90 



THE POPULAE EDUCATOE. 



LESSONS IN GREEK. XXY. 



CONJUGATION. PRELIMINARY NOTIONS. 

 LET us take the word tKvffa^v to illustrate what was said in 

 the last lesson. The word signifies I loosed myself, I untied or 

 unbound myself. Now suppose that I unbound myself was 

 written as though it formed one word, as thus : lunboundmy- 

 self . If we mark off the several elements of this compound by 

 hyphens, and assign names to the several parts 



Personal Prefix. Adverbial Prefix. Verbal Stem. Personal Suffix. 



I un- bound myself, 



we may have some idea how the Greek form above presented 

 has been produced. Here it is divided, and the parts named : 

 Augment. Root. Aorist Stem. Middle Personal Ending. 



f- \v- ffa- Wt>- 



It is thus seen that the root of the form is Av. This is called 

 the root, because it remains permanent under all the modifica- 

 tions. Thus it is found in \vffia, in \vffo/j.fvos, t\vQriv, etc. By 

 prefixing certain letters to An, and by adding certain letters to 

 An, we get all the varieties of form and signification. Thus, if 

 we want to say I loose, we add a>, as Av-w ; if we want to say 

 they loosed, we prefix e and add <rav, thus, e-Au-o-ai/. The pre- 

 fixes and suffixes by whose aid the root is thus modified may be 

 termed formative syllables. A knowledge of these formative 

 syllables, combined with a knowledge of the several roots, is 

 necessary for a correct knowledge of the grammar of the verbs. 

 It is necessary to make a distinction between the r^fc of a verb 

 and the stem. The root of a verb is the verb reduced to its 

 ultimate or most simple form. It agrees with the stem in being 

 generally the stem of the present tense, active voice. But it 

 differs from the stem, inasmuch as it is one primitive form, 

 and there are several stems the stem of the present, the stem 

 of the imperfect, the stem of the perfect, etc. The stem of a 

 tense' is that form which remains when the personal endings 

 and the mood characteristics are taken away. The following 

 are the stems of the root and of several tenses of TVTTTQI, 1 

 strike. 



STEMS. PERSONAL ENDINGS. 



Third Person. Second Person. 

 Eoot, TVTT- 



Present Stem, TVTTT- -ei, lie strikes ; -ets, thou, etc. 



Imperfect Stem, ervirr- -e, he was striking ; -s, 



First Aorist Stem, ertnj/- -e, he struck; -as, ,, 



Perfect Stem, rerv<p- -e- he has struck ; -as, 



Pluperfect Stem, cTtrvQ- , he had struck; -eis, 



That is to say, if to the present stem ft be added, we get 

 which means he strikes ; if to the pluperfect stem ets be added, 

 we get frervQeis, which means thou hadst struck. So, if from 

 Teru^as we take away as, we get the perfect stem rervcf>. If 

 we want to make the perfect stem into the pluperfect stem, we 

 prefix the augment e, and make erervty. If, again, we wish to 

 resolve -rervip into the root, we have to cut off the augment re, 

 and change the aspirate <J> into the corresponding soft IT, and so 

 obtain TVTT. This, the root, can be raised into the present stem 

 by affixing r thus, TVTTT. And TUTTT may be changed into the 

 imperfect stem by prefixing the augment of that tense, namely, e. 



THE AUGMENT. 



First of all, we must consider the augment or temporal prefix. 

 We call the augment temporal, because its function is to denote 

 past time ; and we call it a prefix, because it is put at the be- 

 ginning of the root or stem. The augment is of two kinds : 

 first, syllabic ; second, temporal. It is syllabic when it adds a 

 syllable to the verb ; it is temporal when it lengthens the initial 

 vowel of the verb. The syllabic augment is of two kinds, it is 

 simple or reduplicative. For instance, it is simple when it 

 merely prefixes a vowel, as in t\(nrov, I was leaving ; it is re- 

 duplicative when it doubles the initial consonant, as AeAu/co : 

