances with an unambiguous plural are relatively uncommon, that the suffix appears almost exclusively with inanimate entities, is used predominantly with concrete elements, has often instrumental and locative meaning, but can also be used as an ablative and is very common with prepositions (more than half of the instances). Our findings differ from what Delbrück himself noted in two respects, namely the lack of animacy and the lack of plural meaning, and from the data in Mycenaean in three respects, namely the mostly singular meaning of the suffix (in Mycenaean, the suffix is almost exclusively used in the plural), its common use with prepositions and with the ablative and locative-directive functions (these two uses are very rare in Mycenaean). They also make the interpretation of the ending as a simple oblique case marker or a simple poetic tool less likely and shed new light on the original function and the origin of the ending and its use in Proto-Indo-European (PIE) and other Indo-European languages, but that discussion cannot be performed in the current article.
This is the summary and the abstract of my contribution in the proceedings of the Delbrück-confer... more This is the summary and the abstract of my contribution in the proceedings of the Delbrück-conference, but I cannot post the entire article here.
In this article, I provide an overview and analysis of Berthold Delbrück’s contributions to the field of verbal morphosyntax in Homer, discussing the following issues: the use of the moods, the differences between them, (apparently) special uses and the “rise” of the indicative; the use of the modal particles (MP) in epic Greek; the injunctive and the augment in (Vedic and) Homeric Greek; the use and interaction of tense and aspect; the origins of the “Ionic-epic” iterative forms in -σκ-; the origins of subordination, parataxis and hypotaxis. In my analyses, I first describe his findings, compare them to earlier scholarship at the time, then contrast and / or expand it with later scholarship, pass my “judgement” on them and finally apply them to disputed passages. It goes without saying that an extensive discussion of (the bibliography of) all these issues cannot be performed here (for this, the reader is referred to other works). I hope that the article will show that, while Delbrück was not always the πρῶτος εὑρετής, he was nevertheless the first to provide an in-depth analysis for many syntactical issues and that most of his observations have been confirmed. In some cases, alternative explanations were also possible (this applies to the use of the aspect of the verba dicendi, the origin of the iterative forms, the use of the injunctive in Greek and the origin, use and meaning of the augment).
This article investigates the co-occurrence of iterative forms in-σκ-, unaugmented and augmented ... more This article investigates the co-occurrence of iterative forms in-σκ-, unaugmented and augmented verb forms in Iliad 24. I first give an in-depth overview of the scholarship on the origin (§ 2) and meaning (§ 3) of the suffix. Second, I describe how I determine my corpus of metrically secure forms (§ 4). As the transmission of the text is not always secure, I restrict myself to those forms where the presence or absence of the augment is guaranteed by the metre. Third, I discuss in great length the previous scholarship on the origin and meaning of the augment (§ 5), focusing particularly on the theories by Lazzeroni and Willi, before proceeding to the actual analysis of the passages in Book 24 where iterative forms, unaugmented and augmented forms co-occur, including the forms ἔσκε and ἦ(ε)ν. I argue (§ 6 and § 7) that (a) the iterative suffix marks repeated actions and is different from the unaugmented forms without suffix, (b) that the forms with suffix can be used to contrast the repeated actions of one (group of) protagonist(s) with that of the other(s), (c) the augmented forms convey emphasis and highlighting and (d) the unaugmented forms describe the background and scene setting or appear in negated sentences that refer to past actions that never occurred and can never happen anymore in the future. At the end I also mention the exceptions to the rules.
In this article I analyse the use of the augment in the Apologoi (Books 9 to 12 of the Odyssey). ... more In this article I analyse the use of the augment in the Apologoi (Books 9 to 12 of the Odyssey). I first explain why I have chosen this work and these books. Second, I describe my methodology in analysing and determining my corpus. As the transmission of the Homeric poems has been problematic, I decided to work only with the forms that are secured by the metre and I therefore describe which morphological rules, metrical laws and bridges render the augment in a form secure (or not). Based on that corpus, I proceed to the actual analysis. In analysing the data I compare the previous (morphological, syntactic and semantic) observations on the augment to the data of the Apologoi. My findings show that the explanation of the augment as a foregrounding device is largely confirmed, but that there are nevertheless exceptions.
