47. Q. At what battle did the Macedonian phalanx annihilate the armies of
Thebes and Athens? A. The battle of Chæronea.
48. Q. What befell Philip as he was preparing to lead an army into
Persia? A. He was assassinated at his daughter’s marriage feast.
49. Q. Who succeeded Philip, and by his conquests established a vast
empire in Asia? A. His son, Alexander.
50. Q. Soon after the death of Alexander, among whom was his empire
divided? A. Among his principal generals.
II.—FIFTY QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS ON “PREPARATORY GREEK COURSE IN ENGLISH,”
FROM COMMENCEMENT OF BOOK TO PAGE 87.
51. Q. What is the specific object of the “Preparatory Greek Course in
English?” A. To put into the hands of readers the means of accomplishing,
so far as this can be done in English, the same course of study in Greek
as that prescribed for those who are preparing to enter college.
52. Q. Of what three most famous peoples in the world are the Greeks one?
A. The Jews, the Greeks, and the Romans.
53. Q. By what name did the Greeks speak of themselves, and what was
their name for the land in which they lived? A. Hellenes, and Hellas was
their name for the land in which they lived.
54. Q. When trustworthy history begins, what were the three chief
divisions of the Hellenic stock? A. The Dorians, the Æolians, and the
Ionians.
55. Q. For what two things is the literature of Greece equally
remarkable? A. For its matter and for its form.
56. Q. What is there remarkable about the form of Greek literature? A.
There never has been elsewhere in the world so much written approaching
so nearly to ideal perfection in form as among the Greeks.
57. Q. In what department of literature do we without reserve have to
acknowledge the supremacy of the Greeks? A. In eloquence, and in the
literature of rhetoric, of taste, and of criticism.
58. Q. What is the golden age of Greek literature, Greek art, and Greek
arms? A. The age of Pericles.
59. Q. What do we know of the pronunciation of their language by the
ancient Greeks? A. Nobody knows with certainty exactly how the ancient
Greeks pronounced their language.
60. Q. What has been the general rule for scholars in the pronunciation
of Greek? A. To pronounce somewhat according to the analogy of their own
vernacular.
61. Q. What attempt, only partially successful, has recently been made
to introduce uniformity in the pronunciation of Greek? A. To secure the
common adoption of the pronunciation prevalent in Greece at the present
day.
62. Q. What four Greek grammars are mentioned as perhaps the best? A.
Hadley’s, Goodwin’s, Crosby’s and Sophocles’.
63. Q. To what source of Greek learning do all these manuals acknowledge
their indebtedness? A. To German sources of Greek learning.
64. Q. Who is the most recent of the great German authorities in Greek
grammar? A. Curtius.
65. Q. In what dialect are the books chiefly written from which the
selections are taken in making up Greek readers? A. The Attic dialect.
66. Q. How many chief dialects were there of the Greek language, and
how were they created? A. There were three—the Ionic, the Doric and the
Attic—created in part by differences of age, and in part by difference of
country.
67. Q. In whose writings is the Ionic dialect exemplified, and how is
it characterized? A. In the writings of Homer and Herodotus, and is
characterized by fluent sweetness to the ear.
68. Q. In what dialect were the most of the greatest works in Greek
literature composed? A. The Attic.
69. Q. What are some of the distinguishing features of the Attic dialect?
A. It is the neatest, most cultivated and most elegant of all the
varieties of Greek speech.
70. Q. To whom are the fables commonly attributed that are generally
found in Greek readers? A. To Æsop.
71. Q. Who made the collection of fables that go under Æsop’s name? A.
They are mainly the collection of a monk of the fourteenth century.
72. Q. What are the names of some of the eminent persons about whom
anecdotes are usually related in the collections found in Greek readers?
A. Diogenes, Plato, Zeno, Solon, Alexander, and Philip of Macedon.
73. Q. What Greek writer of the second century after Christ is more or
less quoted from in the ordinary Greek reader? A. Lucian.