From: Carl W. Conrad (cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu)
Date: Sun Jan 07 2001 - 11:19:09 EST
At 10:02 AM -0500 1/7/01, Moon-Ryul Jung wrote:
>[Moon]
>> >By the way, what is the difference between
>> >
>> >hOI MAGOI hOI APO ANATOLWN
>> >and MAGOI hOI APO ANATOLWN?
>>
>[Carl]
>> about one milligram; I guess the first would be a little more definite (as
>> if the author knew who they were; I don't know when we get the first
>> tradition that actually names them whatever: Caspar, Balthazar, and
>> whatever?). But the important thing would be the attributive construction
>> of APO ANATOLWN.
>>
>
>[Moon]
>
>Now, I can ask the question that I really wanted to ask.
>
>According to your understanding there is no way to
>describe unspecified wise men that are from
>the east by using three words, MAGOI, APO, ANATOLWN.
>
>All of three options
> hOI MAGOI APO ANATOLWN,
> hOI MAGOI hOI APO ANATOLWN
> MAGOI hOI APO ANATOLWN
>
>are definite expressions.
>
>The only option, which might refer to indefinite entity,
>MAGOI APO ANATOLWN
>is problematic because APO ANATOLWN does not seem to be
>attributive.
>
>How can I refer to unspecified wise men by using
>MAGOI, APO, ANATOLWN?
Well, perhaps I'm not being wide-open enough to the possibilities in Koine,
but I think that without the article before APO ANATOLWN that phrase ought
to be predicative and construed with a verb rather than with the subject.
MAGOI hOI AP' ANATOLWN would be more indefinite than hOI MAGOI AP'
ANATOLWN. If one wanted to be MOST indefinite, one might write MAGOI TINES
AP' ANATOLWN ELQONTES: "certain (unnamed) Magi, who came from the East ..."
--
Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics/Washington University
One Brookings Drive/St. Louis, MO, USA 63130/(314) 935-4018
Home: 7222 Colgate Ave./St. Louis, MO 63130/(314) 726-5649
cwconrad@artsci.wustl.edu
WWW: http://www.artsci.wustl.edu/~cwconrad/
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