# Proper case to show the duration of a verbal action (Ancient and Modern Greek).



## Michael Zwingli

Hello all.

I have a question about what case one should use in both Ancient and Modern Greek (I assume the case to be the same for both) for a noun describing the duration of a verbal action. I think that I would want to use the accusative case, but I am going crazy with second guessing myself, and thinking: "perhaps nominative?", "perhaps dative?" (I have been studying Latin for a bit now, and the issue of case still perplexes me there as well, undoubtedly because English has become a completely analytic language, with every synthetic attribute seemingly bled out of it.) Allow me to give an example sentence in English, A.G., and M.G., with the portion of the sentence including the noun in question [the week / ἡ ἑβδομάς / η εβδομάδα], the proper case of which I am unsure but in the sample sentence in the accusative, in italics:

English:  I plan (intend) to stay _for a week_.

Ancient Greek:  μέλλω μενέειν _τήν ἑβδομάδα_.

Modern Greek:  σχεδιάζω μείνει(?) _την εβδομάδα_.

My primary question here is, am I correct to use the accusative case [_τήν ἑβδομάδα / την εβδομάδα_] for rendering the English durational noun clause "for the week" into Greek? I have a couple of other questions as well. First, is there any other way in Greek (Ancient or Modern) to translate the English "...for the week", apart from using the case of "the week", such as using "helper words", as in English? Secondly, I would like to verify whether in the Ancient Greek sentence, _μένω_ should be in the infinitive present tense (_μένειν_) or the infinitive future tense (_μενέειν_) for this sentence. Thirdly, I am a bit unsure whether I want the infinitive verb to precede or to follow the main verb in this type of sentence. if you would clarify that for me as well, I shall be grateful.

Thanks in advance, I am just starting out with the study of Greek (primarily Ancient for now, but making comparisons to Modern as I progress), and I truly appreciate any help that I can get along the way!


----------



## διαφορετικός

Michael Zwingli said:


> Modern Greek: σχεδιάζω μείνει(?) _την εβδομάδα_.


I believe that with the definitive article it does not mean a duration, but a particular point (or period) in time. (Maybe the same applies even in English, in "... for the week ...".)

But basically it is true that you can use the accusative for durations (and times) (adverbially). For durations, you can also add the preposition "για" (with accusative likewise) - useful if it seems ambiguous otherwise.

I would express it like this (rather without για):
Σχεδιάζω να μείνω (για) μία εβδομάδα.

I cannot answer your question(s) about Ancient Greek.


----------



## Perseas

διαφορετικός said:


> I would express it like this (rather without για):
> Σχεδιάζω να μείνω (για) μία εβδομάδα.


Excellent!  



Michael Zwingli said:


> My primary question here is, am I correct to use the accusative case [_τήν ἑβδομάδα / την εβδομάδα_] for rendering the English durational noun clause "for the week" into Greek?


"Σχεδιάζω να μείνω την εβδομάδα" sounds incomplete, not natural. "Σχεδιάζω να μείνω αυτή την εβδομάδα" (this week) is okay.

In the examples above "μία εβδομάδα", "την εβδομάδα" are in accusative.

I believe that in A.G. it would be "μέλλω μενεῖν ἑβδομάδα μίαν or μίαν ἑβδομάδα".
μενεῖν is future infinitive and ἑβδομάδα μίαν accusative.


----------



## ioanell

Michael Zwingli said:


> I think that I would want to use the accusative case, but I am going crazy with second guessing myself, and thinking: "perhaps nominative?"



The nominative case is the case of the subject of the clause. In several cases, the nominative may be used in exclamations as a predicate with the subject unexpressed or along with the article may stand in apposition to a vocative. Adverbial relations can only be denoted with the so-called πλάγιες πτώσεις (oblique cases), i.e. genitive, dative and accusative.



Michael Zwingli said:


> I would like to verify whether in the Ancient Greek sentence, _μένω_ should be in the infinitive present tense (_μένειν_) or the infinitive future tense (_μενέειν_) for this sentence.



