[B-Greek] The so-called third attributive position
Carl W. Conrad
cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu
Tue Mar 16 07:53:47 EST 2004
At 8:54 PM -0500 3/15/04, A. Philip Brown II wrote:
>Carl W. Conrad wrote:
>
>>I do believe it is attributive but I have argued on this forum on at least
>one other occasion that the article-adjective phrase DOES function in a
>sort of appositional sense; in part this has to do with the origin of the
>article as a weak demonstrative in the sense "the one"--so that the first
>illustrative sentence above may be understood as "Quickly fetch a gown, the
>very best one." That is to say, the phrase distinctly indicates the noun
>back to which it refers as not simply 'ANY gown whatsoever.' It's
>attributive because it's not simply adding a secondary qualification about
>the gown. Without the article (i.e. if it were phrased TACU EXENEGKATE
>STOLHN PRWTHN, the gown would be a high-quality one, but it would not be
>the very best; I'd English the clause if so worded "Quickly fetch a gown,
>one that is of very good quality." But isn't that different from "Quickly
>fetch a gown--the very best-quality one"?<
>
>OK. Let me see if I understand what you are saying:
>
>Appositives add only secondary qualifications to their referent; whereas
>"attributives" add primary/essential (?) qualifications to a noun?
>
>If that's what you're saying, I'm not following you.
>
>As you say, "Without the article (i.e. if it were phrased TACU EXENEGKATE
>STOLHN PRWTHN, the gown would be a high-quality one, but it would not be
>the very best" --- In this case, I would regard PRWTHN as an attributive
>adjective in this construction (an indefinite attributive adjective).
>
>Here's the rule of thumb I've worked with: In the attributive position,
>modifiers agree with the word they modify in Gender, Number, Case and
>Definiteness/Determination. Admittedly the one construction that is
>syntactically ambiguous is an anarthrous noun + anarthrous modifier, in
>which case the modifier may be predicate or attributive, depending on
>contextual factors.
>
>However, the factor of Definiteness has been very helpful to me, especially
>as applied to understanding a participle's relationship to its referent.
>Attributive participles always agree in Determination with their referent.
>Any articular participle modifying (=GNC) an anarthrous substantive, would
>by this definition be substantive and function appositionally, as hO WN does
>in John 1:18
>
>What are the syntactic markers you use to distinguish syntactic apposition
>from syntactic attribution? Or is this really a matter of semantic elements
>distinguishing attribution from apposition?
You're asking questions that are not very easily answered in a simple,
straightforward manner; I suspect that my attempt to alter TACU EXENEGKATE
STOLHN THN PRWTHN from an attributive to a predicate phrase was not very
good as an illustration; the force of the predicate position of PRWTHN in
TACU EXENEGKATE STOLHN PRWTHN is to give the sense, "Quickly fetch a gown
such that it is first-rate." That's not a very good illustration, although
I think it's grammatically accurate enough.
For definitions of apposition and the different ways in which it is marked
syntactically, I suggest you read through the material in Smyth, §§ 916,
976-995; you might want to note especially § 986, "Attributive apposition."
--
Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University (Emeritus)
1989 Grindstaff Road/Burnsville, NC 28714/(828) 675-4243
cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu
WWW: http://www.ioa.com/~cwconrad/
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