ἀκμήν
(Phryn. Ecl. 93, Moer. α 149, Antiatt. α 21)

D. General commentary

Atticist sources (A.1, A.2, A.3, and B.3) debate the admissibility of the adverb ἀκμήν, ‘still’, ‘yet’, as a substitute for ἔτι, a use that was peculiar to spoken language in Ancient Greek and survives today in Modern Greek in the form ακόμη/ακόμα (see E.).

ἀκμήν belongs to the class of adverbs that are created from inflected forms and, more specifically, from the accusativeAccusative forms of nouns. Adverbial accusatives are typical in Greek since Homer – see, e.g., ἀρχήν, ‘at first’, from ἀρχή, ‘beginning’ (e.g. Il. 3.100); ἀκήν, ‘silently’, from ἀκή, ‘silence’ (e.g. Il. 3.95); further examples are collected in Schwyzer (1939, 621). ἀκμήν is indeed the accusative of the noun ἀκμήἀκμή, which has a range of meanings associated with the base meaning ‘point’: ‘edge’, ‘prime’, or ‘fitting time’ (see LSJ s.v.). Given that ἀκμή is frequently used in contexts in which it expresses a timely occasion – see, for instance, the occurrences in Isocrates and Sophocles mentioned by B.5 – it is unsurprising that its accusative form developed as a temporal adverb. Incidentally, it is worth noting that B.5 may quote Soph. Ph. 12–4, whose mention is at first sight untenable in that it provides an occurrence of the noun and not of the adverb, which is why Lobeck (1820, 125) posited an error on the part of the Suda – precisely because Sophocles here uses ἀκμή with a manifest temporal meaning.

Although the development of the adverbial ἀκμήν is easily understood, no consensus has been reached regarding its meaning in Classical Greek. It is generally believed, following Lobeck (1820, 123), that the adverb’s original meaning was ‘now’, ‘just now’ and that, in late Attic, it underwent a semantic shift that led it to encompass the same meaning as ἔτι (‘still’, cf. also Schwyzer 1939, 621, n. 1; Niehoff-Panagiotidis 1994, 204; Lee 2013, 290; Roumanis 2016, 45; according to Lobeck, ἀκμήν was originally used with the same meaning as the adverb ἄρτιἄρτι, on which see entry ἄρτι). However, Krumbacher (1885, 506–7) convincingly argued that ἀκμήν may well mean ‘still’ in all the classical texts that Lobeck cited as evidence for the supposedly original meaning ‘now’ (C.3 and Isoc. 1.2, where he read σὺ ἀκμὴν φιλοσοφεῖς ‘you now philosophise’, while modern editors print σοῖ ἀκμὴ φιλοσοφεῖν, ‘for you it is the right time to philosophise’) and that the alleged existence of an original meaning ‘now’ thus has thus no solid ground. The two earlier occurrences of the adverbial ἀκμήν are of little help in resolving the issue, since both meanings are applicable to Aeschylus’ line (C.1, see F.1) and ἀκμήν is not an adverb of time in Cratinus (C.2, see F.3). What is ascertainable is that ‘still’ is the meaning of ἀκμήν that fits most occurrences, is discussed by most erudite sources, and survives, together with ‘yet’, in Post-classical Greek and later in Modern Greek (see E.).

The adverbial use of ἀκμήν to mean ‘still’ was a feature of spoken Attic that occasionally surfaces in literature (Niehoff-Panagiotidis 1994, 204; Huitink, Rodd 2019, 27, n.5). In classical times, ἀκμήν is attested across various genres – in addition to Aeschylus (C.1), it is employed by Xenophon (C.3), Hyperides (C.4) and, later, Menander (C.5) – but is very rare in Attic prose, in which it is accepted only by authors who employ a form of Attic which is open to innovative and colloquial traits and in which ἔτι is otherwise the rule. The adverb gains traction in Hellenistic Greek in both prose and poetry: Polybius uses it multiple times (e.g. C.6; cf. also Plb. 8.37.9: οἱ μὲν ἀκμὴν ἔπινον, ‘some were still drinking’), and it occurs twice in Theocritus (C.8, where the Doric form ἀκμάν occurs in response to a question with ἔτι, see Gow 1955, 90; cf. also Theoc. 25.164: ἦν νέος ἀκμήν, ‘I was still young’). The adverbial ἀκμήν is also well attested in the imperial period (it occurs, for instance, in Strabo, 17.1.27: οἱ μὲν ἑστῶτες ἀκμήν, ‘some still standing’, and in Plutarch, De gloria Atheniensium 346d: διαβουλευομένοις αὐτοῖς ἀκμήν, ‘[while] they were still discussing’). Nevertheless, it should be noted that, across the centuries, ἀκμήν meaning ‘still’ remains peculiar to the spoken language and only occasionally surfaces in literary texts, in which ἔτι largely prevails. Apart from being avoided in higher registers – note that, unsurprisingly, it is never found in Atticising authors with the exception of pseudepigraphs – ἀκμήν ‘still’ also appears to be subsidiary in lower registers. In the New Testament, for example, it does not occur outside Ev.Matt. 15.16NT Ev.Matt. 15.16: ἀκμὴν καὶ ὑμεῖς ἀσύνετοί ἐστε; ‘Are you also still unable to understand?’, where it is used in a direct question, which is closer to spoken language. Elsewhere in the New Testament, the form for ‘still’ is the classical ἔτι. The striking rarity of ἀκμήν in inscriptions and documentary papyri further suggests that the adverb was regarded sceptically in formal contexts, in which convention imposed ἔτι; a detailed analysis of the use of ἀκμήν meaning ‘still’ and ‘yet’ in documentary sources may be found in Roumanis (2016, 43–54).

