Herodotean's log (Latin, Greek, German, Spanish, etc.)

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Herodotean
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16–22 January 2022

Postby Herodotean » Sun Jan 23, 2022 4:16 am

I've been sick the past few days with a corresponding decrease in activity.

Latin
  • Erasmus’ Colloquia: pp. 154–75
Greek
Wow, I really need to actually finish some things. I’m taking thorough notes on Theon and Plutarch, or I’d have read more of them.
  • 365-day challenge: two days lost to illness.
  • Shepherd of Hermas 3.4–3.13 (5 pp.).
  • Isocrates, Πρὸς Νικοκλέα 29–end (6 pp.).
  • Theon’s progymnasmata: pp. 28–36
  • Plutarch, Solon 1–9.
German
  • Deutschland: Grundwissen und mehr . . . Comprendre l'Allemagne et sa civilisation: pp. 64–84. This is really a fantastic book. Aside from the content itself, it's giving me some suggestions for further reading. Victor Klemperer's diaries, for example, sound fascinating.
  • A-Grammatik pp. 105–9
Spanish
  • Listening:
    • Some podcasts
    • YouTube: parts of some DW documentaries (without subs); I can understand a lot, but I still miss critical bits, especially with technical vocabulary and rapid-fire numbers.
    • Episode 1 of Presunto culpable on Amazon Prime. I can just barely follow enough of it without subtitles to understand the major plot points. It’s tough, though. I’m still waiting for that breakthrough I’ve heard people talk about.
Persian
  • Sobhani lessons 9–11, 16 (rereading). It’s starting to get frustrating.
  • Anki cards for vocabulary through lesson 5.
French
  • Hugo’s Han d’Islande: a chapter or two.
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MorkTheFiddle
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Languages: English (N). Read (only) French and Spanish. Studying Ancient Greek. Studying a bit of Latin. Once studied Old Norse. Dabbled in Catalan, Provençal and Italian.
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 11#p133911
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Re: Herodotean's log (Latin, Greek, German, Spanish, etc.)

Postby MorkTheFiddle » Mon Jan 24, 2022 6:16 pm

Glad to hear you're feeling better. :)
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Many things which are false are transmitted from book to book, and gain credit in the world. -- attributed to Samuel Johnson

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MorkTheFiddle
Black Belt - 2nd Dan
Posts: 2114
Joined: Sat Jul 18, 2015 8:59 pm
Location: North Texas USA
Languages: English (N). Read (only) French and Spanish. Studying Ancient Greek. Studying a bit of Latin. Once studied Old Norse. Dabbled in Catalan, Provençal and Italian.
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 11#p133911
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Re: 9–15 January 2022

Postby MorkTheFiddle » Mon Jan 24, 2022 6:27 pm

Herodotean wrote:When I started speaking, I modeled my pronunciation on Christophe Rico's. Here's a sample. It's not the most defensible in historical terms -- and he admits as much -- but I find it much more appealing than the standard American Erasmian. It also has the advantage of being understood by most speakers of ancient Greek, though there is a growing circle of Randall Buth's followers who seem to avoid Erasmian as much as possible. Thanks for the links; I'll give them a listen.

Rico's pronunciation is clear and and the words all understandable. I seem to be hearing a -z- or zed sound with some at least final s. τῆς, for example.
I took the accent as given in Reading Greek years ago, and it still sticks,though I don't know how faithful I am to it. Nor do I use it much, not speaking nearly enough, even having to force myself to do it with poetry. Hence I don't read much poetry. :cry:
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Many things which are false are transmitted from book to book, and gain credit in the world. -- attributed to Samuel Johnson

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Herodotean
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Re: 9–15 January 2022

Postby Herodotean » Mon Jan 24, 2022 7:27 pm

MorkTheFiddle wrote:Rico's pronunciation is clear and and the words all understandable. I seem to be hearing a -z- or zed sound with some at least final s. τῆς, for example.


Might be French L1 transfer (he's quite the polyglot -- he speaks French, Spanish, English, modern Hebrew, and ancient Greek and publishes in three of them -- but grew up speaking French and Spanish).

