Ancient Greek for Everyone Unit 3 Greek Nouns

Ancient Greek for Everyone: Unit 3: Greek Nouns supplement: Tips on Translating Greek into English GREK 1001 Fall 2013 M-Th 9: 30 -10: 20 Coates 236 Wilfred E. Major

Ancient Greek for Everyone: A New Digital Resource for Beginning Greek Unit 3: Greek Nouns supplement: Tips on Translating Greek into English 2013 edition Wilfred E. Major wmajor@lsu. edu

Ancient Greek for Everyone This class AGE Unit 3: Introduction to the Greek Noun • This unit has introduced nouns, so that, combined with verbs, you can now begin reading sentences in Greek. • This section offers some observations and notes on Greek sentences and tips for translating a Greek sentence into English.

Ancient Greek for Everyone Sentences in Greek • We will use the sentence below as an example: ὁ Μάρκος δίδωσι τοῖς ἄρχουσι τὸν παῖδα τοῦ Πείσονος. Marcus gives the rulers the child of Piso.

Ancient Greek for Everyone Sentences in Greek • The verb of a Greek sentence conveys the most information and the core information for understanding what the sentence says: – – – Person Number Tense Mood Voice A Greek verb by itself can be an entire sentence.

Ancient Greek for Everyone • From Unit 2: A Greek verb by itself usually communicates FIVE pieces of information: – Person – Number – Tense – Mood – Voice PARSING: To “parse” a Greek verb means to identify the above five qualities about a specific verb form.

Ancient Greek for Everyone Sentences in Greek • This verb is: – 3 rd person – Singular – Present – Indicative – Active the verb means “give” ὁ Μάρκος δίδωσι τοῖς ἄρχουσι τὸν παῖδα τοῦ Πείσονος. Marcus gives the rulers the child of Piso.

Ancient Greek for Everyone Sentences in Greek • IMPORTANT: The form of the verb determines its meaning, not its place in the sentence. It can appear anywhere in the sentence with no change in meaning. • This is crucial: never simply translate a Greek sentence word by word into English order. It hardly ever works. It works about as well as adding numerals in order (does 2 + 4 = 24? ). δίδωσιν ὁ Μάρκος τοῖς ἄρχουσι τὸν παῖδα τοῦ Πείσονος. ὁ Μάρκος δίδωσι τοῖς ἄρχουσι τὸν παῖδα τοῦ Πείσονος. ὁ Μάρκος τοῖς ἄρχουσι δίδωσι τὸν παῖδα τοῦ Πείσονος. ὁ Μάρκος τοῖς ἄρχουσι τὸν παῖδα δίδωσι τοῦ Πείσονος. ὁ Μάρκος τοῖς ἄρχουσι τὸν παῖδα τοῦ Πείσονος δίδωσιν. Marcus gives the rulers the child of Piso.

Ancient Greek for Everyone Sentences in Greek • The case of a noun in a Greek sentence conveys its role in relation to the verb or another noun: – – Nominative Genitive Dative Accusative Parse a Greek noun before deciding its role in a sentence.

Ancient Greek for Everyone • A Greek noun communicates THREE pieces of information: – Gender – Number – Case PARSING: To “parse” a Greek noun means to identify the above three qualities about a specific noun form.

Ancient Greek for Everyone • Greek uses four cases: – Nominative: The nominative case indicates that a noun is the subject of a verb. – Genitive – Dative – Accusative ὁ Μάρκος δίδωσι τοῖς ἄρχουσι τὸν παῖδα τοῦ Πείσονος. Marcus gives the rulers the child of Piso.

Ancient Greek for Everyone • Greek uses four cases: – Nominative – Genitive – Dative – Accusative: The accusative case indicates that a noun is the first (primary, direct) object of a verb. ὁ Μάρκος δίδωσι τοῖς ἄρχουσι τὸν παῖδα τοῦ Πείσονος. Marcus gives the rulers the child of Piso.

