Palmer L.R. The Greek Language
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bhdvas(i), bhávat(i). In Sanskrit the inflexions are par fly primary and partly secondary, but the balance of the
evidence points to the secondary endings for the IE system, of which Greek dialect forms like Arc.
(*eghe-t)
are survivals. Attic-Ionic changed under the influence of the indicative and also generalized
the thematic type. Homeric examples of 1 are
(indic. , , .
Some are used as futures:
(on the middle see below). But. even in Homer the thematic type
encroaches (
/ , / , ) and in the verb 'to be' it is the only form found: ,
contracted to
. On the other hand, forms like may result from quantitative metathesis of ; later
. Another evolution is possible: (with shortening in hiatus), (contraction); thus in
Ionic has , < , the forms with two long vowels being attested in other dialects, e.g.
Delph.
.
In a few verbs the subjunctive stem is made simply by lengthening the vowel: Cret. , Arc. . We may
add the Ionic , for this implies < .
Optaive
There are two types: 1, the thematic verbs use the modal stem suffix *-jeH1-/*-jH1- attached to the zero grade of
the root with the secondary endings: e.g. from *es- 'to be', *sjem, *sjes, *sjet, *sime, *site, *sijent, best preserved
in O.Lat. siem, simus, sient (Skt. syam has generalized the full grade of the modal suffix). In Greek the full grade
of the root apparently occur, but this may be the reflection of a laryngeal *H1s-:
, . With
ablauting verbal stems ending in a vowel the short vowel appears: : in
-verbs a few traces survive of *-nu-i-to > (p. 215); (Horn.), (Attic), but here the thematic
type has prevailed. The same phonetic development of *-ui- appears in
. The short vowel also occurs in
-h aorists, e.g.
, which may be simply due to the analogy of or generalization of the regular
development (Osthoff) of
> this being less probable since the long vowel is retained analogically
in
, etc.
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In post-Classical Greek the full-grade suffix was generalized (
, etc.), but there was a growing encroachment
of the thematic type:
/ / and, as mentioned above, in the verbs.
The thematic optative has the suffix which appears to be a combination of the thematic vowel -o- and the zero
grade of *-je-/*-jH1-: , Skt. bhareyam < *bher-o-j-m *. Greek has substituted the athematic primary ending
for but the expected -a appears in Arcadian . There has been some interaction between the thematic
and athematic types. Thus Homeric
anticipate the regular Attic optatives of such contracted verbs:
, the switch-point being plural forms like , which were equatable with
. The composite stem-suffix subsequently spread to the plural: e.g. , where the
dominant third plural
may also be noted.
The sigmatic aorist is an athematic formation in Cretan (third singular) and (third plural). But
generally the pseudo-thematic -a of this tense (p. 301) has been combined with -i:
. In Attic, however, 2 and 3 appear as , and both types
occur in Homer. Structurally,
appears as an optative formant in the second and third singular and third plural of
the sigmatic aorist. In Arcadian third singular
possibly appears. If these anomalous forms are old, we
may postulate 1, *-sei-m*, 2, -sei-s, 3, -sei-t, 6, *-sei-ent > 1,
, 2, , 3, , 2 and 3 being
transformed to
, on the lines of the indicative . The ultimate origin of or remains an
open question.
Future
Synchronically, the Greek future is a regular component of the conjugational tense system. It is discussed as a
mood since IE lacked this tense, and in all the descendant languages it has developed mainly from the modal forms
(e.g. Lat. ero from subjunctive *eso (see pp. 308f., where Hom.
, etc. are quoted). In a number of IE
languages, however, there are resemblant future formations: Gk.
, etc. (on more composite forms see below),
Lat. faxo, Skt. dasyáti 'he will give',
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Lith. dúosiu 'I will give'. Latin faxo is explicable as the subjunctive of an s-aorist (cf. 'optative' faxim), and the
same origin has been mooted for the main Greek type. What gives pause is a fact of the synchronic structure: the
future often has the e-grade against the zero grade of the aorist and, further, it often appears in the middle voice:
(< ) v. v (with *segh-) v. (with *sgh-), v .
These are striking and anomalous features of the Greek future which are surely old, and it is no answer to say that
Greek might once have had a suitable aorist, since we should have to posit aorists like
, precisely the
type which was strongly expansive in Greek. The proposed explanatory hypothesis carries with it the assumption
that the productive aorist, once having engendered the future, disappeared, leaving the anomalous pair
/
. It is preferable, therefore, to respect the given facts and retain the explanation that these futures are in fact,
like Latin quaeso viso, desideratives. This is supported by the existence of reduplicated futures like
, going
back to an IE type of intensive-desideratives (here with middle inflexions) like Skt. bibhitsa- (bhid-'
split'),yúyutsa- (yudh-' fight'), vivits- (vid-' know),' with the proviso that these have the zero grade of the root.
