- Source
- Polybius. Vols. 1-4. Büttner-Wobst, Theodor, editor. Leipzig: Teubner, 1893.
- Translation
- AI-generated (gemini-3.5-flash) — machine translation; may contain errors
- Languages
- 日本語 · English · 简体中文 · 한국어
- CTS URN
- urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0543.tlg001.humanitext-grc2:31.30.1-31.30.4
- Generated
- Humanitext Reader · reader.humanitext.ai · 2026-11-12
The author explains his intention behind the detailed account of Scipio's youth, emphasizing its benefit to readers and its role in establishing credibility for future narratives, before returning from the digression to the main subject.
ἐγὼ δὲ πλείω πεποίημαι λόγον ὑπὲρ τῆς Σκιπίωνος αἱρέσεως ἐκ τῆς πρώτης ἡλικίας, ἡδεῖαν μὲν ὑπολαμβάνων εἶναι τοῖς πρεσβυτέροις, ὠφέλιμον δὲ τοῖς νέοις τὴν τοιαύτην ἱστορίαν,1 μάλιστα δὲ βουλόμενος πίστιν παρασκευάζειν τοῖς λέγεσθαι μέλλουσιν ἐν ταῖς ἑξῆς βύβλοις περὶ αὐτοῦ πρὸς τὸ μήτε διαπορεῖν τοὺς ἀκούοντας διὰ τὸ παράδοξά τινα φανήσεσθαι τῶν συμβαινόντων μετὰ ταῦτα περὶ αὐτόν, μήτʼ ἀφαιρουμένους τἀνδρὸς2 τὰ κατὰ λόγον γεγονότα κατορθώματα τῇ τύχῃ προσάπτειν,3 ἀγνοοῦντας τὰς αἰτίας, ἐξ ὧν ἕκαστα συνέβη γενέσθαι, πλὴν τελέως ὀλίγων, ἃ δεῖ μόνα προσάπτειν τῇ τύχῃ καὶ ταὐτομάτῳ.
But I have made a longer account of Scipio’s choice of life from his early youth, considering that such history is pleasant to the older and useful to the younger, and especially because I wished to prepare belief in what is going to be said about him in the following books, so that the listeners may neither be perplexed because some of the events that happened to him after this will appear marvelous, nor, being ignorant of the causes from which each event happened to come about, deprive the man of his successes achieved in accordance with reason and attribute them to fortune, except for a very few, which alone must be attributed to fortune and chance.
ταῦτα μὲν οὖν ἐπὶ τοσοῦτον ἡμεῖς διεληλυθότες κατὰ τὴν παρέκβασιν αὖθις ἐπάνιμεν ἐπὶ τὴν ἐκτροπὴν τῆς ὑποκειμένης διηγήσεως.
Therefore, having gone through these matters to this extent in our digression, we shall return again to the departure point of our present narrative.
- 31.30.1ὑπολαμβάνων εἶναι... τὴν τοιαύτην ἱστορίαν
The participle ὑπολαμβάνων (nominative singular masculine) modifies the subject of the main clause 'I' (ἐγώ), taking an accusative-with-infinitive construction as its complement, where τὴν τοιαύτην ἱστορίαν is the subject accusative, ἡδεῖαν / ὠφέλιμον are the predicate adjectives, and εἶναι is the infinitive.
- 31.30.3ἀφαιρουμένους τἀνδρὸς
Since the verb ἀφαιρέομαι ('to deprive') takes a genitive of the person and an accusative of the thing (τὰ ... κατορθώματα), τἀνδρὸς (τοῦ ἀνδρός) is a genitive of separation. The participle ἀφαιρουμένους (present middle/passive participle, accusative plural) modifies the implied accusative subject of the infinitive προσάπτειν, which refers to the 'listeners/readers'.
- 31.30.2πρὸς τὸ μήτε διαπορεῖν... μήτʼ ... προσάπτειν
The preposition πρός followed by the neuter singular accusative article τό and infinitives expresses purpose ('so that... not'). The negative correlatives μήτε... μήτε... connect the two infinitives διαπορεῖν and προσάπτειν in parallel.