I am not persuaded that 'σφαλήσεσθε' can be translated as 'you will be deceived'. I would be more likely to translate it as 'you will be ruined' or 'you will be tripped up' (Thucydides seem to like wrestling terms) or 'you will be making a mistake'. I can perhaps understand why Hobbes would want to translate it as he has for thematic if not historical reasons but it stills seems dubious to me. I would be most interested what others think.

The text in question is from the very end of Melian dialogue:

οἱ μὲν δὴ Μήλιοι τοσαῦτα ἀπεκρίναντο: οἱ δὲ Ἀθηναῖοι διαλυόμενοι ἤδη ἐκ τῶν λόγων ἔφασαν ‘ἀλλ᾽ οὖν μόνοι γε ἀπὸ τούτων τῶν βουλευμάτων, ὡς ἡμῖν δοκεῖτε, τὰ μὲν μέλλοντα τῶν ὁρωμένων σαφέστερα κρίνετε, τὰ δὲ ἀφανῆ τῷ βούλεσθαι ὡς γιγνόμενα ἤδη θεᾶσθε, καὶ Λακεδαιμονίοις καὶ τύχῃ καὶ ἐλπίσι πλεῖστον δὴ παραβεβλημένοι καὶ πιστεύσαντες πλεῖστον καὶ σφαλήσεσθε. 5.114

Hobbes offers the following translation:

Thus the Melians answered. To which the Athenians, the conference being already broken off, replied thus: “You are the only men, as it seemeth to us, by this consultation, that think future things more certain than things seen, and behold things doubtful, through desire to have them true, as if they were already come to pass. As you attribute and trust the most unto the Lacedaemonians, and to fortune and hopes, so will you be the most deceived.”

I should note that Thucydides does use 'ἀπατάω' at 5.85.1, which I would translate as 'to deceive'. I am not sure though that is relevant.

I came across the sentence:

Τὶ ἐστὶν ἀνθρώπῳ εἶναι;

If I understand correctly, the word ἀνθρώπῳ is a predicative expression, since it follows the verb to be. I would thus expect it to be put in the nominative case like the subject of the sentence. But why is the dative ἀνθρώπῳ used instead?

I'm a kid and I want to get started on learning ancient Greek. I'm not sure where to start, I've already learnt how to read(not very good but getting better) and I was wondering if there's any online resources I can use or a general order of what I should learn cuz from what I have seen, what the genuine fuck were they in creating this language. Either way, some help would be much appreciated. Also not sure of what dialect I should start with, I see a lot of people go with attic but I'm also wondering if Koine would be easier

I tried to do another translation of the Litany, and I would like your guys' thoughts on it.

φοβεῖσθαι οὐκ ἔχει με, νουφόνος γὰρ ὁ φόβος, ὁ ὅλως ὀλλὺς ὄλεθρος.

τὸν φόβον μου θαρσήσω, ὑπέρ τε καὶ δι' ἐμοῦ αὐτόν ἐκῥεῖν ἐάσω.

παρερχομένου δ'αὐτοῦ, τὸ ἔνδομμα ἐφέξω, ἵν' ὁδὸν αὐτοῦ ὁρῶ.

οὗ δ'ἄπεισιν ὁ φόβος, οὐδὲν ἔσται, μόνον μενῶ.

I saw a video of fr.seraphim saying that koine greek isn't real and no text other than NT used this language...is it true?

Men was an Anatolian moon god, worshipped in many local cults across Anatolia. Pluto was another name for Hades, while Kore was his wife and queen of the Underworld.

[Ἀ]πελλῆς Ἀπελλήο[υς]

[Μ]ηνὶ Καμαρίτῃ καὶ

[Πλ]ούτωνι καὶ Κόρῃ εὐ-

[χὴ]ν ὅτι μοι ἐπήκουσαν

πάντα.

“Apelles, son of Apelleus, [dedicated] a votive offering to Men Kamarites, Pluto, and Kore, because they heard me in everything.”

