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[204] There is considerable doubt as to the punctuation of the whole of this speech of Nestor's, the note of interrogation having been variously put after “ἐλθεῖν” (206), “Ἀχαιούς” (210), and “ἀσκηθής” (212). The true explanation is mainly due to Lange (EI p. 382). In 206 “εἰ” goes immediately with “ἐλθεῖν”, to go ‘in the hope that’; and “ἕλοι” and “πύθοιτο” are co-ordinate. Then “ἅσσα” is explanatory of “φῆμιν”, as expressing the contents of the supposed rumour, and is again divided into the two alternatives “ἤ — ἦε”. The optatives in 211 resume that after “οὐκ ἂν” in 204; in form they are a wish, in reality they are only a suggestion in form of a hope, ‘I should like him to find out’ — a shade of meaning which we express by ‘he might.’ If we read “κε” for “τε” in 211 (see note there), the expression would be more confident, ‘he would’; but this is better reserved till 212, where “κεν” indicates a result which in that case is asserted to follow upon the assumed condition, being virtually equivalent to the future “ἔσσεται”. We may in fact regard the clause “μέγα κεν .. εἴη” as an apodosis to the sentence “ταῦτα .. ἀσκηθής”, which in effect, though not in form, is a protasis. A similar use of the opt. to express a condition, followed by an apodosis with “κεν”, occurs in Od. 1.265, the difference being that there the opt. resumes a wish introduced by “εἰ” (255); here the wish is put in the form of a question with “οὐκ ἄν”. So also Od. 18.366-70, where, however, the apodosis is postponed till 375. (So in the main Hentze.)

The Iliad, edited, with apparatus criticus, prolegomena, notes, and appendices. Walter Leaf. London. Macmillan. 1900.

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