In this article, I will address the use of the modal particle (MP) with the subjunctive in the ma... more In this article, I will address the use of the modal particle (MP) with the subjunctive in the main clauses in the Odyssey. I choose this feature, because this is a usage that is unknown to Attic and even in Ionic this is extremely rare. I first explain how the corpus was obtained, as the forms described as “future indicatives” in the grammars of Classical Greek descend either from the Indo-European desiderative and will be called “future-desideratives” here, or are metrically equivalent to the subjunctive of the sigmatic aorist, and as in the vast majority of cases, the distinction between desiderative and aorist subjunctive cannot be made, these forms are catalogued as “future-subjunctives”. In a second step, I discuss some of the textual issues that could arise in determining whether or not the MP was in fact attested. Thirdly, I outline a working hypothesis, outlining that the MP refers to single and specific action close to hearer and speaker and is only allowed with the epistemic modality (as in Allan’s 2013 framework). Fourthly, I provide the fact and figures and then, I start with the actual analysis. I find that there are no “future-desideratives” with an MP in the Odyssey and that only a very limited number of (future-)subjunctives are used with an MP in the main clause. This is due to the fact that most of these forms have a desiderative, voluntative and/or exhortative meaning, which are all three incompatibles with the use of the MP. Besides the passages where the rules seem to be observed, I also discuss those in which the rules seem to have been violated, there are different variants attested or more than one interpretation possible
In their recent discussion of the (alleged) Graeco-Anatolian Sprachbund Domenica Romagno listed t... more In their recent discussion of the (alleged) Graeco-Anatolian Sprachbund Domenica Romagno listed three and Michele Bianconi four possible morpho-syntactic isoglosses between Anatolian and Greek (Romagno 2015: 436-440, Bianconi 2015: 149-160). In this extensive article, I address one of them: the use of a modal particle (MP henceforth) to indicate potential, futurative and counterfactual meaning (in the terminology of Classical Philology the term "irrealis" is used), in Greek this is ἄν and in Hittite man. By focusing on the Homeric evidence I will show that the assumption of a Sprachbund is not supported by the evidence. For my analysis I focus on epic Greek, and use Iliad 16 as basis, and when that book does not have sufficient instances, a corpus of 5267 verses from the Iliad (books 1, 5, 9, 11, 16, 22, 24). After pointing out some general problems in equalling the Hittite and Greek "modal particles" (§2), I will show that the MP had deictic and emphatic value in epic Greek and was used predominantly in speeches, and did not convey modal meaning (§3), that a sharp distinction between possibility, remote possibility and unreality cannot be made in epic Greek, that the optative was the original mood in the counterfactual and potential constructions, that it was the mood that communicated the notion of (remote) possibility and contrafactitivity and that the use of the indicative mood was an inner-Greek innovation that had not yet been completed at the time of epic Greek (§4).
Studia Linguistica Universitatis Iagellonicae Cracoviensis, 2022
In epic Greek both the optative and the indicative (the so-called “modal indicative”) can be used... more In epic Greek both the optative and the indicative (the so-called “modal indicative”) can be used in contexts where the degree of realization is uncertain or even impossible, while in Attic Greek only the indicative is used. In these two articles I discuss whether there is a difference between the optative and the modal indicative in these contexts and/or if it can be determined which was the original mood. As there are about 1500 optatives and 250 modal indicatives in Homer, it is not possible to discuss them all and, therefore, I focus on the passages in which aorist forms of γιγνώσκω, βάλλω and of ἴδον appear, and those conditional constructions in the Odyssey in which the postposed conditional clause is introduced by εἰ μή with either a “modal” indicative or optative. The corpus comprises 100 forms (80 optatives and 20 indicatives), but in each example I also address the other modal indicatives and optatives in the passages, which adds another 50 forms to the corpus. In this part (part 1) I address the optative. First, I provide an overview of the research on the optative in Homeric Greek, discuss the different suggestions for the co-existence of the optative and indicative in these uncertain and/or unreal contexts, explanations which can be summarized into two categories, those assuming that the indicative replaced the optative and those arguing that both moods were original, but had different meanings. Then I explain why this corpus was chosen, prior to the analysis that focuses on two elements, namely the temporal reference (does the mood refer to the past or not) and the degree of possibility (is the action described likely, pos¬sible, remotely possible or unlikely/impossible). Initially I consider the optatives with a past reference, then the optatives that could be interpreted as remotely possible or unlikely/impossible (“irrealis” in the terminology of Classical Philology) and conclude by discussing two passages that have been reused in the epics in different contexts with different protagonists and, consequently, with different modal meanings for the same forms. The conclusion of the first part of the article is that the optative was at the most unreal extreme of the irrealis-continuum and could initially refer to the present and future, as well as the past, but that the instances in which there was an exclusive past reference were (very) rare.
