Κατέβην χθὲς εἰς Πειραιᾶ μετὰ Γλαύκωνος τοῦ Ἀρίστωνος προσευξόμενός τε τῇ θεῷ
Descended yesterday from Pereus after ___ of Aristonos praying (in prayer)to God
Καταβαίνω means too descend. Κατέβην is aorist first person singular. Thus, I descended.
In Modern Greek it's κατεβαίνω (pron. kah-teh-VEH-noh) -the augment -ε used to form the past tenses in Ancient Greek, for some peculiar reason in Modern Greek appears in all tenses- it means to descend, and can be also used to express move from the N to the S, i.e. we still say "κατέβηκα στον Πειραιά" (I descended to Piraeus) when going to the harbour from Athens (which is to the N of Piraeus); when I'm going to my hometown, Volos which is in Thessaly (to the N of Athens), I say "ανεβαίνω στον Βόλο" (I ascend to Volos).
The ancient aorist first person singular κατέβην, has become κατέβηκα in Modern Greek.
Χθὲς is yesterday, indeed.
Χθες is yesterday in MG too
Εἰς means to
The ancient "εἰς" in Modern Greek is στον (masc.), στην (fem.), στο (neut.) after the fusion of the preposition εἰς with the definite article in accusative: Ancient Greeκ εἰς τόν = Modern Greek στον (masc.), εἰς τὴν = στην (fem), εἰς τὸ = στο (neut). The omission of the unstressed initial vowel of ancient words, is a common linguistic phenomenon in Modern Greek: εἰς τὸν =
εἰστον. Just like in Ancient Greek the στον, στην, στο is followed by the noun in the accusative.
ἀπό means 'from
Από remains the same.
Mετὰ with an accusative means 'after', but with the genitive it means 'with'
Μετά + gen. is rarely used in the modern language nowadays, and sounds bookish. We prefer μαζί + preposition με (=with) + accus. The adverb μαζί (pron. mah-ZEE) comes from the Byzantine adverb μαζίον (=like a mass, together), from μᾶζα = mass and is translated in English as 'together'.
Mετά + accus. remains the same.
Γλαύκωνος is genetive, Γλαύκωνα would be accusative
In Modern Greek the ancient third declension has not survived, the modern nouns belonging to the ancient Third declension are identical to the ancient Second declension, thus:
Νom. Ὁ Γλαύκων (ancient Third declension) = Ο Γλαύκωνας (Modern Greek)
Gen. Τοῦ Γλαύκων
ος (ancient) = Tου Γλαύκων
α (modern)
Dat. Τῷ Γλαύκων
ι (ancient) = The dative in Modern Greek has not survived it has been replaced by either the genitive or the accusative (depending on context).
Acc. Τόν Γλαύκων
α (ancient) = Τον Γλαύκων
α (modern)
Voc. Ὦ Γλαύκων! (ancient) = Ε Γλαύκωνα! (modern)
Tοῦ Ἀρίστωνος literally means 'of Ariston'. But when this sort of thing is immediatly after another name, it means 'son of [name]'. So Γλαύκωνος τοῦ Ἀρίστωνος means 'Glaukon, son of Ariston'.
That's why we invented surnames. In Byzantine times, Γλαύκων τοῦ Ἀρίστωνος became Γλαύκων Ἀριστωνόπουλος (-πουλος from the Latin pullus, the young foal). In MG we usually render ancient patronymics, periphrastically, i.e. Γλαύκων τοῦ Ἀρίστωνος = Γλαύκωνας ο γιός του Αρίστωνα (=Glaukon, the son of Ariston).
προσευξόμενός is participium, thus it means something like 'praying to', but in this case 'to pray to' would be nicer
In Modern Greek the general trend is to replace the ancient participle with the subjunctive, which is formed with the generic subordinator να (=that) + imperfective non-past aspect of the verb. Thus the phrase προσευξόμενος τῇ θεῷ becomes in Modern Greek, να (generic subordinator) + προσευχηθώ (imperfective non-past aspect of the verb) + στη θεά (accus. fem.) = to pray to the goddess.
Κατέβην χθὲς εἰς Πειραιᾶ μετὰ Γλαύκωνος τοῦ Ἀρίστωνος προσευξόμενός τε τῇ θεῷ thus means 'Yesterday I descended to Piraeus with Glaukon, son of Ariston, to pray to the godess'
This is the first line of Plato's Politeia, btw
In Modern Greek, the above sentence is:
Κατέβηκα χθες στον Πειραιά μαζί με τον Γλαύκωνα το γιό του Αρίστωνα να (οr γιά να = in order to) προσευχηθώ στη θεά.
