Berthold Delbrück and the syntax of cases: an analysis of the case ending -φι in Homer (original) (raw)

Abstract

This is the summary and the abstract of our contribution in the proceedings of the Delbrück-conference, but we cannot post the article as formatted and published in the Proceedings here. This is therefore not the published version of the article nor the version formatted by the editing company. It is the submitted version of the article. For the page numbers and the exact subdivisions, please refer to published version and the conference proceedings In this article, we investigate Delbrück’s analysis of the cases by discussing the case ending -φι in Homer. He himself treated the issue on three occasions and stated that this case form remained insufficiently and unsatisfactorily explained. Initially, he argued that the original meaning was the instrumental-comitative, expanded with locative and ablative functions and the original number was the plural. Later, however, he assumed that the ending could also be used for the genitive and the dative. As Mycenaean had not been discovered at his time and he could therefore not have included it, we focus in our analysis solely on -φι in Homer and only refer to Mycenaean sparingly. First, we provide an overview of the scholarship on Homer, distinguishing between the scholars writing before the decipherment (including Delbrück) and the ones after it. In a second step, we determine our corpus by discussing some passages with uncertain transmission (αὐτόφι versus αὐτόθι and Ἰλιόφι κλυτὰ τείχεα). We then provide the figures and proceed to the actual analysis. We start with number, animacy and concreteness, then discuss the case usages - locative, instrumental, object marking - and the use of the forms with prepositions. After that, we take a closer look at the distribution of the forms and their co-occurrence with genitive and dative forms in the same sentence and the same syntagma. At the end of the article, we analyse the instances for which more than one interpretation is possible. Our analysis shows that the suffix is numerus-indifferent and that instances with an unambiguous plural are relatively uncommon, that the suffix appears almost exclusively with inanimate entities, is used predominantly with concrete elements, has often instrumental and locative meaning, but can also be used as an ablative and is very common with prepositions (more than half of the instances). Our findings differ from what Delbrück himself noted in two respects, namely the lack of animacy and the lack of plural meaning, and from the data in Mycenaean in three respects, namely the mostly singular meaning of the suffix (in Mycenaean, the suffix is almost exclusively used in the plural), its common use with prepositions and with the ablative and locative-directive functions (these two uses are very rare in Mycenaean). They also make the interpretation of the ending as a simple oblique case marker or a simple poetic tool less likely and shed new light on the original function and the origin of the ending and its use in Proto-Indo-European (PIE) and other Indo-European languages, but that discussion cannot be performed in the current article.

Figures (5)

The differences between Mycenaean and Homer can best be summarised in the following table:!*

The differences between Mycenaean and Homer can best be summarised in the following table:!*

hang a lyre on two pegs as well). The cases in which the suffix -@i is used for a single city or place, such as POingi or TA, are obviously also singular. As it is unclear whether igi was an original plural or singular form, the 17 instances have not been counted as a specific singular form, but not as a plural form either (as was discussed above, some argue that this ambiguity might have been the starting point for the singular use of the -@1-ending). The same applies to the 7 instances of avto@u. We thus have the following data: LAVIe 2, ULE Udld OF UIE SULLIA ~-OL ds LO HUTMDET, The data show that only a relatively small part of the attestations (less than one out of six) can be interpreted unequivocally as a plural form or as having unambiguous plural reference. This is, in our opinion, a string indication that the suffix was initially not a plural form. The next issue that needs to be addressed is the animacy.

hang a lyre on two pegs as well). The cases in which the suffix -@i is used for a single city or place, such as POingi or TA, are obviously also singular. As it is unclear whether igi was an original plural or singular form, the 17 instances have not been counted as a specific singular form, but not as a plural form either (as was discussed above, some argue that this ambiguity might have been the starting point for the singular use of the -@1-ending). The same applies to the 7 instances of avto@u. We thus have the following data: LAVIe 2, ULE Udld OF UIE SULLIA ~-OL ds LO HUTMDET, The data show that only a relatively small part of the attestations (less than one out of six) can be interpreted unequivocally as a plural form or as having unambiguous plural reference. This is, in our opinion, a string indication that the suffix was initially not a plural form. The next issue that needs to be addressed is the animacy.

