[B-Greek] Any "dual" verbs in the GNT?
Carl W. Conrad
cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu
Thu Aug 28 05:28:39 EDT 2003
The following message from Chuck Tripp came to me via the list's "bounce"
process; I couldn't find anything in it to explain why it did not reach the
list directly as it was clearly intended for the list; at any rate, I'm
forwarding it now to the list. cwc
From: "Chuck Tripp" <ctripp at ptialaska.net>
Subject: RE: [B-Greek] Any "dual" verbs in the GNT?
Date: Wed, 27 Aug 2003 20:13:32 -0800
Carl wrote:
"Fundamentally, I'd agree; I think Smyth is right to say that the dual
vanished from the living speech of Attica by 300 B.C., and I think it is
pretty clearly not to be found in the GNT. On the other hand, one should
not forget that Attic grammar and vocabulary were revived in the Attic
revival of the late first and second centuries. Lucian of Samosata in
northern Syria wrote very good Attic and used the dual. I haven't read much
in Clement of Alexandria, but I wouldn't be surprised to find the dual used
occasionally there. It never really was all that common in classical Attic
although it's quite common in Homer. One does well to remember that in
almost every period of the Greek language there's been a considerable
difference between the language commonly spoken and the language of
governmental administration and literature."
I have run across the dual in Arrian's Anabasis of Alexander, e.g.:
"...TON GORDION KAI SUGGENESQAI EPI GAMWi THi PAIDI KAI GENESQAI AUTOIN
PAIDA MIDAN ONOMA.
Anabasis of Alexander II.2.4
That is said to have been written in the first half of the 2nd century.
Chuck Tripp
Kodiak, Alaska
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