The difference between the “modal indicative” and the optative in the Odyssey

• Autores: Filip De Decker
• Localización: Historische Sprachforschung = Historical linguistics, ISSN 0935-3518, Nº. 135, 2022, págs. 75-162
• Idioma: inglés
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• Resumen

  • In this article I will investigate the differences between the modal indicative forms on the one hand (for the present investigation I do not distinguish between indicative and injunctive, and will use the term “modal indicative” for both indicative and injunctive) and the optative on the other, in contexts where the realisation of the event seemed or could seem unlikely (the so-called past potential and counterfactual). First (§ 2), I give an overview on the scholarship of the moods in Homer. In § 3, I briefly discuss the terms potential and counterfactual and the past and present reference of these forms. In § 4 I summarise the different explanations provided for the use of the optative and the modal indicative in these “modal” contexts. In the next step (§ 5) I discuss two morphological problems, namely the metrical equivalence between the future-indicative and the aorist subjunctive (subsuming them in a category “future-subjunctives”) and the sigmatic ending -(σ)ει(’). Then I proceed to the actual investigation. My research hypothesis is that the optative was the original mood in these contexts and referred to all degrees of (un)likelihood and (im)possibility, but that the optative was replaced by the modal indicative to allow for a clearer reference to the past, when the optative had past reference and when this substitution was metrically possible. I start with the modal indicative (§ 6). I provide facts and figures, as to the use of indicative, the (non-)past tense reference, the temporal difference and the fact whether or not the modal indicative forms could contain an older optative form. For the optative I will do the same providing figures for and focusing on the (non-)past reference and the degree of (un)likelihood (§ 7). In a next step I analyse the use of the optative and the indicative forms of several verbs (as there are about 100 modal indicative forms and 750 optative forms, analysing all of them individually would be impossible within the framework of an article): the verb θεάομαι (§ 9), ἀγορεύοι(ς) versus ἀγόρευε(ς) (§ 10), and the εἰ μή-clauses with the optative and the indicative (§ 11). Then I discuss some debated passages when the interpretations of the temporal reference, the (un)likelihood and the (im)possibility depend on the viewpoints of speaker and hearer, and when both indicative and optative occur in the same passage, as in Odyssey 1,234–244 (§ 12), 4,435–453 (§ 13), 9,125–139 (§ 14), 12,66–88 (§ 15), 13,383–391 (§ 16), 14,56–71 (§ 17), 18,259–264 (§ 18) and 23,183–189 (§ 19). At the end (§ 20) I discuss three instances in which the optative and the indicative are both transmitted and argue that the transmitted optative has preference over the indicative.