Thus, a verb unites time, action and person in a single word, flexible
enough to reflect all tenses, moods and persons. But why are names also
inflected?
Let's see a sentence; it is from Homer's
Odyssey, 11th rhapsody, v. 438-9.
Odysseus speaks with the soul of King Agamemnon, the leader of the Greek
expedition against
Troy, and remarks how disasters always came because of some woman:
"For
Helen's (Ἑλένης)
sake (εἵνεκα)many of us (πολλοί)
were wiped out (ἀπωλόμεθα),
and (δὲ)
against you (σοὶ)
Klytaimnestra (Κλυταιμνήστρη
- She
is Agamemnon's wife)
was concocting (ἤρτυε)
fraud (δόλον),
while you were (ἐόντι)
far away (τηλόθι
- namely,
in Troy).
* Read
the text, learn the meaning of the words inside parentheses.
Learn it now because we need to concentrate on the original text itself.