While these futures originally had no connection with the perfect, their reduplicated forms drew them into its orbit,
so that futures came to be made from the perfect:
, , etc. The active forms of earlier Attic
, later give way to the middle .
Other futures of this class have the stem of the reduplicated aorist:
/ / (
- 'spare'), / .
A third type appears with disyllabic bases in -a and -e, that is with roots extended by laryngeal suffixation, -H2
and H1. The intervocalic -s- is lost so that the future appears as , , e.g. . Prominent in
this formation are verbs ending in nasals and liquids, and for verbs having asigmatic aorists it is the sole type:
; but both / and / occur in conjunction
with s-aorists:
/ / . The types in and were
particularly productive in Attic,
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those in
being preferred by verbs ending in a liquid (and eventually verbs in ), while was used only
rarely in Attic with
verbs: (Homer), etc.; and finally , such futures
occurring with greater frequency in Ionic and the Koine, whereas Attic mostly has
.
The so-called 'Doric future' in
appears also in Homer and in Attic , etc., but only
in the middle, whereas West Greek has active forms
, , etc.). This type looks like a contamination of
the two preceding classes, but Mycenaean has unexpectedly provided evidence of a type
: ewepsesomena is
most plausibly interpreted as 'to be woven' (see p. 50) and so represents the future participle (in a passive sense) of
the verb 'to weave', which appears in alphabetic Greek only in the zero grade *wbh-:
, 'web', 'weave'.
The full grade appears in other IE languages (cf. Engl. web, weave); there is no evidence for an initial laryngeal (p.
222). Thus the Myc. future is to be traced to
, there being no evidence for the length of the vowel of the
suffix. This supports the view that Myc. asesosi is the future of
'sate', 'fill with drink' (<*H2es-) and is to be
interpreted
. Thus the 'Doric' future may be grouped with this type, i.e. with the phonetic development
> .
Future Passives
That the middle form could have passive meaning at an early date has just emerged, and Homer attests a similar
usage:
'it will be destroyed'. Another passive type was based on the intransitive aorists in -h-, (p. 302).
The only Homeric examples are
and , but there was considerable production in Attic from the
fifth century B.C. on: , etc.
V Verbal Nouns and Adjectives
The IE verbal system comprised a number of adjectival forms, the 'participles'. The suffix -nt- is found in all IE
languages, and these formations had an archaic type of declension: for instance, the participle of *es- 'to be' had
the root in the zero grade, while the suffix had the Ablaut grades *-on/-ont-/-nt *:
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singular nominative *son, accusative *sontm *, genitive *sntos*, locative *snti*, plural nominative *sóntes,
accusative *sontns*, genitive *sntom*, locative *snt-su*. The feminine was *snti* (or *snt-*jH2). Greek
apparently has the full grade of the root (unless
represents *H1s-) and has generalized the full grade of the
suffix *-ont, with the exception of the vrddhied nominative singular
. This is so also in the feminine ( <
*H1s-ont-jH2), but there are dialect forms
(Myc. and Arc.) which go back to . Zero grade of the
suffix is also indirectly attested in the Heraclean dative plural
, which is a remodelling of < *s-nt-si*.
Zero grade of the root must be postulated 1, for Attic
/ (since the neuter form cannot<*es-on) and 2, < *ei-
'go'.
Athematic stems ending in a vowel have the suffix -nt- (
, etc.), and this group
includes the sigmatic aorists (
, etc.). The thematic verbs also add -nt- to the stem, but the vowel is solely -o-:
, (<*lu-ont-jH2), etc.
The perfect participle active is formed with the suffix /*-us-, the corresponding feminine formant being *-
us-jH2. In Sanskrit the zero grade of the root appears both in the masculine vidvan (gen. vidusas) and the feminine
vialusi. In Greek the feminine
regularly<*wid-usjH2, cf. further Myc. araruja. In the masculine, on the
evidence of Gothic 'witness', the unreduplicated form will be ancient, but the Myc. presents
widwoijo = widwo(h)ios, i.e. a derivative showing widwos-, the zero grade of the root. The conclusion is that in the
IE declension the root had zero grade in the oblique cases; Greek generalized the full grade in the masculine/neuter
and Sanskrit the zero grade, while the feminine, as a derived form, is based on the zero grade. In the reduplicated
perfect the root was originally in the zero grade, e.g. Myc. tetukwo(ha) (later
), Hom. . As
for the suffix in alphabetic Greek, except for
/ and the feminine, all the cases have -wot- ( , etc.). A
dental stem appears also in the Sanskrit declension, e.g. singular nominative neuter vidvat, instrumental plural
vidvadbhis, but the resemblance has been dismissed as accidental: Linear B allegedly proves that the Greek
development was post-Mycenaean and so independent of the Sanskrit innovations. However, it would be hazardous
to
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assume that the Linear B texts give us a complete picture of the Greek dialects of the Mycenaean age.