In addition to ἀκμήν ‘still’, post-classical authors occasionally also use the strengthened phrasing ἀκμὴν ἔτι (or ἔτι ἀκμήν), which first occurs in Polybius (C.7, cf. also 14.4.9: οἱ δ᾿ ἀκμὴν ἔτι μεθυσκόμενοι καὶ πίνοντες, ‘some were still drinking and carousing’).

Multiple erudite sources remark that ἀκμήν covers the same meaning as ἔτι: aside from B.1, B.4, and B.5, compare also schol. Ar. Eq. 1000; Hsch. ε 6608; Su. α 906; schol. rec. [Aesch.] PV 509. Atticist sources are concerned with the admissibility of such a use, which Phrynichus (A.1) and Moeris (A.2) and subsequently Thomas Magister (B.3) criticise harshly. As it often happens, the Antiatticist (A.3) alone admits the use of ἀκμήν, invoking the authority of Hyperides (C.4). The distribution of ἀκμήν pro ἔτι helps account for the Atticists’ stance towards the former. Alongside its being a typical feature of spoken language, the absence of ἀκμήν from approved Attic prose authors may have been instrumental in the formation of the stricter Atticists’ opinions (A.1, A.2, and B.3). The same explanation could, at least to some extent, explain Moeris’ claim that none of the Attic authors employs this form. The occurrences in Xenophon (C.3) and Menander (C.5) were anything but helpful to the case of ἀκμήν but rather provided the most uncompromising Atticists with sufficient reason to regard the form with suspicion (on Xenophon’s language vis-à-vis the Attic standard, see Huitink, Rood 2019, 23–9; on Menander’s status in Greek lexicography see Tribulato 2014). Furthermore, Moeris is also suspicious of the expression ἐν ἀκμῇ meaning ‘ripe for’, recommending instead the adjective ὡραῖοςὡραῖος (‘seasonable’, ‘ripe for’); cf. Moer. ω 11Moer. ω 11: ὡραία γάμων Ἀττικοί· ἐν ἀκμῇ γάμου Ἕλληνες, ‘Users of Attic [say] ὡραία γάμων (‘ripe for marriage’), users of Greek [say] ἐν ἀκμῇ γάμου’.

It may be the case that the entry in the lexicon preserved in cod. Vat. gr. 122Vat. gr. 122 (B.2) relies on an item of Atticist scholarship that also adopted a more tolerant position and collected classical occurrences of ἀκμήν to validate its use against its critics, as Olson and Seaberg (2018, 236, see F.2) suggest. The selection of authors included in the entry speaks, at least in part, in favour of this scenario; however, no firm conclusions may be drawn on its origin and intent.

E. Byzantine and Modern Greek commentary

In late antiquity and in the Byzantine period, ἔτι continues to be the standard form for ‘still’ in higher registers and to be preferred by classicising authors up to the late Byzantine period. Nevertheless, the adverbial ἀκμήν occasionally features in middle and sometimes high register: it occurs, among others, in Epiphanius (4th century, De mensuris et ponderibus 274: οὔπω Ῥωμαίοις καλουμένοις ἀκμὴν ἀλλὰ Λατίνοις, ‘which are not yet called Romans, but Latins’) and Gregory of Nazianzus (Ep. 174.3), and later in Theophanes the Confessor (Chronographia 461.1; 8th–9th century) and Constantinus VII Porphyrogenitus (De sententiis 205.4: οἱ δὲ πλείους ἀκμὴν ἠπίστουν, ‘most people still disbelieve’).

