top Lesson 36

Proclitics

  1. Some monosyllable words have no accent and are closely attached to the following word. These are called proclitics (from προκλίνω meaning lean forward).
  2. Proclitic articles: ὁ, ἡ, οἱ, αἱ.
  3. Proclitic prepositions: εἰς, ἐκ, ἐξ, ἐν.
  4. Proclitic conjunctions: εἰ, ὡς
  5. Proclitic negatives: οὐ, οὐκ, οὐχ.
  6. Exceptions:
    1. οὐ takes an acute accent when it is at the end of a sentence:
      1. πῶς γὰρ οὔ; for why not?
      2. Also when it stands alone: Οὔ. No.
    2. When ὡς means thus it is accented
      1. ὣς εἶπεν thus he said
      2. καὶ ὥς even thus
      3. οὐδ᾿ ὥς not even thus
      4. μηδ᾿ ὥς not even thus
    3. When the article ὁ is used for the relative pronoun ὅς, it is accented.

Enclitics

  1. Definition:
    1. An enclitic (ἐγκλίνω lean upon) is a word which causes the previous word to capture the enclitic's accent so that the two words "lean together" and are pronounced as one word with two accents: e.g., ἄνθρωποί τε (AN-throw-POI-te).
  2. Enclitic types:
    1. Enclitic personal pronouns: μοῦ, μοί, μέ, σοῦ, σοί, σέ, οὗ, οἷ, ἕ
    2. Enclitic indefinite pronouns: τί, τινά, τινάς, τινί, τινές, τινός, τινῶν, τισί, τισίν, τίς. Don't confuse them with the interogative pronouns
    3. Enclitic indefinite adverbs: πού, ποθί, πῄ, ποί, ποθέν, ποτέ, πώ, πώς. Don't confuse them with the interogative adverbs: ποῦ, πόθι, πῇ, ποῖ, πόθεν, πότε, πῶ, πῶς.
    4. Enclitic verbs:
      1. All Present Indicative forms of εἰμί except 2nd Sing (εἶ): εἰμί, ἐστί, ἐστίν, ἐσμέν, ἐστέ, εἰσί, εἰσίν.
      2. All Present Indicative forms of φημί except 2nd Sing (φῄς): φημί, φησί, φησίν, φαμέν, φατέ, φασί, φασίν
    5. Enclitic particles: γέ, τέ, τοί, πέρ
  3. Enclitic rules:
    1. When a word is followed by an enclitic with no intervening punctuation, it is almost as though the enclitic is joined to the word.
    2. The word before the enclitic always retains its own accent; but it may capture the enclitic's accent
    3. All single-syllable enclitics can lose their accents.
      1. ἄνθρωποί μου
      2. ἄνθρωποι captures the accent of μοῦ and puts an accute on its last syllable.
      3. It is now pronounced AN-throw-POI-moo as though it were one word.
    4. A two-syllable enclitic can also lose its accent except when it follows a word with an acute on the penult (i.e., next to last syllable).
      1. ἄνθρωποί τινες (ἄνθρωποι captures the accent of the enclitic)
      2. λόγοι τινές (not λόγοί τινες, nor λόγοι τινες).
    5. The word before the enclitic never changes its final acute to the grave.
      1. Example: When the three vocabulary words: τούς, πονηρούς and ἀνθρώπους are linked into a phrase, the final acute accents on the first two words change to grave, so that it ends up as τοὺς πονηροὺς ἀνθρώπους.
      2. If we insert the enclitic τέ after the first word, we have τούς τε πονηροὺς ἀνθρώπους. The first word captures the accent of the enclitic and turns the grave of τοὺς into an acute.
    6. If the word before the enclitic is accented on the antepenult, it captures the enclitic's accent and places an acute on its last syllable. Thus ἄνθρωπός τις, ἄνθρωποί τινες
    7. If the word before the enclitic is accented with a circumflex on the penult, it captures the enclitic's accent and places an acute on its last syllable. Thus δεῖξόν μοι, παῖδές τινες, οὗτός ἐστιν.
    8. If the word before the enclitic is accented with an acute on the penult, it does not capture the enclitic's accent. In this situation, if the enclitic has only one syllable, it loses its accent, but if it has two syllables, it keeps its accent.
      1. λόγος τις (not λόγός τις) -- acute on penult + single syllable enclitic
