As the title suggests, the book focuses on clauses introduced by the classical Greek pronouns ὅς, ὅστις, τίς and their related paradigmatic forms. In comparison to other studies, which only focus on one type of subordinate clause, F.'s approach aims to analyse the whole system of wh-items and to examine how each wh-item can ‘encroach upon its neighbour's domain’ (p. x), i.e. relative, interrogative and exclamative clauses. F. is well acquainted with the new findings of general linguistics, which often inspire his own research. The English title ‘wh-clauses’ serves its purpose well because Greek with its items ὅς, ὅστις, τίς has no simple cover term.
F.'s book is a corpus-based study, the corpus consisting of Plato's dialogues Republic, Protagoras and Gorgias, Xenophon's works Cyropaedia and Anabasis, and the first 21 speeches of Demosthenes; when needed, some other works of the classical period are consulted, especially Aristophanes (see index locorum).
The book is arranged in nine chapters. After an introductory chapter, ‘The Landscape of Wh-clauses in Classical Greek’, which clearly maps the system of the three wh-items’ paradigms and compares it with systems in other languages, there follows Part 1, ‘The Framework’ (Chapters 2–3), which describes the basic uses of ὅς/ὅστις and τίς. Part 2, ‘Marginal Cases’ (Chapters 4–9), deals with special uses of the three wh-items and shows their interconnectedness, thus completing the image sketched in Part 1. The book closes with an extensive appendix with tables presenting ‘Constructions of Interrogative-Embedding Predicates’, which classify illustrative examples according to (a) the semantic type of predicate and (b) the type of complement clause. Furthermore, the book contains a rich section of references (which lacks J. Trotta's Wh-Clauses in English [2000]), an index locorum and a relatively brief index notionum et rerum. It would have been useful to add a glossary of linguistic terms to avoid repeating definitions in several places.
According to F., ὅς and ὅστις (Chapter 2) can be found in four different contexts: in indirect interrogatives (without antecedent), indefinite relatives (with an indefinite antecedent, including thetic sentences such as Ἔστι νόμος, ‘There is a law’), general/future-oriented free relatives and appositive relatives (modifying a definite NP). In addition, some uses are limited to one item, as restrictive relatives to ὅς and anonymity appositives to ὅστις. Based on an analysis of various examples, F. claims that ὅς has an identificational value, while ὅστις has a non-identificational one (non-identification being marked by the -τις element, p. 102). This distinction is maintained in all common uses, so that the two items have complementary distribution (p. 34).
Chapter 3 concentrates on an analysis of τίς and ὅστις. Both items appear in indirect interrogatives, and both signal an absence: ὅστις the absence of identification, τίς the absence of knowledge (which is a subset of the absence of identification, p. 84). F. convincingly shows that τίς rather depends on rogative predicates, ὅστις on resolutive ones (Table 7, p. 70; lists of verbs on pp. 73–4; appendix). F. returns to the distinction between rogative and resolutive predicates in Chapter 5.
The rest of the book (Chapters 4–9) offers an extended and detailed examination. Chapter 4 focuses on relative clauses and deals with ὅστις associated with a definite NP, which could seem strange because of the non-identificational character of ὅστις claimed by F. He analyses sentences such as Σοῦ δ᾽ ἐγὼ λόγους λέγοντος οὐκ ἀκούσομαι μακρούς, ὅστις ἐσπείσω Λάκωσιν (Ar. Ach. 302–3), ‘I'm not going to listen to long speeches from you; you [lit. ‘who’] have made peace with the Spartans!’ (example 16, p. 98; the underlining is mine). Such examples have been classified in grammar books as causal, but F. convincingly shows that a ὅστις clause ‘both modifies a definite term and introduces a justification of a speech act at the pragmatic level’ (p. 26). The speech act being polemical, i.e. not acceptable to the hearer, ὅστις marks the absence of agreement between the speaker and the hearer similarly to the absence of identification.