This article addresses the augment use in Book 10 of the Iliad (the so-called Doloneia). As most ... more This article addresses the augment use in Book 10 of the Iliad (the so-called Doloneia). As most scholars assume that this book is not genuinely Homeric, but a later addition to the Iliad, it could serve as a test case to see if the explanations I provided elsewhere for the augment use are valid for later works as well or if the author(s) of these later works use(s) the augment as a metrical tool. I distinguish between forms that are metrically secure (type A), forms that can be determined by internal reconstruction and comparison (type B) and forms that are insecure and undeterminable (type C). The A and B forms are subjected to a syntactic, semantic and pragmatic analysis. For the syntactic analysis, I investigate the clitic and the reduction rule. For the semantics, I start from observations on the augment use by various scholars who stated that the augmented forms refer to recent past actions, close to speaker and hearer, and that the augment highlights the more pivotal elements in the story or that is a kind of evidential marker indicating that the speaker or narrator vouches for his statement by claiming that he has “witnessed” the events himself; the absence of the augment would mean that the speaker has no direct knowledge of it and/or does not want to make an emphatic statement about it). The analysis shows that the augment use in Iliad 10 can indeed be explained by these semantic and pragmatic factors, whereas a metrical explanation would require a much more random distribution.
In this article, I discuss the use and absence of the augment in the 3 rd singular forms ἔδωκ(ε)(... more In this article, I discuss the use and absence of the augment in the 3 rd singular forms ἔδωκ(ε)(ν) and δῶκ(ε)(ν) in the Iliad. This article is a continuation of earlier research into the augment in other epic works (Odyssey, Hesiod, the Homeric Hymns and the Epic Cycle) and other verbal roots (such as ἔθηκε / θῆκε and ἔειπε / εἶπε), but as all these works and verbs have their own semantics, I decided to perform individual investigations, the data of which are then compared and contrasted with the data of the entire Homeric works. In order to have reliable data that are not influenced by the transmission, I only use the metrically secure forms. First, I list the criteria to determine whether or not a form can be considered secured by the metre (metrical bridges, caesurae, and permitted and prohibited elisions) and then apply these rules to all instances of ἔδωκ(ε)(ν) and δῶκ(ε)(ν) in the Iliad. Once the corpus has been established, I analyse the forms and the passages in which they occur. In my analysis I check if they agree with the previous syntactic and semantic observations that have been made for the use and absence of the augment (Drewitt-Beck's clitic rule, Kiparsky's reduction rule and the distinctions between speech and narrative, foreground and background, and remote and recent past). Occasionally, the data of the corpus were too small to allow for a judgement, but in those instances, to decide on the issue, I compared the results obtained in my investigation to the data of the entire Iliad and/or Odyssey. The current investigation does indeed confirm the findings of earlier research, namely that the use of augmented and unaugmented forms is not governed by chance or the metre, but by syntactic and semantic factors. As a final caveat it has to be added, however, that some exceptions do remain and that none of the rules quoted above is absolute.