In the present participle middle the suffix is
for the present, the aorist and the perfect, except that the last has
the accent
. If these were originally adjectives derived by means of the accented thematic vowel from verbal
nouns in *-men, the suffix would be -mnó-, with the zero grade still preserved in Lat. alumnus and the
substantivized
. Such an origin would imply that the insertion of the vowel in Greek is an innovation,
which appears to imply the attachment of the thematic vowel to a noun of the structure
.
The adjectives in -tó- are not strictly speaking participles and have no connection with a tense stem, the suffix
being added to the zero grade of the root: e.g.
(*klew-/klu-), (*ten- / tn- *). The meaning was not
originally passive or active, but more generally 'susceptible to the action of the verb', so that, according to the
context, such adjectives may be either active or passive or express possibility:
(*mr-to-s*) does not mean
'dead' but 'susceptible to dying'. This word was probably created from
'immortal', since -tó- was used by
preference in compound adjectives corresponding to simple adjectives in
(p. 257). The gerundive in , on
the Mycenaean evidence, is not to be connected with Skt. -tavya, but is a parallel formation from -ti- nouns, i.e.<*-
tejo- rather than from-tu-/-tew- (p. 51).
Infinitives
These are, in origin, cases of verbal nouns which in IE had no systematic connection with the verbal conjugation.
The underlying noun stems contained a general reference to the verbal event, but there was no connection with any
'tense'. The systematic development of present, future, aorist and perfect infinitives was a Greek innovation, as was
the distinction of voice, for the verbal nouns were neutral in this respect. This state of affairs persisted in Vedic
Sanskrit, which has a rich variety of noun forms in different cases (accusative, dative, ablative, genitive and
locative) with infinitival function. Classical Sanskrit has only one infinitive in -rum, this being the accusative of a
-tu- stem (like the Latin supine), whereas in Vedic the dative is by far the most frequent type of 'infinitive', this
case having
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'final' function. In Greek the dialectal distribution is the result of independent selection from a wide range of
choice. In the active there is a preponderance of -n- suffixes, *-en-, *-sen-, *-men-, *-wen-, which appear to have
been formally locatives with zero inflexion. The first two, -en- and -sen- (for the type
cf. Skt. ne-sán-i 'to
lead'), appear in the active infinitives of the thematic verbs'
is found in Arcadian and certain Doric dialects; -
ehen in Myc. ekee = ekhehen; the contracted form
or in most alphabetic Greek dialects. The athematic
verbs have
in Attic-Ionic, Arcado-Cypriot and Homer ( < *es-nai, etc.); in Lesbian and Homer (
, etc.); and ( , etc.) in West Greek, and in Boeotian, Thessalian and Homer (with secondary
extension to thematic verbs). The last two recall the Vedic type
' to give', while (Cypr.) resembles
daváne 'to give' (cf.
, Skt. vidmáne), but these are simply the datives of verbal nouns da-man-, da-van-, with
-e from *-ei. Greek
, however, which is common to and , is not equatable with any known IE case-
ending, and it must be designated neutrally as a 'particle'. The same particle appears in the infinitive of the s-aorist
, which may be based on s-stems (cf. Skt. áyase 'to go'), but it is open to equation with the Vedic type in
-dhyai (duhddhyai 'to milk'), which would develop to in Greek: e.g. .
In the middle only one suffix appears, ; there is a bare possibility that this is a remodelling of under the
influence of the middle intexions
and (see above).
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BIBLIOGRAPHY
General
Burrow, T., The Sanskrit Language, London (1973).
Chantraine, P., Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue grecque: histoire des mots, Paris (1968-).
Frisk, H., Griechisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, 3 vols., Heidelberg (1961-72).
Hiersche, R., Grundzüge der griechischen Spraehgeschichte, Wiesbaden (1970).
Hoffmann, O., and Debrunner, A., Geschichte der gritchischen Sprache, I, 4th edn. by Scherer, A.; II,
Grundfragen und Grundzüge des nachklassischen Griechisch, 2nd edn. by Scherer, A., Berlin (1969).
Householder, F.W., and Nagy, G., Greek: A Survey of Recent Work, The Hague (1972).
Kretschmer, P., Sprache in Gercke-Norden, Einleitung in die Altertumswissenschaft, I, 6, Leipzig-Berlin (1923), 64
ff.
Kretschmer, P., and Locker, E., Rückläufiges Wörterbuch der griechischen Sprache, 2nd edn., with additions by
Kisser, G., Göttingen (1963).
