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The Hortatory Subjunctive in the first person is a polite way to urge/ask someone to do something: eamus: let's go!.

I wonder if it is possible to add -ne to this subjunctive creating even-weaker command - which is basically a suggestion. eamusne? = would we go now?/ are you ready?

d_e
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1 Answers1

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Eamusne – and more generally direct questions in the present subjunctive, in particular in first person – will generally be understood as the deliberative or dubitative subjunctive (coniunctivus deliberativus/dubitativus). This type of subjunctive is called so because the speaker is weighing his options, or wondering if he should take a certain course of action or not. So

Eamusne?

translates to:

Should we go?

(I guess Eamus an non? can probably have a hortatory undertone, like asking “Are we going or not?” in English, but in general it is an open question.)

Often the deliberative subjunctive can take on a polemical character, especially in the past (imperfect subjunctive), e.g. Quid facerem? can, depending on context, be translated as “What was I to do?” or as “What was I supposed to do?”

Sebastian Koppehel
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    What I find interesting is that there is no attestation for eamusne in PHI. The only place we get -iamusne is in a -ne...an construction, and looking through -amusne and -emusne I don't see a plethora of subjunctives that fit the bill. – cmw Jun 04 '22 at 15:55
  • @cmw but note A&G's example Etiamne eam salūtem? from Plautus. – Sebastian Koppehel Jun 04 '22 at 20:54
  • I found another with Pliny NH: dubitemusne. First person, plural, subjunctive + ne still seems surprisingly rare, and nothing that that I see would constitute hortatory over deliberative. – cmw Jun 04 '22 at 22:10