< Page:Comedies of Aristophanes (Hickie 1853) vol2.djvu
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153—166.

THE ECCLESIAZUSÆ.

625

I might have been sitting quiet. But now,[1] according to my motion, I will not suffer a single hostess to make cisterns of water in the taverns.[2] I don't approve of it, by the two goddesses![3]

Prax. "By the two goddesses!" "Wretch, where have you your senses?

9th Wom. What's the matter? for indeed I did not ask you for drink.

Prax. No, by Jove; but you swore by the two goddesses, being a man. And yet you spoke[4] the rest most cleverly.

9th Wom. (correcting herself). Oh!—by Apollo!

Prax. (snatching the chaplet from her). Have done then! for I would[5] not put forward one foot to hold an assembly, unless[6] this shall be arranged precisely.

9th Wom. Give me the chaplet! I will speak again. For now I think I have gone over it properly in my mind. "To me, O women,[7] who are sitting here"——

Prax. Again you are calling the men "women," you wretch.

  1. ↑ "So kann Ich's, falls ihr was auf meine Meinung gebt,
    ⁠Nicht leiden, dass sich die Frau in der Schenke Keller gräbt
    ⁠Zu Wasser; dagegen stimm' Ich bei den Göttinnen!" Droysen.
    For κατὰ γε τὴν ἐμὴν, see Bernhardy, W. S. p. 186.
  2. ↑ "She means, perhaps, there shall be no water at all in the taverns." Droysen.
  3. ↑ "She swears by 'the two goddesses,' i. e. by Demeter and Persephone, an oath which only women use." Droysen.
  4. ↑ "The participle is made clear by καὶ, also, even, (negative, οὐδὲ, μηδὲ,) and καίπερ, which in Attic writers scarcely ever occurs otherwise than with a participle or a participial construction, whilst καίτοι is found only with an independent clause (with a finite verb). The later writers have been the first to use these vice versâ. Yet also in Plato, Symp. 219; Rep. 511; Lysias, 31, 34, if the text be not corrupt." Krüger. In the present instance the departure from the statutable construction is very remarkable.
  5. ↑ ⁠"Um keinen Preis
    ⁠Auch einen Schritt nur möcht' Ich zur Ekklesie thun,
    ⁠Bevor wir nicht mit diesen Dingen im Reinen sind." Droysen.
  6. ↑ "εἰ is rightly construed with a future indicative, although there be an optative with ἂν in the other member of the sentence. Eur. Hippol. 484,
    ⁠ἧ τἄρ᾽ ἂν ὀψέ γ᾽ ἄνδρες ἐξεύροιεν ἂν,
    ⁠εἰ μὴ γυναῖκες μηχανὰς εὑρήσομεν." Brunck.
    Cf. Ran. 10. Æsch. Theb. 196. Eur. Hippol. 484. Tro. 736.
  7. ↑ See Krüger, Gr. Gr. §45, 2, obs. 7. Cf. Pax, 466. Ach. 491.
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