366 David J. Armitage I. Structure and Semantics of Conditional Clauses 1. Classification of conditional clauses Various criteria have been used to classify Greek conditional clauses. Conditional clauses may be distinguished by lexico-syntactic structure, or by other semantic features, such as time reference, whether the protasis is already fulfilled or unfulfilled, and whether the condition applies generally or is specific to a particular situation. An ideal classification would correlate the sense of conditions with their structure. Indeed a classification of this type would be the only type which genuinely classified conditional sentences in their own right. If the classification does not reflect structural patterns, it follows that the feature under consideration is controlled by context, and not by the conditional structure itself. Once a structural classification is made, there are two possible ways to relate this to sense. One is to examine as many instances as possible of each structure and look for shared features. The other is to start with the component elements of the conditional structure, such as the particle used, the mood, and the tense, and attempt to build on what is already known of these smaller units. The semantics of these smaller units can also only be derived from a survey of usage, but more data is available for the smaller units (4). Goodwin, a grammarian of classical Greek, classified conditional clauses primarily based on their time reference, as shown in Table 1 (5). TIME APODOSIS VERB KEY FEATURES PROTASIS VERB REFERENCE eij + indicative Any Particular Implying ejavn + subjunctive Present indicative nothing General Present & past as to fulfilment eij + optative Imperfect conditions eij + past form an + past form [ Implying condition not fulfilled indicative indicative ejavn + subjunctive / More vivid Any future Future eij + future conditions eij + optative an + optative [ Less vivid (4) This approach would be less effective if conditional clause structures were strongly idiomatic. (5) W.W. GOODWIN, Syntax of the Moods and Tenses of the Greek Verb (London – Melbourne – Toronto 1889) §388-§397.