      2. λόγοι τινές (not λόγοι τινες) -- acute on penult + double syllable enclitic
      3. λόγων τινῶν -- acute on penult + double syllable enclitic
      4. οὕτω φησίν -- acute on penult + double syllable enclitic
      5. οὗτός φησιν -- NO acute on penult + double syllable enclitic. It is like the examples in the previous note where the penult is accented with a circumflex.
    9. If the word before the enclitic is accented on the last syllable, it remains unchanged; but the enclitic loses its accent.
      1. τιμαί τε
      2. τιμῶν γε
      3. σοφός τις
      4. σοφοί τινες
      5. σοφῶν τινες
    10. If a proclitic comes before an enclitic, the proclitic gets an acute and the enclitic loses its accent.
      1. εἴ τις if someone
      2. εἴ φησιν οὗτος if he says this
    11. If an enclitic begins a sentence or clause, the enclitic retains its accent. In other words, its accent is not captured by the previous sentence or clause.
    12. If an enclitic pronoun expresses an antithesis, the enclitic does not lose its accent. οὐ τἄρα Τρωσὶν ἀλλὰ σοὶ μαχούμεθα. we shall fight, if not with Trojans but with you
    13. If the word previous to an enclitic ends in an elision (i.e., apostrophe), the enclitic retains its accent. πόλλ᾿ ἐστίν otherwise it would be πολλά ἐστιν.
    14. When ἐστί begins a sentence or when it signifies existence or possibility, it becomes ἔστι
    15. When several enclitics occur in succession, each one takes an acute from the following, but the last loses its accent
      1. εἴ τίς τί σοί φησιν if anyone is saying anything to you
      2. εἴ τίς ἐστιν ἀνέγκλητος if anyone is blameless (Titus 1:6)
    16. The form of εἰμί (and its enclitic forms) after οὐκ are different.
      1. οὐκ εἰμί
      2. οὐκ ἔστι
      3. οὐκ ἔστιν
      4. οὐκ ἐσμέν
      5. οὐκ ἐστέ
      6. οὐκ εἰσί
      7. οὐκ εἰσίν
    17. It is easy to confuse τίς and τὶς and their forms.
      1. Interrogative pronouns have acute accents and they can never lose them.
      2. For the two-syllable forms:
        1. If the accent is on the first syllable, it is an interrogative pronoun (Who? What? Why?)
        2. If the accent is on the last syllable or has no accent, it is an indefinite pronoun (someone, something, anything, certain thing, etc.).
      3. However for the single syllable forms (τίς and τί) there can be a problem identifying the word.
        1. If the word has a grave accent or no accent (τις, τὶς, τι, τὶ) it is always an indefinite pronoun.
        2. If the word has an accute accent and not followed by an enclitic, it is always an interrogative pronoun.
        3. If the word has an accute accent and followed by an enclitic, it could be either one. The context should reveal the answer.
      4. Note: In Titus 1:6 (εἴ τίς ἐστιν), is τίς an interrogative pronoun or an indefinite pronoun?
        1. Without the accents affected by the enclitics, it would be εἰ τὶς ἐστίν.
        2. εἰ captured an accent. It can't capture the accent of an interrogative pronoun, so τίς must be indefinite.
        3. τις, in turn, captures the accent of the enclitic ἐστίν
        4. If εἰ had not captured an accent, τίς would have been interrogative.
      5. Note: Yet in Rom 9:20 (τί με ἐποίησας οὕτος, why have you made me thus), τί is followed by an enclitic, but it is an interrogative pronoun because of context.
      6. Note: In I Cor 10:11, τί is used three times. The first is an in interrogative, but the other two (followed by enclitics) are indefinite. Τί οὖν φημι; ὅτι εἴδωλόν τί ἐστιν ἢ ὅτι εἰδωλόθυτόν τί ἐστιν; (What am I saying? that an idol is something or that offering to an idol is something?)