This is the video guys. I wanted to know what he got wrong with some evidences if you can

Hi, I've been studying Iphigenia at Aulis lately, and, while reading the introduction to Andò's critical edition of the play, I found many interesting theses surrounding the prologue. More specifically I was fascinated by the stance of the philologist W. Willink, who insists on the authenticity of the full prologue and proposes to transpose the verses in the following order (I'm referring to the prologue as transmitted through the manuscript):

49-96 first, 1-48 then, and after it 97-163.

As far as I know this interpretation was criticized by Bain, as he considered spurious the whole prologue.

I decided to give this interpretation a try, as I wanted to check how it read, but honestly I found some weird passages (e.g. the stark shift between one section and another, or the fact that in the first block Agamemnon says he he ordered Talthybius to disband the fleet, although it doesn't look like he did since they're there).

I am a complete beginner in regards to philology, and I probably either misunderstood Willink's view, or read it incorrectly. Let me know what you think!

Bogotá, Universidad Nacional de Colombia

I came across this set of lemmas in LSJ, which somehow just felt like a brain-slap to me:

νέρτερος νέρτατος νερτέριος νερτεροδρόμος νερτερόμορφος

They basically all seem to relate to the underworld, or to the less mystical idea of being underground.

Beekes has no entry for any of these.

Is there anything that can be said about this word-family's etymology? I'm imagining some Cthulhu-style underground deity, Νέρτων, lost in the mists of Pelasgian deep time.

Hi! I came across a post on another platform discussing Ancient Greek and a poetic phrase translated roughly as:

“And where did Artemis not dance?”

The post didn’t give the original Ancient Greek, so I tried to track it down myself. I did some searching for references to this rhetorical question and to the poetry attributed to Callimachus( or sometimes Aesop), and the version I found was:

Ποῖ δ᾽ οὐκ ὠρχήσατο Ἄρτεμις;

I was wondering whether this is grammatically correct and natural in Ancient Greek, particularly as a poetic or rhetorical question.

I’m especially curious about the use of ποῖ here. Would ποῦ (“where?”) be more appropriate if the intended meaning is “Where did Artemis not dance?”, or can ποῖ work with the intended sense of “where/to what place” in this context?

Also, if this phrase actually comes from a known ancient text or source, I’d be very interested to know where it appears and whether this is an accurate reconstruction of the original.

I’d really appreciate any corrections or insights from people familiar with Ancient Greek!

I've been a bit rusty on my Greek translation, but yesterday I decided to translate the Orphic Hymn to Aether. Below I've shared the Greek text along with my translation and a bit of an explanation of my work. Please feel free to comment on my work or the poem itself.

Ὦ Διὸς ὑψιμέλαθρον ἔχων κράτος αἰὲν ἀτειρές,

ἄστρων ἠελίου τε σεληναίης τε μέρισμα,

πανδαμάτωρ, πυρίπνους, πᾶσιν ζωοῖσιν ἔναυσμα,

ὑψιφανὴς Αἰθήρ, κόσμου στοιχεῖον ἄριστον ·

ἀγλαὸν ὦ βλάστημα, σελασφόρον, ἀστεροφεγγές,

κικλήσκων λίτομαί σε, κεκραμένον εὔδιον εἶναι.

Translation:

O unyielding eternal vault, domain held by Zeus,

Part sun, and stars, and light of moon

All brought under you, fiery spark of all life

High-shining Aether, The cosmos’s most noble element

O bright offspring, light-bearer, shining with stars 
I pray calling you, to be mingled with calmly 

On the translation:

The word I translated as vault was ὑψιμέλαθρον. It literally means “high construction” or loft. It can refer to a vaulted ceiling so I translated it as vault.

The word I translated as “All brought under you” was πανδαμάτωρ; it literally means all-subduer or all tamer.

The word I translated as element was στοιχεῖον. Its first definition in my lexicon was the shadow of a gnomon (part of a sundial). Because Wikipedia includes the detail that Aether was the son of Chronos in Orphic cosmogony, I wanted to translate this passage as: The cosmos’s most noble marker of time.

