--- In
cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "P&G" <G&P@...> wrote:
> >> "On emploie le parfait pour désigner un ensemble d'actions qui
> >> aboutissent à un état présent: epeì kakà pollà pépontha ."
> >Does not the word <epeì> 'after, après que' give it away? How can
> >something be reported as being 'after' the present? This must
> >contain a past-tense element.
>
> Doesn't epei here mean "since=because" rather than "when"? So it
is
> describing a present condition.
You are right: "My courage is patient, for I have suffered much on
the waves and in battle". The conjunction does state the cause. The
suffering, however, took place in the past.
> >Especially the example with léloipen seems to show this (Il.
> >1.235): "This stick - it has never produced (literally 'never
> >produces') leaves or branches since it first left the stump in the
> >mountains, nor will it blossom". This is a clear reference to a
> >single moment in the past.
>
> Or to a timeless condition? "It has never produced leaves because
of this
> condition"
You seem to be rather addressing the meaning of <phúsei> 'produces',
while I am talking about <léloipen> 'it left, has left'. The stick's
leaving its trunk must be a single event belonging to the past.
Still, it did it "once and for all" - I'll come back to that.
> >Another case of the same kind seems to be:
> >Il. 21.81 : hé:de duo:dekáte:, hót' es Ílion eilé:loutha / pollà
> >pathó:n "it is now the twelfth day since I came to Ilios after
much
> >suffering". Achilles is looking back on the day he arrived in
Troy;
> >that must be in the past.
>
> This seems to me to be more clearly present. "This day ..." is a
kind of
> clue.
No, the coming part was an event that took place twelve (eleven)
days ago. It has a note of finality about it, cf. below.
> However, I'm happy to accept that there are examples of past
reference
> perfects in Homer - the language is very mixed. I also like your
comment
> about the perfect:
> "This all points to a mixing of the points of view, in that an
event
> may be regarded as something occurring in the past while at the
same
> time having after-effects of importance for the present, and the
> linguistic form of a sentence may even be inconsistent in its
choice
> of adverbs and other accompanying pointers."
Thank you for a constructive reaction. I am not so sure myself
anymore. The perfects found in Homer are in fact typically those
with a present meaning, as mémona, pépoitha, eío:tha, while verbs
expressing dramatic events hardly ever occur in the perfect. It will
seem wrong to ascribe a narrative use of the perfect to PIE, so the
perfect cannot have been a preterite on a par with the imperfect and
the aorist. But it may well have had a *concluding* effect: The
stick left the stump, I finally got here, I have had my fill of
suffering. This type of present-relevant use of the perfect is also
found in Avestan, and it will in all probability belong to PIE
already.
There is another thing I may have to modify: If the use of the
perfect as a normal preterite is not of PIE date, its continuation
in the past tense of the Anatolian hi-conjugation cannot well
continue a PIE "simple-past" use. However, that does not really
matter, and I just don't understand one can have overlooked this for
so long. If the development of the perfect into a preterite is such
a trivial thing that nobody wants to push the preterital value of
the reflexes of the perfect in Germanic, Celtic, Italic, Albanian
and Tocharian back into PIE, then of course the same trivial
development of the perfect into a past may well have occurred in
Anatolian BEFORE the restructuring of the verbal system. All it
takes is that the reflexes of the perfect had attained (if not
preserved) a preterital value, then analogy could create the present
forms without any problems. If only Anatolian is given the same
rights as the other branches to develop in a natural way I really
see no problems with the traditional PIE verbal system as valid for
the prehistory of Anatolian as well.
Jens