On 'have' in Ancient Greek. An investigation on echo and the construction einai with a dative as expressions for 'have'

Abstract: This book deals with ’have’ in ancient Greek. Two different types of ’have’-constructions were used, viz., on the one hand, the active transitive verb ??? and, on the other hand, the verb ?????, ’be’, with a complement in the dative case (here called the ???? ??? construction). A transitive ’have’ does not seem to be of Proto-Indo-European origin but rather an innovation in separate Indo-European languages. In Greek the attestation for ??? is very early, and both types of ’have’ constructions existed side by side for a very long time. Here an attempt has been made to investigate the way in which ??? has been used, during the course of time and also as compared to ???? ???. Over time ??? gains ground at the cost of ???? ???, irrespective of whether the possession is concrete or not. In Homer and Herodotus ???? ??? is more frequent than ??? when the possession is non-concrete, in Euripides, Xenophon, and Plato ??? dominates, and in Isocrates there is a strong dominance of ??? in these cases; however, this dominance is practically always less marked than when the possession is concrete, non-animate. The supposed background of ???, viz.that it meant ’hold’ in an earlier period (it means ’hold’ in some cases in the older texts), may explain the fact that there is a higher proportion of concrete, non-animate, possessions than of non-concrete possessions connected with ???. This fits in well with the fact that ???, besides denoting a very vague ’have’, had shades of meanings such as the metaphorical ’hold in one’s power’ or ’contain’, shades of meanings which can never be part of the meaning of ???? ???. However, there are restrictions on the very vague and empty ???? ???, in that it is not often used when the possessor is the element in focus in the clause. ???, on the other hand, may well be used when either the possessor or the possession has focus function. Simultaneously with its expansion ??? becomes vaguer and the shades of meanings which discriminated it from ???? ??? disappear. In the latest of the investigated texts ??? dominates very strongly over ???? ???.