[B-Greek] "gnomic" masculine

Carl Conrad cwconrad2 at mac.com
Thu Jun 26 19:24:44 EDT 2008


On Jun 26, 2008, at 6:03 PM, Elizabeth Kline wrote:

>
> On Jun 26, 2008, at 1:20 PM, Carl Conrad wrote:
>
>> I don't find this at all problematic except for the term "gnomic" --
>> do you perhaps mean "generic"?
>
>
> Carl,
>
> OK, the term is used by Cooper, KLUTAIMHSTRA's statement is gnomic,
> the masculine used in the statement is generic.
> Cooper again, the persons referred to by this masculine are women,
> exclusively, cannot be men.

That I understand and have no problem with. Having done a Google  
search for "gnomic masculine" I've found a few references on the net,  
although several of those I found referred specifically to the passage  
you cite. It's just the terminology that I find questionable; it seems  
to me that what's involved here is a generalizing statement such as  
hOSTIS AN TOUTO POIHSHi ENOCOS ESTAI QANATOU, where the hOSTIS could  
very well refer to a woman. ENOCOS happens to be a common-termination  
adjective, but the masculine of a regular 3-termination adjective  
would be used in the same situation.

I'm quibbling, of course, as I quibble at such Wallace-isms as  
"aporetic genitive."


Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University (Retired)






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