Lucan 10.82: quem

Discuss meter, interpretation, and all things Latin Poetry
Post Reply
nate.a
Textkit Neophyte
Posts: 36
Joined: Wed Apr 10, 2019 7:26 pm

Lucan 10.82: quem

Post by nate.a »

Good morning,

I'm having a bit of trouble with this relative at line 82:

quem formae confisa suae Cleopatra sine ullis (82)
tristis adit lacrimis, simulatum compta dolorem
qua decuit, ueluti laceros dispersa capillos,
et sic orsa loqui: 85

(My translation: And Cleopatra, relying on the perfection of her beauty, presented herself upset but without tears[scil. to Caesar], putting on a false act of pain - at least as far as she saw fit - and having messed up her hair as if she had been tearing at them, she began to speak as follows... )

I asked a friend and she proposed that it might be a combination of a connective relative and accusative of respect (Greek accusative). I don't find the Greek accusative convincing: although it is a construction Lucan uses, it is less frequent in his work when compared with his contemporaries, and then we have a certain instance of this construction just two lines later with laceros capillos.

I have read over Woodcock §230 and I see how there might be some semblance to "connexion," however I can't rationalise it within the syntactic context of the passage. In other words, I'm quite lost.

Can anyone help?

Thanks, Nathaniel

Aetos
Textkit Zealot
Posts: 1041
Joined: Sat May 19, 2018 6:04 pm

Re: Lucan 10.82: quem

Post by Aetos »

I think quem is the object of adit. "And she approaches him..."

User avatar
seneca2008
Textkit Zealot
Posts: 2006
Joined: Wed Sep 09, 2015 1:48 pm
Location: Londinium

Re: Lucan 10.82: quem

Post by seneca2008 »

That was my thought too, Aetos. It's how Braund translates it.
Persuade tibi hoc sic esse, ut scribo: quaedam tempora eripiuntur nobis, quaedam subducuntur, quaedam effluunt. Turpissima tamen est iactura, quae per neglegentiam fit. Et si volueris attendere, maxima pars vitae elabitur male agentibus, magna nihil agentibus, tota vita aliud agentibus.

mwh
Textkit Zealot
Posts: 4790
Joined: Fri Oct 18, 2013 2:34 am

Re: Lucan 10.82: quem

Post by mwh »

Was it the apparently transitive use of adit that troubled you Nate? If you, like me, don’t care to think of the accusative as a direct object, we can think of the verb’s prefix as governing it. I think that's a better way of looking at it. Many verbs with prepositional prefixes behave in the same sort of way, whether with acc. or with abl. The passage reminds me of Aeneas’ trip to the underworld in Aen.6: "ut tristis sine sole domos (loca turbida) adires?"

nate.a
Textkit Neophyte
Posts: 36
Joined: Wed Apr 10, 2019 7:26 pm

Re: Lucan 10.82: quem

Post by nate.a »

Thanks to both of you!

I was seriously overthinking it...

And yes, I was reading adit as intransitive and trying to shoehorn quem into the rest of the phrase with whatever rule I could find. If I'd consulted a dictionary I would have avoided much unnecessary confusion :lol:

Thanks again!

Post Reply