# Ancient Greek - λειψων



## chessie273

Hello all!

"λειψων" - Please could someone tell me what it means?!

The context is a story on Alexander and Dionysus "εκτισε την Nυσαν ώς μνημειον της νικης τοίς εσομενοίς λειψων"

sorry about the lack of accents, if it makes it incomprehensible i'll be happy to add them.

Thanks in advance!


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## Traduita

Hi
Look, λείψων is a future participle of the verb λείπω, which in this case I think means "to leave behind one, to bequeath". 
Λείψων in reality is introduced here with ως, although there other words in between them and the construction "ως+future participle" is normally translated as a purpose clause: "in order to, so that +verb". 
I am not 100 per cent sure because we don't have more context, but the sentence in itself looks pretty simple:

[He] built  Nysa _to leave behind him_ a monument to the future generations".
 Less literally: /"[He] built the town of Nysa _to leave_ a memory of his glory to the future generations". 

Does it make sense? Sorry, I cannot think of a better translation right now.


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## chessie273

Thank you so much! that makes perfect sense!


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## brian

Traduita, I think your "less literal" translation is actually the more literal one.  Except without context we don't know whether νίκη means "victory" (the literal & usual meaning) or "glory" (a more extended meaning).

εκτισε την Nυσαν ώς μνημειον της νικης τοίς εσομενοίς λειψων
[he] built (the) Nysa so [as to] [a] memory of (the) [his] victory to those-to-be (to) leave.
= [he] built (the) Nysa so [as to] leave [a] memory of (the) [his] victory [to] those-to-be.

= _He built Nysa so as to leave a memory (memorial) of his victory to future generations._

The reason I saw your 2nd translation is more literal is that the first one leaves out νίκη completely... maybe that was a typo?


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## Traduita

Yeah, some kind of typo, I think I didn't see νίκη although I read the sentence over many times. Well, cognitive science will sudy this interesting phenomenon...

Sorry, chessie, brian's *"He built Nysa so as to leave a memory (memorial) of his victory to future generations*." is the correct one.


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## brian

Oh I see.. "glory" was not intended as a translation of νίκη, but rather "memory of his glory" was a less literal translation of μνημειον.

Yeah, maybe you just need a cup of coffee. 

cheers


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## Traduita

Haha!  Well, the important thing is that the guy wanted to leave someting behind him, isn't it?  As i am having that coffee (just plain coffee, no alcohol),  I find the rest of the details to be quite superfluous.
Cheers


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