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428.a) The imperfect of μέλλω with the infinitive may express a past intention or expectation which was not realised, and so take the place of the verb of the infinitive with ἄν. E.g. μάλα δὴ Ἀγαμέμνονος φθίσεσθαι κακὸν οἶτον ἔμελλον, εἰ μὴ . . . ἔειπες, i.e. I should have perished like A. (lit. I was to have perished), if thou hadst not spoken. Hom. Od. xiii. 383. Μέλλεν μέν ποτε οἶκος ὅδ᾽ ἀφνειὸς καὶ ἀμύμων ἔμμεναι: νῦν δ᾽ ἑτέρως ἐβόλοντο θεοί, “this house was to have been rich and glorious; but now the Gods have willed it otherwise.” Hom. Od. i. 232. Οὐ συστρατεύσειν ἔμελλον, they were not going to join him, or they would not have joined him (in that case). DEM. xix. 159; see xviii. 172. Ἧττον τὸ ἀδίκημα πολλῶν οὐσῶν ἔμελλε δῆλον ἔσεσθαι, the offence would have been less plain when there were many (olive trees). LYS. vii. 24. See THUC. v. 38, μέλλοντες πρότερον, εἰ ταῦτα ἔπεισαν, πειράσεσθαι. Compare the Latin: Hoc facturi erant, nisi venisset, they were to have done this (would have done this), had he not come.1

b) A single case of ἄν with ἔμελλεν occurs in AND. i. 21: εἰ καὶ πατὴρ ἐβούλετο ὑπομένειν, τοὺς φίλους ἂν οἴεσθε . . . ἐπιτρέπειν αὐτῷ, ἀλλ᾽ οὐκ ἂν παραιτεῖσθαι καὶ δεῖσθαι ἀπιέναι ὅπου ἂν ἔμελλεν σωθήσεσθαι; i.e. to depart to a place where he would have been likely to be safe. Most critics repudiate this ἄν; but it seems perfectly analogous to ἄν with ἔδει, χρῆν, etc. (423).

1 This use of ἔμελλον with the infinitive corresponds precisely to the Sanskrit use of the past future tense in the sense of the Greek aorist indicative with ἄν. Thus “if he had said (avaksyat) this, he would have slain (ahaniSyat) Indra” (zat. Brahm. i. 6, THUC. 3^{10}), where the two verbs are augmented past futures, meaning literally he was going to say and he was going to slay. See Whitney's Sanskrit Grammar, § 950.

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