Autore
De Decker, Filip

Titolo
Tense, Aspect and Modality, and Textual Criticism in Herodotos «Historiai» 5.48
Periodico
In verbis
Anno: 2025 - Fascicolo: 2 - Pagina iniziale: 159 - Pagina finale: 180

In Historiai 5.48 the transmitted imperfect forms εβασιλευε and κατέμείνε , which appear in an irrealis of the past, have been changed into the aorists εβασίλευε and κατέμεινε by Krüger and Wilson respectively. In this article, I discuss whether these changes are necessary. I first quote the passage and provide an overview of the choices made by the different editors and commentators. I argue that the transmitted imperfect forms can in fact be maintained. I start by summarising scholarship on Greek aspect and aspect in the Greek counterfactual constructions, and then I briefly discuss the so-called “Strunk’s aorist rule” (which states that the aorist is used when a verb is used with an adverbial temporal object). I then apply “Strunk’s aorist rule” to the instances of βασιλεύω (discussing a few examples) and show that the imperfect forms are perfectly defendable in this passage, taking into account that the tense-usage in the counterfactual constructions in Greek was aspectually motivated and not based on temporal reference, and that the imperfect forms referred to a long-lasting reign.



SICI: 2279-8978(2025)2<159:TAAMAT>2.0.ZU;2-H
Testo completo: https://www.rivisteweb.it/download/article/10.7368/119409
Testo completo alternativo: https://www.rivisteweb.it/doi/10.7368/119409

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