Optative (Ancient Greek)

The optative mood (/ˈɒptətɪv/ or /ɒpˈteɪtɪv/;^[1] Ancient Greek [ἔγκλισις] εὐκτική, [énklisis] euktikḗ, "[inflection] for wishing",^[2] Latin optātīvus [modus] "[mode] for wishing")^[3] is a grammatical mood of the Ancient Greek verb, named for its use as a way to express wishes.

The optative mood in Greek is found in four different tenses (present, aorist, perfect and future) and in all three voices (active, middle and passive). It has multiple uses:

• To express wishes for the future ("may it happen!")
• To talk about a hypothetical future situation ("what would happen if I did this?")
• In purpose clauses ("so that it could happen") or clauses expressing fears ("for fear that it might happen") in a past context. (The subjunctive mood can also be used in this type of clause in a past context.)
• In subordinate clauses referring to repeated events in a past context ("whenever it happened", "whoever did this" etc.)
• To indicate reported speech in a past context ("he said that it had happened", "he asked who they were")
• In epic dialects, contrary-to-fact clauses in the present^[4][5]

Post-Homeric Greek is similar to many languages in its use of a "fake past" for contrary-to-fact clauses, e.g., "if dogs had hands". However, Homer uses the present optative for such statements when they are imagined to be at the present time. Together, the optative and the subjunctive cover most of the areas for which the Latin subjunctive is used, but Greek is unlike Latin in not using the subjunctive for contrary-to-fact suppositions.

Over the centuries, the optative mood became more and more rarely used, and it has disappeared in Modern Greek.