In this article I address the use of the optative (appearing alone or in in contrast with the sub... more In this article I address the use of the optative (appearing alone or in in contrast with the subjunctive or indicative) in Iliad 2,1-493 (the part before the Catalogue of Ships starts). This part of the book describes Agamemnon’s (failed) attempts to rouse the army and Odysseus’ intervention to restore the damage caused by Agamemnon’s blunder(s). In these lines there are about 110 subjunctive and optative forms, and they provide a small but reliable corpus of instances in different constructions and are therefore sufficient to serve as basis for an investigation and can be used to check if results acquired in other investigations can be confirmed or refuted. As the optative is the mood with the widest array of uses (from the unreal to the almost-certain-future), I focus on the passages in which the optative is used, either alone or in contrast with the subjunctive or indicative.
1. Abstract.
In my presentation, I will discuss the possible origins of the Greek "Genitive Abs... more 1. Abstract.
In my presentation, I will discuss the possible origins of the Greek "Genitive Absolute" construction. Three different explanations have been given, one as an inherited construction from Indo-European (Ruppel (2013: chapter 2, especially pages 39-41), one as a genitive construction of noun and conjunct participle that was reinterpreted as an absolute construction or even a non-liquet (Keydana 1997: 31, 34 - no explicit standpoint was taken in Maiocco 2005). The Indo-European origin is problematic in light that the Anatolian languages do not have this construction (in spite of what Carruba 1966: 41 and Holland 1987 claimed, both suggesting different cases however) and that the other old Indo-European languages all use different cases (the ablative in Latin, the genitive in Greek and the locative in Sanskrit). A non-liquet cannot be discarded, but cannot be (dis)proved either. This leaves us with the inner-Greek explanation, according to which the construction was in origin a genitive noun with a conjunct participle that was then reinterpreted as an absolute construction. The details in that scenario differ, as many argue that the genitive of time was the starting point (as e.g. Classen 1867: 176-188), whereas others suspect that the genitive of cause, and/or of circumstance and/or the object genitive might have played a role as well (Wentzel 1811: 24-26, Delbrück 1897: 484-485, Brugmann 1900: 523-524, Schwyzer & Debrunner 1950: 398-399). Others argued that the participle was the basis (a possible example of this could be Iliad 19,418, not discussed in any of the works on the issue, only explained -differently- in De Decker 2015: 154-155), while some even explained the construction as an ellipsis of a causal preposition (such as héneka or khárin "because of"). While for all three explanations, elements can be found in the oldest Greek literary texts (the Mycenaean texts do not have any undisputed examples), the explanation as an extension of and the creation of new construction of a noun and conjunct participle, based the different adverbial usages of the genitive (and not simply the temporal one) seems to be most plausible one (a very clear example is Iliad 4,494). Two additional elements argue in favour of this: first, in the old Indo-European languages that have an absolute construction, the case that is being used, is the adverbial case par excellence and second, there are parallels for the secondary origins of an absolute construction by reinterpretation of a certain construction or syntactic errors, as can be seen in the creation of the Latin Nominative Absolute (as elaborated in Galdi 2017 and Galdi & De Decker 2022). In my presentation, I will discuss several examples and argue that even the examples used to prove that the genitive absolute was already fully established in Homeric Greek (e.g. Iliad 1,88-92), can still be interpreted as an original noun and conjunct participle and will draw a parallel with the absolute constructions of later Latin.
2. References.
Brugmann, K. 1900. Griechische Grammatik. München.
Carruba, O. 1966. Das Beschwörungsritual für die Göttin Wišurijanza. Studien zu den Boğazköy-Texten 2.Wiesbaden.
Classen, J. 1867. Beobachtungen über den homerischen Sprachgebrauch. Frankfurt.
De Decker, F. 2015. A Morpho-Syntactic Analysis of Speech Introductions and Conclusions in Homer. PhD Thesis Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München.
Delbrück, B. 1897. Vergleichende Syntax der indogermanischen Sprachen. II. Strassburg.
Galdi, G. 2017. Zum sogenannten Nominativus Absolutus im Lateinischen: Neue Auslegungen zu einem alten Problem. Symbolae Osloenses 91. 28-80.
Galdi, G. & De Decker, F. 2022. Preliminary Observations on the Nominative Absolute in Latin. In: Haverling, G. (ed.) Studies on Late and Vulgar Latin in the Early 21st Century. Uppsala. 142-165.