While ἀκμήν is retained in the middle register, a new form derived therefrom gains ground in low-register language: ἀκόμη. The omission of the final ν poses no problems (see CGMEMG vol. 1, 164–5; 174–85), but no consensus exists regarding the origin of the /ο/ in ἀκόμη, which is thought either to have been added on analogy with other adverbs (e.g. τότε, ‘then’, πότε, ‘when?’; see Hatzidakis 1930; ILNE s.v. ακόμη) or to be an anaptyctic vowel inserted between κ and μ to ease the pronunciation of the biconsonantal cluster κμ (see Krumbacher 1885, 512–5; Kretschmer 1934, 234–5. Earlier explanations derived ἀκόμη from Romance languages on the basis of parallels with Romanian and Friulian; see Krumbacher 1885, 518–21). According to Kretschmer (1934, 234–5), Greek resorted to anaptyxis because the regular phonological development ἀκμήν > ἀγμή(ν) > ἀμή(ν) would have rendered the adverb easily confused with the conjunction ἀμή, ‘but’ (note that the form ἀγμήν, although extremely rare, is attested in Romanus the Melodist, 19.2.8 and in Medieval Greek documents from Southern Italy: see Caracausi 1990, 7, 20). Nevertheless, the identification of ἀκόμη as an outcome of anaptyxis raises several problems, since the anaptyctic vowel in Medieval Greek is usually /i/ or, more rarely, /u/ (on anaptyxis, see CGMEMG vol. 1, 42–4). If we assume that anaptyxis is at work, the adverb must have evolved as follows: ἀκμήν > *ἀκουμήν > ακομή > ακόμη. The form *ἀκουμήν, however, is not attested, although this vocalism is found in some Modern Greek dialects (as, for instance, Cappadocian, see ILNE s.v.). Regarding the accent shift that is evident in ακόμη, the paroxytone ακόμη must be later than ακομή, which preserves the accent’s original position. Krumbacher (1885, 515–8, cf. also 1888, 188–9) argues that this shift occurred when there was no longer awareness of the anaptyxis (since, as a rule, the anaptyctic vowel is unstressed in Medieval Greek). Alternatively, the accent shift may be regarded as an analogical process based, again, on paroxytone adverbs (e.g. τότε, πότε, see ILNE s.v. ακόμη). The chronological precedence of the oxytone ἀκομή may be confirmed by the fact that this form is standard in the Greek of Southern Italy, which is among the most isolated and conservative dialects (see also Calabrian Greek ἀκομήνε [akomine] cf. ILEIKI s.v.). Although the distribution of these forms in written texts is not a wholly reliable criterion for dating these phenomena, they may serve as general reference points. The oxytone ακομή is attested for the first time in Michael Glycas’ Versus in carcere scripti (178; 12th century) and then occurs, alongside ακόμη, in multiple works in Medieval Greek spanning from the 12th to the 17th century: for instance, the novel Libistrus and Rhodamne (e.g. 969, 13th–14th century) and George Chortatzis’ Erofili (e.g. 106, 16th–17th century). The paroxytone ακόμη is difficult to date, as its apparently earliest occurrences are found in works that were composed during the early and middle Byzantine period but were the subject of late rewritings; it occurs, for instance, in multiple redactions in Medieval Greek of the Alexander Romance (e.g. recensio E 33.2.2), in the Digenis Akritis (e.g. cod. E 260), and in the Book of Syntipas (69.2). Overall, although the paroxytone form prevails, fluctuations between ακόμη and ακομή are frequent, often occurring within the same text. Various forms of the adverb are attested in Medieval Greek (see Kriaras, LME s.v. ακμήν): besides ακόμη and ακομή, one also finds ακμή, ακομήν, ’κόμη, and ακόμα (α being the most common adverbial ending in lower registers of Medieval Greek: see CGMEMG vol. 2, 833–4).

While the katharevousa preferred ἔτι, nowadays ακόμη (or more commonly ακόμα, with numerous local variants; see ILNE s.v.) is the standard form for ‘still’ and ‘yet’ in Modern Greek and is also in use with the meaning ‘even’ (e.g. ακόμη πιο, ακόμη περισσότερο…, ‘even more…’) or, with και, ακόμη και ένα μικρό παιδί, ‘even a little child’).