Chapters 5–7 are focused on complement wh-clauses, i.e. on indirect questions. In Chapter 5 F. deals with the classification of interrogative-embedding predicates into two main groups, rogative (interrogative) and resolutive predicates (which denote knowledge rather than lack thereof). It appears that, while ὅστις and τίς clauses can be combined with both semantic types of predicates, ὅς clauses are only compatible with resolutive predicates.
Chapters 6 and 7 concentrate on an analysis of so-called ‘unselected embedded questions’, i.e. τίς and ὅς clauses depending on resolutive predicates such as know, which usually are combined with propositions and not questions (ex. 17, p. 143): ἴσως οὖν οὔπω οἶσθα τί λέγω (Plat. Gorg. 500d), ‘You may not know yet what I mean’; εἴ τις ὑμῶν εἰς Φερὰς ἀφῖκται, οἶδ᾽ ὃ λέγω (Dem. 19.158.7), ‘Any of you who have been to Pherae knows what I mean’ (the underlining is mine). F.'s analysis reveals that τίς clauses are nearly always licenced by non-veridical operators (negation, question, necessity and modals, future and imperative etc.), see Table 16, p. 146. Although ὅς clauses clearly denote propositions and not questions (e.g. p. 149), τίς clauses seem to be questions, which contradicts the properties of resolutive verbs. F. solves this problem by investigating the compatibility of τίς clauses with prolepsis and with extraction of a ὅς item (pp. 166–7). This rather complicated way, inspired by the findings of general linguistics, leads F. to postulate an operator, which is located above the interrogative clause (p. 156) and which turns questions into (true) propositions (the so-called type-shifting [answerhood] operator, p. 168).
Chapter 7 focuses on prototypically relative ὅς clauses that seem to squeeze into the domain of embedded interrogation. F. shows that their (rather rare) use is limited to resolutive predicates and to veridical contexts where the answer is known, i.e. they are found outside of the focus (p. 183). In a rather intricate argument, inspired by L.E. Nathan (On the Interpretation of Concealed Questions [2006]), F. argues that ὅς clauses can function as concealed questions but, finally, he admits that future research will be needed.
In Chapter 8 F. examines exclamative clauses that are introduced only by some items of the ὅς paradigm, i.e. ὡς, οἷος, ὅσος, ἡλίκος (with the exclusion of ὅς). F. points out the curious association of their focus position with their identificational nature. Arguing that the exclamative clauses do not form a subtype of embedded interrogatives, he explains this phenomenon by the semantics of exclamative clauses combining the presupposed meaning and the expression of the speaker's emotive reluctance of the content of the exclamatory clause. The last chapter, Chapter 9, is not so much a conclusion or summary as rather some additional remarks and clarifications on the analyses in earlier chapters, including especially suggestions for further research.
The book has a clear table of contents, but does not list sub-chapters of a lower order, which makes the book less user-friendly; however, the index notionum et rerum is of some help. Short sub-chapters enable a good orientation in the book. Each chapter is provided with an abstract and a more detailed outline, where F. carefully formulates the thesis and describes the organisation of the chapter. Each chapter closes with concluding remarks. Some chapters were published as autonomous articles with some modifications; this fact is stated at the end of the relevant chapters, including links to respective articles. The individual parts of the text are carefully connected by internal references, though it can be seen that it is not an original monograph, since the exposition and argumentation do not develop gradually and increasingly, and sometimes F. presents more complex grammatical phenomena before explaining the terminology fully, only returning to it much later.
F.'s investigation is interesting, if sometimes somewhat speculative, but it provides many new and valuable insights for research in the field of ancient Greek linguistics, enriching our current knowledge and approaches. He often builds on general linguistic theses and findings, but he is not ashamed to admit his hesitation when solving certain questions, as when he states on p. 171: ‘The question as to whether ὅς clauses are still concealed propositions in Classical Greek or became actual interrogatives is left for future research’. The book can definitely be recommended to researchers who are interested in new approaches and new linguistic solutions in ancient Greek.
