Cum-Clauses

Cum-Clauses1 As a conjunction cum was written as quom up to about the time of Cicero, and in some grammars or lexica (e.g. the Thesaurus Linguae Latinae) it may even be found under quom in order to distinguish it from the preposition cum. It is a frozen form of the accusative masculine relative pronoun, indicating ‘(at the time) when’, whose correlative form is tum (‘at that time’, ‘then’). The relative force is particularly evident in the cum inversum clauses, where cum may be thought of as et tum, on analogy of the ‘relative connective’, e.g. quae res = et ea res. Cum as a conjunction initially required the indicative rather than the subjunctive, but developed a number of different subordinate uses with the subjunctive in the ‘classical’ period, a development which ‘postclassical’ authors advanced (e.g. the regular use of the subjunctive in iterative cum-clauses). The most important use is that of ‘narrative’ or ‘historical’ cum in past tense narratives, where the cumclause plays a distinctly descriptive function. The conjunction may be thought to set the stage for the events in the main clause ‘When (cum) I was doing X, Y happened/had happened’. Hauptsatz/Main Clause Nebensatz/Subordinate Clause Indikativ/Indicative Temporale Tum, eo tempore, eo anno, nunc ------Nunc vobis cessare videor, cum bella non gero. Caesar, cum primum per anni tempus potuit, ad exercitum contendit. De iunoribus iam dicendi locus erit, cum de senioribus pauca dixero. Si vs. cum: Formam mihi, si iam es Romae, aut cum eris, velim mittas. ‘Seitdem’/’Since’: Vicesimus annus est, cum omnes scelerati me unum petunt. Diu est (nonnulli anni sunt), cum te vidi. Cf.: Secutum illud tempus est, cum me proficisci coegit officium. Fuit quoddam tempus, cum in agris homines bestiarum more vagabantur. The above examples should be carefully distinguished from the ‘resultative’ temporal cum clause. Fuit tempus (sc. tale), cum rura colerent homines neque urbem haberent. erit illud profecto tempus cum tu amicissimi benevolentiam desideres (Cic. Mil. 69) The focus here is less on determining the temporal moment itself, than on the description of that period of time ‘at such a time that’, ‘a time such that’. ---------Present Past Imperfect Iterativum quotiens, quotienscumque Perfect Pluperfect ‘Gleichzeitigkeit/Contemporaneity’ Imperfect dum lego, adsentior, cum posui librum et coepi cogitare, adsensio omnis illa elabitur. neque vero, cum aliquid mandarat, confectum putabat. Cum equites tela coniciebant, tum magno erat in periculo res. To my mind Woodcock’s A New Latin Syntax (1959, but reprinted often) provides the most cogent and plausible explanation of cumclauses, which are among the most complex phenomena of Latin syntax. Chapter XX 187-195 discusses them with a valuable comparison to different types of relative clauses. The new revised version of Menge’s Lehrbuch der lateinischen Syntax und Semantik (2000) offers the greatest wealth of examples and the most exact treatment, but handles cum-clauses across too many sections to be useful for introductory or even intermediate purposes. 1 The imperfect in both clauses can be used to stress the contemporaneity of the action in each clause. Livius Tacitus et Suetonius, interdum etiam Caesar et Cicero, subiunctivo iterativo utuntur, cum id de tempore praeterito agatur (the (mostly) non-classical use of cum iterativum in the past): cum cohortes procucurissent, Numidae fugiebant nusquam cunctabundus, nisi cum in senatu loqueretur (Tac. Ann. 1, 7, 8) Identicum ‘indem; dadurch, daß; wenn’ ‘in that, because [like quod], when’ ‘zeitlich und sachlich zusammenfallen, daher strenge Gleichzeitigkeit’ ‘temporal and factual coincidence, resulting in strict concordance of tense [and mood]’ ‘Hierzu gehören auch Definitionen’/‘Definitions fall under this category’ Cum tacent, clamant. Cf. Sustulisti hanc suspicionem, cum dixisti (=dicendo, cum identicum) Subito assedit, cum diceret (=dicens, cum narrativum) Vix, iam, modo, nondum Imperfect (andauernd/continuing) Pluperfect (abgeschlossen/completed) Inversum subito, repente Perfect/Hist. Present Perfect/Hist. Present Vixdum epistulam tuam legeram, cum ad me amicus quidam venit. Hannibal iam subibat muros, cum repente patefacta porta in eum erumpunt Romani. Cf. Iam vēr appetēbat, cum Hannibal ex hībernīs mōvit. Cum ver iam appeteret, Hannibal ex hibernis movit. Vere iam appetente Hannibal ex hibernis movit. Cf.: Modo cenabam/cenaveram, cum amicus advenit. Ich speiste gerade (hatte eben gespeist), da kam mein Freund. I was just eating (had just eaten) when my friend arrived. ‘Weiterführendes’/‘Continuing’ This may in some ways be considered an extension of cum inversum with contemporaneity of tenses signaled by cum interea, cum interim, cum tamen. ‘wobei (aber); während doch/whereas, and yet’ -------cum interea, cum interim, cum tamen caedebatur virgis civis Romanus, cum interea nulla vox illius miseri audiebatur nisi haec: civis Romanus sum (Verr. 5, 162). fit gemitus omnium et clamor, cum tamen a praesenti supplicio tuo continuit populus Romanus se. Konjunktiv/Subjunctive Narrativum vel Historicum Most Common Usage of cum-clauses! MOST IMPORTANT OF ALL USES. 1)A contemporaneous or continuing action requires the Imperfect Subjunctive This is equivalent to dum plus the present indicative This is equivalent to the use of a present participle 2)A completed action requires the Pluperfect Subjunctive This is equivalent to ubi or postquam plus the perfect indicative This is equivalent to a perfect participle Meaning: ‘When, once’ but only in the past tense. Present narrative cum typically requires the indicative (cf. cum temporale above). 1) Cum in Italiam proficisceretur Caesar, Galbam in Nantuates misit. 2) Vercingetorix cum ad suos redisset, proditionis insimulatus est. Cf. Cum Romae fui, in morbum incidi <-> Cum Romae essem, in morbum incidi. Causale -------praesertim cum, quippe cum, ut cum, utpote cum cum vita sine amicis metus plena sit, ratio ipsa monet amicitias comparare [NB: monet + inf. inusitatus] id miror a Posidonio breviter esse tactum, praesertim cum scribat nullum esse locum in tota philosophia tam necessarium. id difficile non est, cum tantum equitatu valeamus. (A)dversativum (‘wobei [aber]’/‘whereas’) et (C)oncessivum (‘obwohl’/‘although’) (A) A Caesare nemo ad Pompeium transit, cum paene cottidie a Pompeio milites ad Caesarem perfugerent. (A) Socratis sermones immortalitati scriptis suis Plato tradidit, cum ipse litteram Socrates nullam reliquisset. (C) Vincere cum possis, interdum cede sodali. Cf. ‘quamquam + ind.’ quamquam Galli fortiter resistebant, tamen Caesar eos vicit. Cf. ‘quamvis/ut (non) + Koniunktiv/subjunctive’ paupertas si malum est, mendicus beatus esse nemo potest, quamvis sit sapiens. ut desint vires, tamen est laudanda voluntas.