Greek Verb Future Tense Quirks

Ancient Greek for Everyone: A New Digital Resource for Beginning Greek Unit 9 part 2: Unorthodox Futures 2013 edition Wilfred E. Major wmajor@lsu.edu

Ancient Greek for Everyone This class AGE Unit 9 part 2: Unorthodox Futures This unit adds the other principal voice in Greek, the middle. This part covers a quirk in the future of some Greek verbs.

Ancient Greek for Everyone VOCABULARY: For reasons unclear now, and obscure already in antiquity, some verbs that are regularly active in the present tense become deponent in the future tense. These verbs are said to have a deponent future. These verbs retain active meaning in the future, even though the forms are middle. The challenge of conveying middle or passive meaning in the future of these verbs is complex, and a topic reserved for advanced study.

Ancient Greek for Everyone Building a Greek verb Following are two examples of verbs with a deponent future. Recall that the verb be, despite its irregularities in the present tense, has the stem -. This verb is regular in the future tense, but it is deponent. The model verb take is also deponent in the future tense.

Ancient Greek for Everyone / Building a Greek Verb The Future Indicative and Infinitive Middle of

Ancient Greek for Everyone Building a Greek verb Recall that adding a - - to the stem marks a verb as in the future tense. So now the stem looks (and sounds) like this: + = take = take (in the future) ALL VERBS, regardless of what endings they use in the present tense, use - verb endings in the future tense. Future tense = verb stem + + - verb endings This is true in both the active and middle voices.

Ancient Greek for Everyone / Building a Greek Verb The Future Indicative and Infinitive Middle of

Ancient Greek for Everyone Vocabulary: Principal Parts Greek verbs can morph into a variety of forms (you now know 28 different forms of a verb). You have already seen how vocabulary entries have two principal parts: 1st person singular present indicative active/middle (- , - or - ) 1st person singular future indicative active/middle (- or - ) Following are the verbs from your vocabulary so far that have deponent futures. As it happens, most - verbs that add a or to mark the present tense have deponent futures.

Ancient Greek for Everyone Future Deponent Vocabulary: Classical , hear - , miss, make a mistake - , walk, come, go happen, agree, result , see, look - , know, learn, judge, think - , be , be present

Ancient Greek for Everyone Future Deponent Vocabulary: Classical - , die - , take, grab; receive, get seize, catch up to, arrest take up, reply, suppose - , learn - , drink , flee, run away

Ancient Greek for Everyone Future Deponent Vocabulary: NT - , miss, make a mistake - , walk, come, go walk up, go aboard, enter walk down, descend - , know, learn, judge, think Notice the change of spelling ( ) from Classical to Koine. read know, understand

Ancient Greek for Everyone Future Deponent Vocabulary: NT - , be - , die - , take, grab; receive, get take, receive, accept - , drink

Ancient Greek for Everyone Future Deponent Vocabulary: Core , miss, make a mistake , die , walk, come, go ( ) , know, learn, judge, think , be , take, grab; receive, get , drink

Ancient Greek for Everyone VOCABULARY: The verbs on the following slides all have futures, mostly deponent, with variations or stem changes that are unpredictable or more complex than the patterns presented so far. These are all very common and important verbs, however, and recognizing these unusual principal parts is essential to reading Greek.

Ancient Greek for Everyone Unorthodox Futures Vocabulary: Classical , come, go , and have, hold, be provide , see , suffer, experience , fall

Ancient Greek for Everyone Unorthodox Futures Vocabulary: Classical , and sail , learn, hear, inquire , give birth , happen, meet , carry, bring spread, differ benefit, profit

Ancient Greek for Everyone Unorthodox Futures Vocabulary: NT (New Testament) , come, go come, go through come, go into come, go out of come, go to , eat , and have, hold, be

Ancient Greek for Everyone Unorthodox Futures Vocabulary: NT (New Testament) , see , suffer, experience , fall , and sail , carry, bring offer, present

Ancient Greek for Everyone Unorthodox Futures Vocabulary: Core , come, go , and have, hold, be provide , see , suffer, experience , fall , and sail , carry, bring