Holland, G. 1987. Nominal Sentences and the Origin of Absolute Constructions in Indo-European. (Kuhns) Zeitschrift für vergleichende Sprachforschung 100. 163-193.
Keydana, G. 1997. Absolute Konstruktionen in altindogermanischen Sprachen. Göttingen.
Kunst, K. 1922. Vom Wesen und Ursprung des absoluten Genitivs. Glotta 12. 29-50.
Maiocco, M. 2005. Absolute Participial Constructions. Alessandria.
Ruppel, A. 2013. Absolute constructions in early Indo-European. Cambridge.
Schwyzer, E. 1942. Zum sog. Genitivus Absolutus statt Participium Coniunctum im Griechischen. Emerita 10. 98-104.
Schwyzer, E. & Debrunner, A. 1950. Griechische Grammatik. Teil II. Syntax. München.
Spieker, E. 1885. On the So-Called genitive Absolute and its Use, Especially in the Attic Orators. American Journal of Philology 6. 310-343.
Wentzel, E. 1811. De genitivis et dativis linguae graecae, quos absolutos vocant. Dissertatio. Bratislava.
3. Acknowledgements.
This research was conducted during the project Particles in Greek and Hittite as Expression of Mood and Modality (PaGHEMMo), which has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Grant Agreement Number 101018097.
In my presentation I intend to analyze the use and absence of the modal particle (MP) in Epic Gre... more In my presentation I intend to analyze the use and absence of the modal particle (MP) in Epic Greek. I will first provide a brief overview of existing literature on the subject. Secondly, I will determine my corpus, addressing some morphological problems (such as determining whether a form is a subjunctive aorist or future indicative) and textually disputed instances. Afterwards I will provide facts and figures for the Iliad and Odyssey per type of sentence and per tense and mood.
In my presentation I intend to analyze the use and absence of the modal particle (MP) in Epic Gre... more In my presentation I intend to analyze the use and absence of the modal particle (MP) in Epic Greek. I will first provide a brief overview of existing literature on the subject. Secondly, I will determine my corpus, addressing some morphological problems (such as determining whether a form is a subjunctive aorist or future indicative) and textually disputed instances. Afterwards I will provide facts and figures for the Iliad and Odyssey per type of sentence and per tense and mood.
These are the slides of a presentation held on 19.I.2022 at the Linguistisches Kolloquium of the ... more These are the slides of a presentation held on 19.I.2022 at the Linguistisches Kolloquium of the Ludwig Maximilians Universität München, in which I treated the (non-)existence of morphosyntactic isoglosses, contact-induced or not, between Greek and Anatolian.
This is the abstract of a presentation held on 19.I.2022 at the Linguistisches Kolloquium of the ... more This is the abstract of a presentation held on 19.I.2022 at the Linguistisches Kolloquium of the Ludwig Maximilians Universität München, in which I treated the (non-)existence of morphosyntactic isoglosses, contact-induced or not, between Greek and Anatolian. The text of the presentation has been published, but is still under embargo.
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Papers by Filip De Decker
In this article, we investigate Delbrück’s analysis of the cases by discussing the case ending -φι in Homer. He himself treated the issue on three occasions and stated that this case form remained insufficiently and unsatisfactorily explained. Initially, he argued that the original meaning was the instrumental-comitative, expanded with locative and ablative functions and the original number was the plural. Later, however, he assumed that the ending could also be used for the genitive and the dative. As Mycenaean had not been discovered at his time and he could therefore not have included it, we focus in our analysis solely on -φι in Homer and only refer to Mycenaean sparingly. First, we provide an overview of the scholarship on Homer, distinguishing between the scholars writing before the decipherment (including Delbrück) and the ones after it. In a second step, we determine our corpus by discussing some passages with uncertain transmission (αὐτόφι versus αὐτόθι and Ἰλιόφι κλυτὰ τείχεα). We then provide the figures and proceed to the actual analysis. We start with number, animacy and concreteness, then discuss the case usages - locative, instrumental, object marking - and the use of the forms with prepositions. After that, we take a closer look at the distribution of the forms and their co-occurrence with genitive and dative forms in the same sentence and the same syntagma. At the end of the article, we analyse the instances for which more than one interpretation is possible. Our analysis shows that the suffix is numerus-indifferent and that instances with an unambiguous plural are relatively uncommon, that the suffix appears almost exclusively with inanimate entities, is used predominantly with concrete elements, has often instrumental and locative meaning, but can also be used as an ablative and is very common with prepositions (more than half of the instances). Our findings differ from what Delbrück himself noted in two respects, namely the lack of animacy and the lack of plural meaning, and from the data in Mycenaean in three respects, namely the mostly singular meaning of the suffix (in Mycenaean, the suffix is almost exclusively used in the plural), its common use with prepositions and with the ablative and locative-directive functions (these two uses are very rare in Mycenaean). They also make the interpretation of the ending as a simple oblique case marker or a simple poetic tool less likely and shed new light on the original function and the origin of the ending and its use in Proto-Indo-European (PIE) and other Indo-European languages, but that discussion cannot be performed in the current article.