Ancient Greek for Everyone • Greek uses four cases: – Nominative – Genitive – Dative: The dative case indicates that a noun is the second (indirect) object of a verb. – Accusative: ὁ Μάρκος δίδωσι τοῖς ἄρχουσι τὸν παῖδα τοῦ Πείσονος. Marcus gives the rulers the child of Piso.

Ancient Greek for Everyone • Greek uses four cases: – Nominative – Genitive: The genitive case plays roughly the same role as the preposition “of” in English. – Dative – Accusative: ὁ Μάρκος δίδωσι τοῖς ἄρχουσι τὸν παῖδα τοῦ Πείσονος. Marcus gives the rulers the child of Piso.

Ancient Greek for Everyone Sentences in Greek • In general, read the entire Greek sentence to determine what it says before you translate it into English. • Often you will have more than one legitimate way to turn the sentence into English. Choose the version that sounds best to you in English. ὁ Μάρκος δίδωσι τοῖς ἄρχουσι τὸν παῖδα τοῦ Πείσονος. Marcus gives the rulers the child of Piso. Marcus gives the rulers Piso’s child. Marcus gives Piso’s child to the rulers. Marcus is giving Piso’s child to the rulers. All of these translations are legitimate and correct.

Ancient Greek for Everyone Sentences in Greek • Often you will have more than one legitimate way to turn the sentence into English. Choose the version that sounds best to you in English, so long as you do not change what is happening in the Greek sentence. ὁ Μάρκος δίδωσι τοῖς ἄρχουσι τὸν παῖδα τοῦ Πείσονος. correct: Marcus is giving Piso’s child to the rulers. wrong: Piso is giving child of Marcus to the rulers. wrong: The rulers are giving Piso’s child to Marcus. wrong: Marcus is giving the rulers to the child of Piso. wrong: Marcus gives the child of the rulers to Piso. wrong: any English sentence that makes no sense

Ancient Greek for Everyone Sentences in Greek • On an exam, you are graded on both parsing and translation. • Each item of parsing information is worth one point: ὁ Μάρκος δίδωσι τοῖς ἄρχουσι τὸν παῖδα τοῦ Πείσονος. Μάρκος: nominative, masculine, singular (3 points) δίδωσι: 3 rd, singular, present, indicative, active (5 points) ἄρχουσι: dative, masculine, plural (3 points) παῖδα: accusative, masculine, singular (3 points) Πείσονος: genitive, masculine, singular (3 points) TOTAL: 17 points

Ancient Greek for Everyone • At this point, the Ten Thousand are at the city of Gymnias (getting close to the Black Sea), where: ὁ ἄρχων τοῖς Ἕλλησιν ἡγεμόνα πέμπει Xenophon Anabasis 4. 7. 19 Note: You are not required to parse words that are given in the notes with the readings. Ἕλλάς, -άδος ὁ Greek ἡγεμών –όνος ὁ guide, leader πέμπει (3 rd sg) sends

Ancient Greek for Everyone Sentences in Greek • On an exam, you are graded on both parsing and translation. • Each verb and noun is worth two points: one for its vocabulary meaning and one for using it correctly in the sentence. • All other words are worth one point each. ὁ Μάρκος δίδωσι τοῖς ἄρχουσι τὸν παῖδα τοῦ Πείσονος. Marcus is giving the child of Piso to the rulers. TOTAL: 14 points

Ancient Greek for Everyone • At this point, the Ten Thousand are at the city of Gymnias (getting close to the Black Sea), where: ὁ ἄρχων τοῖς Ἕλλησιν ἡγεμόνα πέμπει Xenophon Anabasis 4. 7. 19 Note: You are required to translate the complete sentence including the words that are given in the notes. Ἕλλάς, -άδος ὁ Greek ἡγεμών –όνος ὁ guide, leader πέμπει (3 rd sg) sends

Ancient Greek for Everyone • Next – Unit 3 part 1 Biblical reading. – Unit 3 part 1 Classical reading. – Be able to: • read the sentences aloud • parse each verb, noun and pronoun • translate the sentences into English.