I wanted to lean into the fact that στοιχεῖον is literally a shadow and translate the passage as High-shining Aether, The cosmos’s most noble shadow of time. Since the keeping of dates can be done via measurements of the sky (Aether) calling him a keeper of time seemed appropriate. That being said, Aether being an element is a common idiom, and so that is probably the most correct translation.

The word I translated as light-bearer was σελασφόρον, it could have been translated as lucifer, but I chose not to.       

Fun alternate translation:

O unyielding eternal vault, domain held by Zeus,

Part sun, and stars, and light of moon

All brought under you, fiery spark of all life

High-shining Aether, The cosmos’s most noble shadow of time

O bright offspring, Lucifer, shining with stars  

I pray calling you, to be mingled with calmly  

Χαίρετε.

In 2022, heavy metal legends Manowar released an EP entitled Highlights from the Revenge of Odysseus, which includes two (non-metal) songs featuring narration in Ancient Greek. But rather than a recitation of the original Homeric verses, we get to hear Mr. Joey DeMaio's own adaptation of the Odyssey, translated into Ancient Greek by Sakis Tolis of Rotting Christ.

The first of these two tracks, "Telemachus, Pt. 1" (YouTube), features Konstantinos Kazakos in the role of Telemachus. (Manowar also uploaded a short making-of video.)

Here is my attempt at transcribing the song:

Ἐν τῇ ἐμῇ γενέσει ὁ πατὴρ ἐτάγη, οἶκον ἐγκατέλειψε.
Ἔπλευσε σὺν τοῖς στρατιώταις τούτου πόλεμον παρασκευάζοντος [?].
Ἔτη πολλὰ παρῆλθον, μὰ φήμης περὶ πατρὸς οὐκ ἔμαθον.
Ἐπ(ε)ὶ […] δεκάτου ἔτους μνηστῆρες τῆς ἐμῆς μητρὸς ἐφάνησαν.
Ἔφησαν νεκρὸν τὸν πατέρα εἶναι, καὶ τὴν μητέρα θέλουσι (ὑ)πανδρεύειν [?].
[…]
Ἀπόντος πατρὸς, μηδενός ὑπερασπιζομένου […]ον τοῦ οἴκου ἐμόν.
Ὕβριζον τὴν μητέρα, καὶ ᾔσχυνον τὸν οἶκον, δειπνοῦντες τὴν περιουσίαν, ποτιζόμενοι τὸν οἶνον, σφαγιάζοντες τοὺς βοῦς, μολύνοντες τοὺς δούλους […].
[…] ἀπέλπιδες […].
Κατ’ ἐκάστην ἡμέραν θεοῖς […].
[…] θεοὶ κατένευσαν.
Ἡ θεὰ Ἀθηνᾶ ἦλθε καί μοι ὡμίλησε.
Προσέφη πάντας […]ρα.
[…]ρεύσω μνήστηρσι συμπεριλαμβανομένοις.
Θεὰν ἤρωτησα· Τίνας λόγους λέξω;
Μὴ φοβοῦ. Λέξεις ἐλεύσονται. Ἡγούμενος ὑπὸ τὴν τοῦ πατρὸς δύναμιν καὶ τὸ τῆς θεᾶς Ἀθηνᾶς σθένος φωνασκῶ [?] […] τοῖς πᾶσι μανθάν[…] τὰ τῶν μνηστήρων αἴσχη, ἃ τὸ μένος τῶν θεῶν ἤγαγον, […] τῶν θεῶν […].
[…]δίο(ν) ἐφάνησαν ἐν νεφέλαις.
Ὁ μάντις Ἁλιθέρσης προεμήνυσε […].
[…] οἱ μνηστῆρες θανοῦνται.
«Αυτό είναι σημάδι των θεών. Θάνατος θα βρει τοὺς μνηστήρες.»
Ἐγέλασαν […].
[…] ουδαμᾶ […].
[…], ἐμνημόνευσα τὰ τῆς μητρὸς ἔπεα.
Ἐπ(ε)ὶ τῇ γῇ τοῦ πατρὸς ἀναχωρι[…]
[…]
Ὅτι εἰ μὴ πάλιν νοστεῖ οὗτος, ἄλλον τινὰ (ὑ)πανδρεύ[…]
Ἡ δὲ ὥμνυτο, εἰ μὴ πάλιν νοστεῖ, αὐτὴ ἀνα[…] τοῦτο.