MorkTheFiddle wrote:Glad to hear you're feeling better. :)


Thanks!
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rng
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Re: Herodotean's log (Latin, Greek, German, Spanish, etc.)

Postby rng » Wed Jan 26, 2022 4:31 am

Hi Herodotean, I read in this thread that you are using A-Grammatik for German. Could I get your opinion of the A-Grammatik? I am considering purchasing a book in the same series for my own study of German. How do you typically use the book in your study? Do you find the exercises useful for supporting the grammar?
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Herodotean
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Re: Herodotean's log (Latin, Greek, German, Spanish, etc.)

Postby Herodotean » Thu Jan 27, 2022 3:25 am

rng wrote:Hi Herodotean, I read in this thread that you are using A-Grammatik for German. Could I get your opinion of the A-Grammatik? I am considering purchasing a book in the same series for my own study of German. How do you typically use the book in your study? Do you find the exercises useful for supporting the grammar?


Hi rng, and welcome to the forum! Always good to see other ancient language enthusiasts here. I gather your German is better than mine, so I suspect you're considering the B-Grammatik (which I have) or C-Grammatik (which I don't). I like A-Grammatik pretty well. It comes with an answer key and a CD of audio for some, not all, exercises; the audio is also available to download from the publisher's website. It's organized by grammatical concept: verbs, nouns, pronouns, adjectives, sentence structure, etc. I do a few exercises most weekday mornings, using it as a supplement to my German reading. I find the explanations mostly clear. Having gone through over half the book now, I don't regret it and am comfortable recommending it. It would be insufficient as a complete course in German, but that's not what you have in mind. A-Grammatik has both German and English explanations; B-Grammatik drops the English and is a noticeably thicker volume.
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rng
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Re: Herodotean's log (Latin, Greek, German, Spanish, etc.)

Postby rng » Thu Jan 27, 2022 3:49 am

Thanks for the welcome! I found it fun to learn about your readings Latin and Greek in this language log. Hopefully one day I will be able to read just as freely!

Herodotean wrote:
rng wrote:I do a few exercises most weekday mornings, using it as a supplement to my German reading


That's also how I imagine I would use the book. I find in my reading a lot of constructions that are part of my passive knowledge but which I cannot reproduce in my own speech or writing. I am hoping the C-Grammatik will rectify that.
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Herodotean
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23–29 January 2022

Postby Herodotean » Sun Jan 30, 2022 6:04 am

Latin
  • Teaching!
  • Erasmus’ Colloquia, pp. 176–87. Some new-to-me words: lumbrīcus (earthworm), strabus (squinting), tōnstrīna (barbershop), cēnāturiō (to desire to eat dinner). Latin desideratives (in -urio) became more common after the classical period. Here are some others: scripturio (to desire to write), empturio (to desire to buy), nupturio (to desire to marry), morturio (to desire to die). My favorite one is probably Cicero’s coinage, sullaturio (to desire to be like Sulla).
Greek
  • Rijksbaron 2006, The Syntax and Semantics of the Verb in Classical Greek, pp. 1–26. This is a book I’ve intended to work through for a long time now. So far I’ve read Chapter 1 (“Introduction to the Moods and Tenses”). It’s not earth-shattering, but it’s organized somewhat differently than the usual Anglo-American treatments. One observation that stood out to me: a verb’s Aktionsart – durative, stative, telic, bounded/unbounded, etc. – can be used to help determine whether an imperfect is conative or not. The imperfect of a durative verb will not be conative, because a conative imperfect is by definition about an state of affairs that can be completed but isn’t. A non-telic verb doesn’t have that kind of completion in view. Examples: ἔπειθε often means “was trying to convince,” but ἐβασίλευε never means “was trying to reign”!
  • North & Hillard exercise 70.
  • Plato’s Republic 337b–339c with notes in Greek. I’m trying to reuse the Platonic vocabulary and structures without simply quoting. Here’s a sample (my note for 339c): Σωκράτης· δίκαιον μὲν (κατὰ τὸν Θρασυμάχου λόγον) τοῖς ἄρχουσι πείθεσθαι, ἀνάγκη δὲ τοὺς ἄρχοντας ἐνίοτε ἁμαρτάνειν. δῆλον οὖν ἐκ τούτων ὅτι τῶν νόμων οἱ μὲν δίκαιοι ἔσονται (διὸ τοῖς θεμένοις συμφέροντες), οἱ δὲ ἄδικοι (διὸ ἀσύμφορα).
  • Xenophon’s Hellenica 6.3.13–6.5.12.
  • Plutarch’s Life of Solon 11–14.
German
Spanish
Some podcasts, some more Presunto Culpable. I think I'm starting to understand more without subs, but my comprehension of different characters' speech varies wildly.