The verb μέλλω as having the meaning of “I plan to, I intend to [do sth from now on]” has a future tense infinitive as its object. Mενέειν [< fut. μενέω] is the uncontracted epic and ionic form of the future tense infinitive, whereas μενεῖν [< fut. μενῶ] is the contracted attic form, which, of course, is the most usual one in AG texts.



Michael Zwingli said:


> Ancient Greek: μέλλω μενέειν _τήν ἑβδομάδα_.





Michael Zwingli said:


> is there any other way in Greek (Ancient or Modern) to translate the English "...for the week", apart from using the case of "the week"



I’m not sure whether a passage containing the word *ἑβδομάδα* (accusative) could be found in A.G. texts, because Ancient Greeks used the periphrasis *ἡμέρας ἑπτά* instead, as e.g. in ΞΕΝΟΦΩΝΤΟΣ ΚΥΡΟΥ ΑΝΑΒΑΣΙΣ, Xen. Anab. 1.2.5-6             Κῦρος δὲ … ἐξελαύνει διὰ Φρυγίας … εἰς Κολοσσάς, …. ἐνταῦθα ἔμεινεν *ἡμέρας ἑπτά *(_the noun in the accusative case_) · καὶ ….



Michael Zwingli said:


> English: I plan (intend) to stay _for a week<> _the English durational noun clause_ "for the week" _



Don’t think they are quite the same, are they? Maybe native English-speakers would like to comment on this.


----------



## Scholiast

ὦριστοι

For time of _duration_, both Latin and classical Greek use the accusative case, and a quick glance at LSJ shows that (unsurprisingly) it is only in post-Christian sources that the word ἑβδομάς in the sense of 'week' appears.

Σ


----------



## Perseas

In the Greek version of Liddell & Scott it reads that  "ἑβδομάς"  in the sense  of "week" appears in Hippocrates  and Aristotle, but I don't have access to the content of the books.


----------



## Scholiast

Greetings again

Perseas (# 6) is perfectly correct, that ἑβδομάς appears in these authors as 'a period of seven days'. But so (for example) does ἐννεάς for a 'period of nine days'. My point (in # 5) was that, until the (originally Judaic) notion of the universe created in seven days gained world-wide currency with the spread of Christianity from the 1st century AD onwards, the 'week' as we understand it did not exist except as observed by Jewish communities. Classical Athenian practice was to divide months into three δεκάδες.

Σ


----------



## bearded

To express duration, in Ancient Greek also the preposition  κατά (+ accusative) was used (example from Herodotos: katà tèn nóson Kambýseo = during Cambyses's illness).  Cf. in Mod.Greek  κατά τη διάρκεια ...


----------



## Perseas

Scholiast said:


> Greetings again
> 
> Perseas (# 6) is perfectly correct, that ἑβδομάς appears in these authors as 'a period of seven days'. But so (for example) does ἐννεάς for a 'period of nine days'. My point (in # 5) was that, until the (originally Judaic) notion of the universe created in seven days gained world-wide currency with the spread of Christianity from the 1st century AD onwards, the 'week' as we understand it did not exist except as observed by Jewish communities. Classical Athenian practice was to divide months into three δεκάδες.
> 
> Σ


Greetings

From the 21st century perspective the language of the two first post-Christian centuries is still ancient, althought the form of Greek spoken then is called Koine. 

But you're right, in classical Greece (and later) they didn't use "week" as we use it nowadays.
Even Arrianus who lived in the first two post-Christian centuries wrote:
_Ἐνταῦθα ἔμειναν *ἡμέρας* τὰς πάσας *μίαν καὶ εἴκοσι.*_
He wrote 21 days, not 3 weeks!


----------



## ioanell

Hello everyone,

There seems to be a differentiation between the original LSJ Lexicon on the one hand and the Middle Liddell, the Greek version and its epitome on the other, as to under which meaning the word ἑβδομάς is used by Aristotle in his Politics; the last three say that *ἑβδομάς* is “a period of seven days, a week” Arist*.*: also of seven years, a septenary, id=Arist.”, whereas the original LSJ Lexicon only reads: “b. period of seven years, … Arist. Pol. 7.1336b40”, and this can be easily ascertained in favour of the original LSJ Lexicon.

_(Aristot. Pol. 7.1335b  αὕτη δ᾽ ἐστὶν ἐν τοῖς πλείστοις ἥνπερ τῶν ποιητῶν τινες εἰρήκασιν οἱ μετροῦντες ταῖς ἑβδομάσι τὴν ἡλικίαν, περὶ τὸν χρόνον τὸν τῶν πεντήκοντα ἐτῶν.

and this in the case of most men is the age stated by some of the poets, who measure men's age by periods of seven years,_)

_(Aristot. Pol. 7.1336b40  δύο δ᾽ εἰσὶν ἡλικίαι πρὸς ἃς ἀναγκαῖον διῃρῆσθαι τὴν παιδείαν, πρὸς τὴν ἀπὸ τῶν ἑπτὰ μέχρι ἥβης καὶ πάλιν μετὰ πρὸς τὴν ἀφ᾽ ἥβης μέχρι τῶν ἑνὸς καὶ εἴκοσιν ἐτῶν. οἱ γὰρ ταῖς ἑβδομάσι διαιροῦντες τὰς ἡλικίας ὡς ἐπὶ τὸ πολὺ λέγουσιν οὐ κακῶς,

And there are two ages corresponding to which education should be divided—there must be a break after the period from seven to puberty, and again after that from puberty to twenty-one. For those who divide the ages by periods of seven years are generally speaking not wrong,)_


----------



## Scholiast

χαίρετ᾽ ὦ φίλοι

ionell's observation (# 10) is interesting. For English-speaking students, there are three versions of LS(J) to choose from, the full-scale edition, the 'Middle Liddell', and the 'baby', which is really designed for beginners as it lemmatizes irregular principle parts as well as giving definitions, but supplies no references. In this last, ἑβδομάς is glossed simply as 'a number of seven', with no mention of days or years.

The more up-to-date _DGE_ gives both 'a seven-day period' and 'a seven-year period'), and also 'a week' (_semana_), here; but it does make explicitly clear that it is only in Christian or post-Christian texts that 'week' is an appropriate translation.

Σ


----------



## apmoy70

In Classical Greece thay didn't use ἑβδομάς for the week because the concept was absent due to their calendar, they divided each month (which was lunar) into three periods of ten days (δεκάδες, δεκάς in singular). And each lunar month had fixed thirty days.
The first day of the month was called νουμηνίᾱ (νέᾱ+μήνη (moon)) and each day after the first, was numbered (δευτέρᾱ, τρίτη etc.) followed by the distinction ἱσταμένου (of standing, μηνός (month), which was usually omitted).
The second period of ten days began with πρώτη ἐπὶ δεκάδι, and ended with the last one, usually called εἰκάς (twentieth).
Τhe last ten days were (usually) numbered backwards starting with δεκάτη ἀπιόντος (tenth (day) of the leavetaking) and the last day, of the month was the ἕνη καὶ νέᾱ (old & new, ἕνη is the feminine form of ἕνος = wiktionary ἕνος)


----------



## ioanell

Hello,



Perseas said:


> Even Arrianus who lived in the first two post-Christian centuries wrote:
> _Ἐνταῦθα ἔμειναν *ἡμέρας* τὰς πάσας *μίαν καὶ εἴκοσι.*_
> He wrote 21 days, not 3 weeks!



This is a good example (in # 4 above I only disputed that the accusative *ἑβδομάδα* could be found in AG authors / texts and referred to a similar example)- but it seems that the word *ἑβδομάς *(in other cases singular and plural), although rarely, had already shown up in AG authors in the sense of the “week” as we understand it today.

Exempli gratia:

1. in Hippocrates’s “Aphorismi”, according to LSJ (Hp. Aph. 2.24) _τ__ῶν_ _ἑπτὰ_ _ἡ_ _τετάρτη_ _ἐπίδηλος__: __ἑτέρης_ _ἑβδομάδος_ _ἡ_ _ὀγδόη_ _ἀρχὴ__, __θεωρητὴ_ _δὲ_ _ἡ_ _ἑνδεκάτη__, __αὕτη_ _γάρ_ _ἐστι_ _τετάρτη_ _τῆς_ _ἑτέρης_ _ἑβδομάδος__: __θεωρητὴ_ _δὲ_ _πάλιν_ _ἡ_ _ἑπτακαιδεκάτη__, __αὕτη_ _γάρ_ _ἐστι_ _τετάρτη_ _μὲν_ _ἀπὸ_ _τῆς_ _τεσσαρεσκαιδεκάτης__, __ἑβδόμη_ _δὲ_ _ἀπὸ_ _τῆς_ _ἑνδεκάτης__.

[translation from Perseus] The fourth day is indicative of the seventh; the eighth is the commencement of the second week; and hence, the eleventh being the fourth of the second week, is also indicative; and again, the seventeenth is indicative, as being the fourth from the fourteenth, and the seventh from the eleventh._

2. in Empedokles Fragmenti, Emp.B 153a: 

τὸ γοῦν βρέφος δοκεῖ τελειοῦσθαι ἐν ἑπτὰ ἑβδομάσιν

The baby in the womb seems to come to perfection in seven weeks.

3. the same sense is there in the Septuagint, LXX De.16.9, rendering in mid-3rd century BC Greek (Koine) what Scholiast stated as observed by Jewish communities:

ἑπτὰ ἑβδομάδας ὁλοκλήρους ἐξαριθμήσεις σεαυτῷ’ ἀρξαμένου σου δρέπανον ἐπ’ ἀμητὸν ἄρξῃ ἐξαριθμῆσαι ἑπτὰ ἑβδομάδας.

You will count yourself seven weeks; you will begin to count [these] seven weeks, since you began to put the sickle in the harvest.



Scholiast said:


> But so (for example) does ἐννεάς for a 'period of nine days'.



ὤριστε Σχολιαστά,

I think no meaning 'period of nine days' can be found. As LSJ shows the word *ἐννεάς* only has these three meanings: _body of nine, the number nine _and_ the ninth day of the month_.


----------



## Michael Zwingli

As is often the case, this digression is as interesting as my original question, which has been sufficiently addressed above by diaphoretikos, @Perseas, @ioanell, @Scholiast and @bearded (thank you all). In this case, the digression tends to make one consider his perspective on the world.



apmoy70 said:


> In Classical Greece...they divided each month (which was lunar) into three periods of ten days (δεκάδες, δεκάς in singular). And each lunar month had fixed thirty days...


That's intriguing; I quite like the concept, of which I was quite ignorant. Forty-six weeks/_dekades_ comprising twelve months per year, with a remainder of five days, seems to provide the opportunity for a bit more regularity than we have currently. Is it known how they dealt with the remaining five and a quarter days to make up the solar year?



Scholiast said:


> Greetings again
> 
> Perseas (# 6) is perfectly correct, that ἑβδομάς appears in these authors as 'a period of seven days'. But so (for example) does ἐννεάς for a 'period of nine days'. My point (in # 5) was that, until the (originally Judaic) notion of the universe created in seven days gained world-wide currency with the spread of Christianity from the 1st century AD onwards, the 'week' as we understand it did not exist except as observed by Jewish communities. Classical Athenian practice was to divide months into three δεκάδες.
> 
> Σ


Yes, sir, you make some interesting points. In my more whimsical moments, I have thought it rather unfortunate that the ancient Hebrews, considering (for rather mysterious reasons) the number 7 to be the number of perfection/completion, decided that 7 days should be the length of the week. It creates a need for all kinds of problematic compensation: the differing lengths of the months, particular calendar dates (including New Year's Day) falling on different days of the week from year-to-year, etc. It also makes calendar periods difficult to describe decimally. Note that the number 365 is divisible without a remainder by only 1, 5, 73, and 365! Given those facts, the only rational week would have been that of five days. A "_pentas_", perhaps? Then, rather than a year of 52.143 weeks, we could have a year of an even 73 weeks. But, then, egads! (not often that I have the opportunity to use that word...), 73, being a prime number, is not evenly divisible into months, and even upon solving that conundrum, we would yet have that pesky quarter day which necessitates the leap years...uuugh! Couldn't the big man in the sky have designed this solar system in such a way as to ensure mathematical elegance from the perspective of this 3rd rock???.


----------



## Scholiast

χαίρετ᾽ ὦ φίλοι



ioanell said:


> I think no meaning 'period of nine days' can be found. As LSJ shows the word *ἐννεάς* only has these three meanings: _body of nine, the number nine _and_ the ninth day of the month_.


ioanell (# 13) is quite right here—I wrote in haste and should have checked before posting.


Michael Zwingli said:


> the ancient Hebrews, considering ... the number 7 to be the number of perfection/completion


Remember Mt. 18:22, where Jesus plays (with a touch of mischievous humour?) on this, when he says in response to a somewhat naive or legalistic query from Peter that he should be prepared to forgive a wrongdoer 'seventy times seven' times (Οὐ λέγω σοι ἕως ἑπτάκις ἀλλὰ ἕως ἑβδομηκοντάκις ἑπτά).

And a footnote, as regards calendrical calculations: neat exactitude is even more difficult to arrive at than Michael Zwingli (# 14) supposes, as there are not exactly 365.25 days in the solar year, but fractionally less—hence the 1563 Gregorian adjustment to the Julian calendar.

Σ


----------



## Michael Zwingli

Scholiast said:


> Remember Mt. 18:22, where Jesus plays (with a touch of mischievous humour?)


Yes, I am very familiar with that.


Scholiast said:


> ...when he says in response to a somewhat naive or legalistic query from Peter that he should be prepared to forgive a wrongdoer 'seventy times seven' times (Οὐ λέγω σοι ἕως ἑπτάκις ἀλλὰ ἕως ἑβδομηκοντάκις ἑπτά).


I have always assumed the idea here to be: "perfection upon perfection", or "more than perfect".


Scholiast said:


> ...as regards calendrical calculations: neat exactitude is even more difficult to arrive at than Michael Zwingli (# 14) supposes...


Yes, given the astronomical facts, I suppose that the seven day week is not much worse than any other possibility. Regardless, it is what we will have for the remainder of this age, and perhaps the age to come.

I begin to feel that we should probably recall, at this point, that the site moderators rightly look askance at such tangential discussions as this time-reckoning conversation has become (though in this instance it has been instructive to myself), and so desist. I do feel that my original query has been well answered, though any additional instruction on how duration may be described in Greek grammar will be appreciated.


----------



## apmoy70

Michael Zwingli said:


> ...
> That's intriguing; I quite like the concept, of which I was quite ignorant. Forty-six weeks/_dekades_ comprising twelve months per year, with a remainder of five days, seems to provide the opportunity for a bit more regularity than we have currently. Is it known how they dealt with the remaining five and a quarter days to make up the solar year?
> ...


After the 430's BCE they used what's called the Metonic cycle, named after Meton of Athens to compensate for the lost days. Roughly, they squeezed in seven intercalary months (called ἐμβόλιμος, ἐμβόλιμοι in plural < ἐν+βολή) within the 19-year Metonic cycle, at first randomly, later, they added one intercalary month on the 3rd, 6th, 8th, 11th, 14th, 17th and 19th year. The intercalary month took the name of the previous month e.g. in the Aetolian calendar, in an intercalary year, the yearly calendar is:
Προκύκλιος, Ἀθαναῖος, Βουκάτιος, Διός, Ἑυθυαῖος, Ὁμολώιος, Ἑρμαῖος, Διονύσιος, Ἀγύειος, Ἱπποδρόμιος, Λαφραῖος, Πάναμος, *Πάναμος ἐμβόλιμος*


----------