deciding on “concrete” or “abstract” we decided based on the syntagma in which the ending -@t was used and not only of the noun, pronoun, adjective or participle that had the ending. As such, matvopévyot in Hoi gatvopévyg@t is considered “concrete”, because “dawn” is a concrete element and not an abstract concept. The same applies to expressions such as Emi SEELOMI TAVTOsG OTpatod “at the right side of the army” (/liad 13,308). Similarly, local descriptions, such as “in Troy” or “in Phthia” have also been catalogued as concrete. It goes without saying that all animate instances are concrete as well. The data are

deciding on “concrete” or “abstract” we decided based on the syntagma in which the ending -@t was used and not only of the noun, pronoun, adjective or participle that had the ending. As such, matvopévyot in Hoi gatvopévyg@t is considered “concrete”, because “dawn” is a concrete element and not an abstract concept. The same applies to expressions such as Emi SEELOMI TAVTOsG OTpatod “at the right side of the army” (/liad 13,308). Similarly, local descriptions, such as “in Troy” or “in Phthia” have also been catalogued as concrete. It goes without saying that all animate instances are concrete as well. The data are

Table 4: the prepositional uses of the ending -@i in Homer. We note that there are 33 instances with the meaning of an ablative and 12 with that of a direction. The directive uses are certainly not inherited from PIE whereas the ablative uses of the ending -q are in all likelihood not inherited either but an inner-Greek evolution that had already started in pre-Mycenaean times but had not been completed yet. Delbriick (1867: 45) argued that the locative often had the notion of a movement in it anyway and he called this a locativ des zieles and that it was safer to interpret the instances of 14 6& ot 8eo0@w (which we considered to be “directive”) as instrumentals after all, as genuine genitive forms of the ending -@1 were not attested (1867: 70). This is somewhat problematic because one cannot deny that the terms “locative” and “direction, goal” seem mutually exclusive (even if one were to agree that there were no instances of a genitive use of -@1). In addition, there are some passages with a directive or ablative meaning where the exact interpretation is not entirely clear and they will be discussed in §17. prepositions, those with one can be analysed as having a function. We distinguish between locative, comitative- instrumental, ablative, directive, (locative-)directive. In some debated cases, one could argue that we were dealing with a postposition or even with a case of tmesis (they are discussed below in §16). The 7 instances of adto@vw can be interpreted in different ways (cf. supra) and for that reason we decided to put them in a special category, namely that of abto@tv. Our analysis of the different prepositional constructions is as follows:

Table 4: the prepositional uses of the ending -@i in Homer. We note that there are 33 instances with the meaning of an ablative and 12 with that of a direction. The directive uses are certainly not inherited from PIE whereas the ablative uses of the ending -q are in all likelihood not inherited either but an inner-Greek evolution that had already started in pre-Mycenaean times but had not been completed yet. Delbriick (1867: 45) argued that the locative often had the notion of a movement in it anyway and he called this a locativ des zieles and that it was safer to interpret the instances of 14 6& ot 8eo0@w (which we considered to be “directive”) as instrumentals after all, as genuine genitive forms of the ending -@1 were not attested (1867: 70). This is somewhat problematic because one cannot deny that the terms “locative” and “direction, goal” seem mutually exclusive (even if one were to agree that there were no instances of a genitive use of -@1). In addition, there are some passages with a directive or ablative meaning where the exact interpretation is not entirely clear and they will be discussed in §17. prepositions, those with one can be analysed as having a function. We distinguish between locative, comitative- instrumental, ablative, directive, (locative-)directive. In some debated cases, one could argue that we were dealing with a postposition or even with a case of tmesis (they are discussed below in §16). The 7 instances of adto@vw can be interpreted in different ways (cf. supra) and for that reason we decided to put them in a special category, namely that of abto@tv. Our analysis of the different prepositional constructions is as follows:

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