previous next

224. A participle representing a protasis (472) is especially apt to have an emphatic ἄν near it. This, by showing that the verb is to form an apodosis, tends to point out the participle as conditional in an early part of the sentence. E.g. Νομίσατε τό τε φαῦλον καὶ τὸ μέσον καὶ τὸ πάνυ ἀκριβὲς ἂν ξυγκραθὲν μάλιστ᾽ ἂν ἰσχύειν, believe that these, if they should be united, would be especially strong. THUC. vi. 18. (Here ξυγκραθέν, not with ἄν, is equivalent to εἰ ξυγκραθείη.) Ἀγῶνας ἄν τίς μοι δοκεῖ, ἔφη, πάτερ, προειπὼν ἑκάστοις καὶ ἆθλα προτιθεὶς μάλιστ᾽ ἂν ποιεῖν εὖ ἀσκεῖσθαι, it seems to me, said he, father, that if any one should proclaim contests, etc., he would cause, etc. XEN. Cyr. i. 6, 18. (Here the protasis implied in the participles is merely emphasised by ἄν, which belongs to ποιεῖν.) See also λέγοντος ἄν τινος πιστεῦσαι οἴεσθε; (i.e. εἴ τις ἔλεγεν, ἐπίστευσαν ἄν; ) do you think they would have believed it, if any one had told them? DEM. vi. 20. (Here ἄν stands near λέγοντος only to point this out as the protasis to which its own verb πιστεῦσαι is the apodosis, with which ἄν is not repeated.)

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.

An XML version of this text is available for download, with the additional restriction that you offer Perseus any modifications you make. Perseus provides credit for all accepted changes, storing new additions in a versioning system.

hide References (2 total)
  • Commentary references to this page (2):
    • William Watson Goodwin, Commentary on Demosthenes: On the Crown, 128
    • William Watson Goodwin, Commentary on Demosthenes: On the Crown, 22
hide Display Preferences
Greek Display:
Arabic Display:
View by Default:
Browse Bar: