Double Negative - Greek

Greek

Doubled negatives are perfectly correct in Ancient Greek. With few exceptions, a simple negative (οὐ or μή) following another negative (e.g., οὐδείς, no one) results in an affirmation: οὐδείς οὐκ ἔπασχε τι ("No one was not suffering") means more simply "Everyone was suffering". Meanwhile, a compound negative following a negative strengthens the negation: μὴ θορυβήσῃ μηδείς ("Do not permit no one to raise an uproar") means "Let not a single one among them raise an uproar".

These constructions apply only when the negatives all refer to the same word or expression. Otherwise, the negatives simply work independently of one another: οὐ διὰ τὸ μὴ ἀκοντίζειν οὐκ ἔβαλον αὐτόν means "It was not on account of their not throwing that they did not hit him", and one shouldn't blame them for not trying.

Modern Greek prefers double negation — Κανείς δεν μίλησε, "No one did not talk" — to single (here, Ουδείς μίλησε, "None talked").

Read more about this topic:  Double Negative

Famous quotes containing the word greek:

    It is an elegant refinement that God learned Greek when he wanted to become a writer—and that he did not learn it better.
    Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)

    In the Greek cities, it was reckoned profane, that any person should pretend a property in a work of art, which belonged to all who could behold it.
    Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)

    What is lawful is not binding only on some and not binding on others. Lawfulness extends everywhere, through the wide-ruling air and the boundless light of the sky.
    Empedocles 484–424 B.C., Greek philosopher. The Presocratics, p. 142, ed. Philip Wheelwright, The Bobbs-Merrill Co., Inc. (1960)