In this article, I provide an overview and analysis of Berthold Delbrück’s contributions to the field of verbal morphosyntax in Homer, discussing the following issues: the use of the moods, the differences between them, (apparently) special uses and the “rise” of the indicative; the use of the modal particles (MP) in epic Greek; the injunctive and the augment in (Vedic and) Homeric Greek; the use and interaction of tense and aspect; the origins of the “Ionic-epic” iterative forms in -σκ-; the origins of subordination, parataxis and hypotaxis. In my analyses, I first describe his findings, compare them to earlier scholarship at the time, then contrast and / or expand it with later scholarship, pass my “judgement” on them and finally apply them to disputed passages. It goes without saying that an extensive discussion of (the bibliography of) all these issues cannot be performed here (for this, the reader is referred to other works). I hope that the article will show that, while Delbrück was not always the πρῶτος εὑρετής, he was nevertheless the first to provide an in-depth analysis for many syntactical issues and that most of his observations have been confirmed. In some cases, alternative explanations were also possible (this applies to the use of the aspect of the verba dicendi, the origin of the iterative forms, the use of the injunctive in Greek and the origin, use and meaning of the augment).
In this extensive article, I address one of them:
the use of a modal particle (MP henceforth) to indicate potential, futurative and counterfactual meaning (in the terminology of Classical Philology the term "irrealis" is used), in Greek this is ἄν and in Hittite man.
By focusing on the Homeric evidence I will show that the assumption of a Sprachbund is not supported by the evidence. For my analysis I focus on epic Greek, and use Iliad 16 as basis, and when that book does not have sufficient instances, a corpus of 5267 verses from the Iliad (books 1, 5, 9, 11, 16, 22, 24). After pointing out some general problems in equalling the Hittite and Greek "modal particles" (§2), I will show that the MP had deictic and emphatic value in epic Greek and was used predominantly in speeches, and did not convey modal meaning (§3), that a sharp distinction between possibility, remote possibility and unreality cannot be made in epic Greek, that the optative was the original mood in the counterfactual and potential constructions, that it was the mood that communicated the notion of (remote) possibility and contrafactitivity and that the use of the indicative mood was an inner-Greek innovation that had not yet been completed at the time of epic Greek (§4).