Persian
Now that the semester has started, I have virtually no time for luxury pursuits like learning Persian. But I’ve spent enough time learning the script that I don’t want to quit – sunk cost fallacy and all that. So I’m hoping to progress very slowly but steadily through Sobhani.
  • Reread Sobhani 8–11.
  • Anki cards for Sobhani lessons 8–10. I’m actually typing in Persian now, which is cool, and it’s much more effective than taking screenshots of a PDF.
French
  • Hugo’s Han d’Islande: a few chapters. From 22% to 26%.
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Herodotean
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Re: Herodotean's log (Latin, Greek, German, Spanish, etc.)

Postby Herodotean » Fri Feb 04, 2022 10:37 pm

Σήμερον τὸ ἔσχατον μέρος ἀνέγνων τοῦ Σόλωνος βίου ὃν Πλούταρχος συνέγραψεν· ἀναγνόντι δέ μοι ἔδοξε ἐπιτομὴν οὐ τοῦ παντὸς ἀλλὰ τῶν πρώτων κεφαλαίων συνθεῖναι ἐνταῦθα τεθησομένην. πρῶτον μὲν οὖν τὰ περὶ τοῦ οἴκου εἰσάγεται· τίς ὁ πατήρ, τίς ἡ μήτηρ, τίνες οἱ φίλοι. δεύτερον δὲ ἡ αίτία δι’ ἣν ὁ Σόλων ἔμπορος ἐγένετο, ὅτι τοῦ πατρώιου πλούτου ἀφανισθέντος ἠναγκάζετο τρόπον τινὰ κερδαίνειν. ὁ δὲ συγγραφεύς, γνοὺς τὴν ἐμπορίαν τοῖς αὑτοῦ ἡλικιώταις οὐκ ἀξίαν δοκοῦσαν, ὑπὲρ αὐτῆς ἀπολογεῖται, λέγων ὅτι τῷ Σόλωνος χρόνῳ ηὐδοκίμει ἅτε “οἰκειουμένη” (φησί) “τὰ βαρβαρικὰ καὶ προξενοῦσα φιλίας βασιλέων καὶ πραγμάτων ἐμπείρους ποιοῦσα πολλῶν.” καὶ δὲ καὶ τῶν φιλοσόφων τινὲς ἐχρήσαντο αὐτῇ, ἐν οἷς ὁ Θαλῆς. προὐτίμα δὲ ὁ Σόλων τοῦ πλούτου τὴν ἀρετήν· ὁ μὲν γὰρ ἔξω, ἡ δὲ ἔσω ἐστίν.
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MorkTheFiddle
Black Belt - 2nd Dan
Posts: 2114
Joined: Sat Jul 18, 2015 8:59 pm
Location: North Texas USA
Languages: English (N). Read (only) French and Spanish. Studying Ancient Greek. Studying a bit of Latin. Once studied Old Norse. Dabbled in Catalan, Provençal and Italian.
Language Log: https://forum.language-learners.org/vie ... 11#p133911
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Re: Herodotean's log (Latin, Greek, German, Spanish, etc.)

Postby MorkTheFiddle » Sat Feb 05, 2022 6:49 pm

Nicely done. Your command of Ancient Greek exceeds mine οὐκ ὀλίγη.
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Many things which are false are transmitted from book to book, and gain credit in the world. -- attributed to Samuel Johnson


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