 here e is called the simple syllabic augment, and A the redupli- 

 cative. The syllabic augment is employed when the verb begins 

 with a consonant. If the verb begins with a vowel, the tempo- 

 ral augment is used, the vowels a and e being changed into 17 or 

 ei, and i and C (iota short and upsilon short) being changed 

 into I and : o is changed into u. In the same way, in verbs 

 beginning with the diphthongs at, ei, ot are changed into p, <f, 

 the first vowel being changed into its corresponding long one, 

 and the i written underneath ; av becomes TJU. If a verb begins 

 with p, the p is generally doubled, as pnrrw, I throw, 



The simple syllabic augment is found in only the indicative 

 mood ; the reduplicative extends through all the moods. The 

 simple syllabic augment is used with the imperfect tense and 

 with the aorist. The reduplicative augment is used with the 

 perfect tense, the pluperfect tense, and the third future, some- 

 times called the paulo-post-future. If, however, the verb begins 

 with a vowel, the perfect and the pluperfect have, instead of 

 the reduplicative, merely the temporal augment. The pluper- 

 fect has a double augment, inasmuch as it prefixes the simple 

 augment e to the reduplicative re, etc. ; for instance, tTe-rvtyeiv. 

 Fuller details will be given hereafter. 



CHARACTERISTIC LETTERS. 



We have used previously the terms pure verbs. This is one 

 class into which verbs are divided. Verbs are divided gene- 

 rally into classes, according to the characteristic letters of the 

 present tense, or the stem of the present tense. The letter 

 which stands immediately before the ta of the present tense is 

 called the characteristic letter : thus, in Atw, the v is the charac- 

 teristic of the verb ; in TI/ITTCO, the r is the characteristic of 

 the verb ; and in <rrt\\oi, the A is the characteristic of the 

 verb. If the characteristic is a vowel, the verb is called pure, 

 e.g., Aiw ; if the characteristic is a consonant, the verb is 

 called mute, e.g., TUTTTOJ ; if the characteristic is a liquid, the verb 

 is called liquid, e.g., oreAAw, I send. Thus there are three kinds 

 of verbs. 



Pure. Mtite. Liquid. 



rifj.au, I honour. rpipca, I rub. <f>aivu, I show. 



FLEXIONAL TERMINATIONS. 



Another kind of characteristic letters or syllables are the 



inflexions, which mark the time (tense), the manner (mood), 



and the persons of the verb. Look at \vffofj.ai, I will loose 



myself. Analyse it, and the parts will be found to stand thus : 



Boot. Tense Sign. Mood Sign. Person Sign. 



\V- ff- O- fJLO.t. 



Here Au is the root, ff is the characteristic of the future, o of 

 the indicative mood, and pai of the first person singular. Let 

 us vary these forms a little. 



Boot. Tense Sign. Mood Sign. Person Sign. 

 Au- ff- 01- fj.tOa. 



Here the sign of the indicative mood, o, has become 01, to indi- 

 cate the optative, and juai of the first person singular is changed 

 into nt6a of the first person plural. Again, take eXvaavro. 

 Augment. Root. Tense Sign. Mood Sign. Person Sign. 

 f. Au- ff- a- vro. 



fie- /3ouAev- ff- o- fMU. 



t- jBouAev- ff- a- pi\ v ' 



Augment. Root. Voice Sign. Person Sign. 



e- &ov\ev- 6- i]v. 



The tense sign, in union with the person sign, is termed the 

 tense-ending. Thus in \uffo> the ff is the tense sign, being the 

 sign of the future, and ffta is the ending of the future tense, 

 active voice, commonly called the first future active. The stem 

 of the verb, in connection with the tense sign and with the 

 augment, is called the tense-stem. Thus, in t&ovXfvaa the 

 tense-stem is ef$ov\fvff that is, the stem of the first aorist 

 active. 



GENERAL TABLE OF THE TENSE-ENDINGS. 



Active. Middle. Passive. 



Present, -u, -o/j.ai.* 



Imperfect, -ov, -o^v.* 



Perfect, -a, -/J.O.L.* 



Pluperfect, -eiv, -n.i}v.* 



Aorist First, -ffa., -cra^v, -Qt]v. 



Future First, -ffa, -cro/xai, 



Aorist Second, o*', -owv, -i\v. 



Future Second, 



This arrangement places under the middle voice some tenses, 

 those marked with an asterisk, which are commonly ascribed 

 to the passive voice. If the student bears in mind what was 

 said in the last lesson of the intimate relation of the two, he 

 will see a ground for this diversity of view. 



PERSONAL ENDINGS AND TOWEL SIGNS. 



The personal endings are the terminations by which the varia- 

 tions of person are indicated. They are closely connected with 