In this article, we investigate Delbrück’s analysis of the cases by discussing the case ending -φι in Homer. He himself treated the issue on three occasions and stated that this case form remained insufficiently and unsatisfactorily explained. Initially, he argued that the original meaning was the instrumental-comitative, expanded with locative and ablative functions and the original number was the plural. Later, however, he assumed that the ending could also be used for the genitive and the dative. As Mycenaean had not been discovered at his time and he could therefore not have included it, we focus in our analysis solely on -φι in Homer and only refer to Mycenaean sparingly. First, we provide an overview of the scholarship on Homer, distinguishing between the scholars writing before the decipherment (including Delbrück) and the ones after it. In a second step, we determine our corpus by discussing some passages with uncertain transmission (αὐτόφι versus αὐτόθι and Ἰλιόφι κλυτὰ τείχεα). We then provide the figures and proceed to the actual analysis. We start with number, animacy and concreteness, then discuss the case usages - locative, instrumental, object marking - and the use of the forms with prepositions. After that, we take a closer look at the distribution of the forms and their co-occurrence with genitive and dative forms in the same sentence and the same syntagma. At the end of the article, we analyse the instances for which more than one interpretation is possible. Our analysis shows that the suffix is numerus-indifferent and that instances with an unambiguous plural are relatively uncommon, that the suffix appears almost exclusively with inanimate entities, is used predominantly with concrete elements, has often instrumental and locative meaning, but can also be used as an ablative and is very common with prepositions (more than half of the instances). Our findings differ from what Delbrück himself noted in two respects, namely the lack of animacy and the lack of plural meaning, and from the data in Mycenaean in three respects, namely the mostly singular meaning of the suffix (in Mycenaean, the suffix is almost exclusively used in the plural), its common use with prepositions and with the ablative and locative-directive functions (these two uses are very rare in Mycenaean). They also make the interpretation of the ending as a simple oblique case marker or a simple poetic tool less likely and shed new light on the original function and the origin of the ending and its use in Proto-Indo-European (PIE) and other Indo-European languages, but that discussion cannot be performed in the current article.
In this article, I provide an overview and analysis of Berthold Delbrück’s contributions to the field of verbal morphosyntax in Homer, discussing the following issues: the use of the moods, the differences between them, (apparently) special uses and the “rise” of the indicative; the use of the modal particles (MP) in epic Greek; the injunctive and the augment in (Vedic and) Homeric Greek; the use and interaction of tense and aspect; the origins of the “Ionic-epic” iterative forms in -σκ-; the origins of subordination, parataxis and hypotaxis. In my analyses, I first describe his findings, compare them to earlier scholarship at the time, then contrast and / or expand it with later scholarship, pass my “judgement” on them and finally apply them to disputed passages. It goes without saying that an extensive discussion of (the bibliography of) all these issues cannot be performed here (for this, the reader is referred to other works). I hope that the article will show that, while Delbrück was not always the πρῶτος εὑρετής, he was nevertheless the first to provide an in-depth analysis for many syntactical issues and that most of his observations have been confirmed. In some cases, alternative explanations were also possible (this applies to the use of the aspect of the verba dicendi, the origin of the iterative forms, the use of the injunctive in Greek and the origin, use and meaning of the augment).
In this extensive article, I address one of them:
the use of a modal particle (MP henceforth) to indicate potential, futurative and counterfactual meaning (in the terminology of Classical Philology the term "irrealis" is used), in Greek this is ἄν and in Hittite man.
By focusing on the Homeric evidence I will show that the assumption of a Sprachbund is not supported by the evidence. For my analysis I focus on epic Greek, and use Iliad 16 as basis, and when that book does not have sufficient instances, a corpus of 5267 verses from the Iliad (books 1, 5, 9, 11, 16, 22, 24). After pointing out some general problems in equalling the Hittite and Greek "modal particles" (§2), I will show that the MP had deictic and emphatic value in epic Greek and was used predominantly in speeches, and did not convey modal meaning (§3), that a sharp distinction between possibility, remote possibility and unreality cannot be made in epic Greek, that the optative was the original mood in the counterfactual and potential constructions, that it was the mood that communicated the notion of (remote) possibility and contrafactitivity and that the use of the indicative mood was an inner-Greek innovation that had not yet been completed at the time of epic Greek (§4).