Now, I am familiar with Classical Greek and Homeric Greek but not so much with Modern Greek, which some parts of this version seem to be based on.

Can someone who is more familiar with Modern Greek pronunciation and vocabulary help me out with the few remaining gaps?

Thank you very much!

I configured the Perseus Scaife viewer to run completely locally/offline on my Mac, pulling down their github data repos for Greek and Latin. The main branch is a minimally-changed Docker version. A branch with updated component library versions is in feature/update_sbom_versions. Use your AI to install it. It will take a minute the first time to clone their data repos. Click on Highlight option on the right to get click-word-to-dictionary.

https://github.com/threedlite/scaife-local

I looked into where the Latin phrase "amor meus crucifixus est" came from and found that the original text is "ὁ ἐμὸς ἔρως ἐσταύρωται," where the word eros was translated as amor. I initially thought amor in this context meant Jesus Christ, but if the original word was eros, was my interpretation wrong?

I don't know Greek at all, but referring to Jesus as eros feels a bit unfamiliar to me. Is this simply because I don't know Greek?

Hello! Does anyone know where I can order Life of Symeon the Fool in Ancient Greek? I am looking for a physical edition of the Greek text

In case you missed it, Oxytone is a free web app for reading Ancient Greek, along with full morphology breakdowns, definitions, and more. No account needed.

It builds upon the GLAUx treebank dataset, which covers most of the surviving Greek corpus. See Keersmaekers 2021 for details.

The site was down for about six months, due to lack of funding. It is back up now, along with some new features:

• Every work now links to its matching Perseus translations.
• LLM integration : highlight a passage to ask a question or get a quick translation (useful for works with no available human translation)
  • The feature is bring-your-own-key: your API key is stored in your browser and calls go straight to your LLM provider of choice, so it never reaches the Oxytone server.
  • If you would rather not use it, leave the key unset and the feature stays hidden.
• Fixed many broken works that lacked pagination, such as Aesop's Fables.
• Significant loading speed and responsiveness improvements
• LSJ definitions render more cleanly
• Wiktionary as a second, more concise dictionary

Sponsorship

Oxytone has no accounts, no ads, and no paywall, and I would like to keep it that way. If you enjoy the website, feel free to sponsor me on GitHub.

Feedback

Bug reports and suggestions are welcome on GitHub.

Aethiopica 1.30:

ἅπερ ὡς εἶδέ τε καὶ ἤκουσεν ὁ Θύαμις, ἐνθύμιον αὐτῷ τὸ ὄναρ γίνεται, καθ᾽ ὃ τὴν Ἶσιν ἑώρα καὶ τὸν νεὼν ἅπαντα λαμπάδων καὶ θυσιῶν ἀνάμεστον· καὶ ταῦτα ἐκεῖνα εἶναι τὰ νῦν ὁρώμενα, καὶ πρὸς τὰ ἐναντία τῶν προτέρων τὴν ὄψιν συνέβαλλεν, ὡς ἔχων οὐχ ἕξει τὴν Χαρίκλειαν, ὑπὸ τοῦ πολέμου ταύτης ἀφαιρεθείσης, καὶ ὡς φονεύσει καὶ οὐ τρώσει, ξίφει καὶ οὐκ Ἀφροδίτης νόμῳ.

NOTE: Reddit sometimes decides to autotranslate posts. If this passage from the Aethiopica shows up in some other language than Greek, that's what's happened.

The context here is that the bandit king Thuamis is in love with the young priestess Chariclea whom he has captured, and he has had a dream from Isis, which he originally interpreted as meaning that he would end up having her as his woman. Now his outlaw community is being attacked by an armed force, and he thinks, uh oh, the dream probably actually meant that Chariclea is going to get killed.

Why are the verbs φονεύσει and τρώσει in the active voice? I'm assuming the implied subject to be Chariclea.