F. Commentary on individual texts and occurrences

(1)    Su. α 904 (B.5)

This entry’s text is the result of the layering of multiple materials. The original item in the Synagoge dealt with the meanings of the noun ἀκμή and derives from Cyril’s lexicon. The entry was then enlarged in the Σ´ expansion with the addition of the Antiatticist’s gloss (A.3; on Σ´ incorporating a fuller version of the Antiatticist, see Cunningham 2003, 52). The extended Synagoge’s item was then further expanded in the Suda with the addition of literary loci.

(2)    Aesch. fr. 339 (C.1)

The adverbial ἀκμήν occurs for the first time in this fragment (C.1). Here, ἀκμήν is usually translated as ‘now’ (compare Ramelli 2009, 587: ‘ora, proprio’; Xanthaki-Karamanou 2022, 20: ‘now’), which, according to Lobeck, would be the adverb’s original meaning; nevertheless, nothing prevents us from translating these lines to mean ‘and many cymbals still resound’ (cf. also Sommerstein 2008, 309: ‘even now’). In such a case, the use meaning that erudite sources reject would be already attested in Aeschylus. Regarding the identification of the play to which the fragment belongs, the presence of cymbals suggests a Dionysiac play. Sommerstein (2008, 309) leaves open several possibilities for its attribution: Edonians, Wool-Carders or Pentheus, whereas Xanthaki-Karamanou (2022, 20) claims that it may be ascribed to Edonians on the basis of its ‘remarkable stylistic affinity’ with Aesch. fr. 57.

(3)    Cratin. fr. 408 (C.2)

The entry of the Lexicon Vaticanus transmitted in cod. Vat. gr. 122 attests that Cratinus used the adverb ἀκμήν. Olson and Seaberg (2018, 236) question the fragment’s authenticity, suggesting that the Cratinus mentioned by B.2 might be not the comic poet but rather the defendant of Hyperides’ speech On Behalf of Cratinus (C.4), which is mentioned by the Antiatticist (A.3). According to Olson and Seaberg, this hypothesis would be supported by the Atticist doctrine reflected in the entry, which accepts the adverbial use of ἀκμήν and defends it against other scholars’ stricter stances (e.g. A.1 and A.2), just as the Antiatticist does (A.3). This suggests that B.2 derives, at least in part, from the same source as the Antiatticist. Nevertheless, there can be no doubt that the Cratinus mentioned by B.2 (immediately after Menander and possibly in opposition to the latter’s usage) is the comic poet; nor is it obvious that B.2 and A.3 somehow rely on the same doctrine. The meaning of ἀκμήν is crucial in elucidating this issue: whereas Hyperides used ἀκμήν in place of ἔτι (see A.3), according to the testimony of B.2, Cratinus did not use ἀκμήν as a substitute for ἔτι, but of ἀκμαίως (cf. also Kassel and Austin in PCG vol. 4, 311). According to Niehoff-Panagiotidis (1994, 204, n. 32) Cratinus used ἀκμήν to mean ‘now’, and his use is a good illustration of how the original adverbial meaning of ἀκμήν is reflected in Old Comedy; it follows that ἀκμαίωςἀκμαίως itself would be an adverb of time meaning ‘now’ (see also the translation ‘in a timely fashion’ in Olson, Seaberg 2018, 236). However, the extant occurrences of ἀκμαίως suggest that it was rather in use as an adverb of quality, meaning ‘in full bloom; vigorously’ (see e.g. Plb. 31.29.7: ὡς κατά τε τὴν ἡλικίαν ἀκμαίως ἔχοντος αὐτοῦ καὶ κατὰ φύσιν οἰκείως διακειμένου, ‘for he was in the bloom of his age, and he was physically fit for it [i.e. hunting]’). If B.2 had this standard meaning of ἀκμαίως in mind when using it to underline the difference between the adverbial ἀκμήν occurring in Aeschylus and Menander (C.1 and C.5) and that used by Cratinus (C.2), it follows that the comic poet possibly used ἀκμήν meaning ‘in full bloom; vigorously’. In C.2 ἀκμήν would thus rest upon ἀκμή ‘prime, peak’ (see LSJ s.v. ἀκμή II): such a use, which is entirely possible, is extremely rare (indeed, to the best of my knowledge, it is unparalleled). Luppe’s correction to the Antiatticist’s Ὑπερείδης Ὑπὲρ Κρατίνου into Ὑπερείδης καὶ Κρατῖνος (in A.3 as well as in Antiatt. κ 2Antiatt. κ 2), which attributes the use of ἀκμήν meaning ἔτι to Cratinus, has been proven wrong by Alpers (1981, 108 n. 37), who noted that the lexicon never uses καί to refer to two authors (see also Kassel and Austin, PCG vol. 4, 138, 311).