Liddell, H. G., and Scott, R., A Greek-English Lexicon, 9th edn. by Jones, H. S., with the assistance of McKenzie,
R., Oxford (1940). A Supplement, ed. by Barber, E. A., with the assistance of Maas, P., Scheller, M., and West, M.
L., Oxford (1968).
Meillet, A., Aperçu d'une histoire de la langue grecque, Paris (1913); 8th edn. (with bibliography supplemented by
Masson, O.) (1975).
Meillet, A., Introduction d l'étude comparative des langues indo-européennes, 8th edn., Paris (1937). Reprinted
with a preface by Buck, G. C., Alabama (1964).
Palmer, L. R., The Latin Language, London (1954).
Pisani, V., Manuale storico della lingua greca, and edn., Brescia (1973).
Schwyzer, E., Griechische Grammatik, I, Lautlehre, Wortbildung, Flexion; II (with Debrunner, A.), Syntax; III,
Indexes by Georgacas, D.J.; IV, Stellenregister by Radt, F. and S., Munchen (1939, 1950, 1953, 1971).
Chapter I
Hiersche, 13-39.
Hoffmann-Debrunner, I, 6-25.
Kretschmer, Sprache, 64-75.
Meillet, Aperçu, 3-76.
Schwyzer, Gr. Gr. 48-75.
Caskey, J. L.,' Greece and the Aegean Islands in the Middle Bronze Age', Cambridge Ancient History, 3rd edn.,
Cambridge (1973), II 1, Ch. iv (a), 117-40.
Chadwick, J. (1963), 'The Prehistory of the Greek Language', Cambridge Ancient History, 3rd edn., Cambridge
(1975), II a, Ch. xxxix (a), 805-19.
Croasland, R. A., 'Immigrants from the North', Cambridge Ancient History, 3rd edn., Cambridge (1971), 12, Ch.
xxvii, 824-76.
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Kretschmer, P., Einleitung in die Geschichte der griechischen Sprache, 2nd edn., Göttingen (1970) (1st edn.,
1896).
Laroche, E., ' Linguistique Asianique', Acta Mycenaea (ed. Ruipérez, M. S.), Salamanca (1972), I, 112-35.
Lewy, H., 'Anatolia in the Old Assyrian Period', Cambridge Ancient History, 3rd edn, Cambridge (1971), I 2, Ch.
xxiv (b), 7o7-28.
Mellaart, J., 'Anatolia, c. 4000-2300 B.C.', Cambridge Ancient History, 3rd edn., Cambridge (1971), I 2, Ch. xviii,
373-416.
Mellaart, J.,' Anatolia, c. 2300-1750 B.C.', Cambridge Ancient History, 3rd edn., Cambridge (1971), 12, Ch. xxiv
(a), 681-706.
Palmer, L. R., Mycenaeans and Minoans, 2nd edn., London (1965), Ch. vi 'The Coming of the Greeks', 321-57.
Palmer, L. R., 'Linear B and the Anatolian Languages', Atti e Memorie del 1º Congresso Internazionale di
Micenologia, Rome (1968), I, 339-54.
Vermeule, E., Greece in the Bronze Age, Chicago (1964).
Chapter II
Baumbach, L., Studies in Mycenaean Inscriptions and Dialect, Rome (1968).
Chadwick, J., The Decipherment of Linear B, and edn., Cambridge (1967).
Dow, S., and Chadwick, J., 'The Linear Scripts and the Tablets as Historical Documents', Cambridge Ancient
History, 3rd edn., Cambridge (1973), III, Ch. xiii, 582-626.
Hiller, S., and Panagl, O., Die frühgriechischen Texte aus Mykenischer Zeit, Erträge der Forschung Bd. 49,
Darmstadt (1976).
Landau, O., Mykenisch-griechische Personennamen, Göteborg (1958).
Lejeune, M., Mémoires de philologie mycénienne, I, Paris (1958); II, Rome (1971); III, Rome (1972).
Morpurgo, A., Mycenaeae Graecitatis Lexicon, Rome (1963).
Olivier, J.-P., Godart, L., Seydel, C., and Sourvinou, C., Index généraux du Linéaire B, Incunabula Graeca LII,
Rome (1973).
Palmer, L.R., The Interpretation of Mycenaean Greek Texts, 2nd impression with additions and corrections,
Oxford (1969).
Palmer, L. R., and Boardman, J., On the Knossos Tablets, Oxford (1963).
Ruijgh, C.J., Études sur la grammaire et le vocabulaire du grec mycénien, Amsterdam (1967).
Ventris, M., and Chadwick, J., Documents in Mycenaean Greek, 2nd edn. by Chadwick, J., Cambridge (1973).
Vilborg, E., A Tentative Grammar of Mycenaean Greek, Göteborg (1960).
Chapter III