In my presentation, I will discuss the possible origins of the Greek "Genitive Absolute" construction. Three different explanations have been given, one as an inherited construction from Indo-European (Ruppel (2013: chapter 2, especially pages 39-41), one as a genitive construction of noun and conjunct participle that was reinterpreted as an absolute construction or even a non-liquet (Keydana 1997: 31, 34 - no explicit standpoint was taken in Maiocco 2005). The Indo-European origin is problematic in light that the Anatolian languages do not have this construction (in spite of what Carruba 1966: 41 and Holland 1987 claimed, both suggesting different cases however) and that the other old Indo-European languages all use different cases (the ablative in Latin, the genitive in Greek and the locative in Sanskrit). A non-liquet cannot be discarded, but cannot be (dis)proved either. This leaves us with the inner-Greek explanation, according to which the construction was in origin a genitive noun with a conjunct participle that was then reinterpreted as an absolute construction. The details in that scenario differ, as many argue that the genitive of time was the starting point (as e.g. Classen 1867: 176-188), whereas others suspect that the genitive of cause, and/or of circumstance and/or the object genitive might have played a role as well (Wentzel 1811: 24-26, Delbrück 1897: 484-485, Brugmann 1900: 523-524, Schwyzer & Debrunner 1950: 398-399). Others argued that the participle was the basis (a possible example of this could be Iliad 19,418, not discussed in any of the works on the issue, only explained -differently- in De Decker 2015: 154-155), while some even explained the construction as an ellipsis of a causal preposition (such as héneka or khárin "because of"). While for all three explanations, elements can be found in the oldest Greek literary texts (the Mycenaean texts do not have any undisputed examples), the explanation as an extension of and the creation of new construction of a noun and conjunct participle, based the different adverbial usages of the genitive (and not simply the temporal one) seems to be most plausible one (a very clear example is Iliad 4,494). Two additional elements argue in favour of this: first, in the old Indo-European languages that have an absolute construction, the case that is being used, is the adverbial case par excellence and second, there are parallels for the secondary origins of an absolute construction by reinterpretation of a certain construction or syntactic errors, as can be seen in the creation of the Latin Nominative Absolute (as elaborated in Galdi 2017 and Galdi & De Decker 2022). In my presentation, I will discuss several examples and argue that even the examples used to prove that the genitive absolute was already fully established in Homeric Greek (e.g. Iliad 1,88-92), can still be interpreted as an original noun and conjunct participle and will draw a parallel with the absolute constructions of later Latin.
2. References.
Brugmann, K. 1900. Griechische Grammatik. München.
Carruba, O. 1966. Das Beschwörungsritual für die Göttin Wišurijanza. Studien zu den Boğazköy-Texten 2.Wiesbaden.
Classen, J. 1867. Beobachtungen über den homerischen Sprachgebrauch. Frankfurt.
De Decker, F. 2015. A Morpho-Syntactic Analysis of Speech Introductions and Conclusions in Homer. PhD Thesis Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München.
Delbrück, B. 1897. Vergleichende Syntax der indogermanischen Sprachen. II. Strassburg.
Galdi, G. 2017. Zum sogenannten Nominativus Absolutus im Lateinischen: Neue Auslegungen zu einem alten Problem. Symbolae Osloenses 91. 28-80.
Galdi, G. & De Decker, F. 2022. Preliminary Observations on the Nominative Absolute in Latin. In: Haverling, G. (ed.) Studies on Late and Vulgar Latin in the Early 21st Century. Uppsala. 142-165.
Holland, G. 1987. Nominal Sentences and the Origin of Absolute Constructions in Indo-European. (Kuhns) Zeitschrift für vergleichende Sprachforschung 100. 163-193.
Keydana, G. 1997. Absolute Konstruktionen in altindogermanischen Sprachen. Göttingen.
Kunst, K. 1922. Vom Wesen und Ursprung des absoluten Genitivs. Glotta 12. 29-50.
Maiocco, M. 2005. Absolute Participial Constructions. Alessandria.
Ruppel, A. 2013. Absolute constructions in early Indo-European. Cambridge.
Schwyzer, E. 1942. Zum sog. Genitivus Absolutus statt Participium Coniunctum im Griechischen. Emerita 10. 98-104.
Schwyzer, E. & Debrunner, A. 1950. Griechische Grammatik. Teil II. Syntax. München.
Spieker, E. 1885. On the So-Called genitive Absolute and its Use, Especially in the Attic Orators. American Journal of Philology 6. 310-343.
Wentzel, E. 1811. De genitivis et dativis linguae graecae, quos absolutos vocant. Dissertatio. Bratislava.
3. Acknowledgements.
This research was conducted during the project Particles in Greek and Hittite as Expression of Mood and Modality (PaGHEMMo), which has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Grant Agreement Number 101018097.