Plus quam perfectum in this sentence

[interprete]

Hello,

I came across a sentence in teaching material written by a Latin teacher I know:
Antequam adulescens factus erat, puer idoneus ad rustica opera videbatur.

It is unclear to me why he used 'factus erat' instead of 'factus est' since the kid became a grownup only after he seemed fit for farming, so if there was any need for a pluperfect I would have put it in the main clause.
The author kindly tried to explain to me why the sentence reads like this but I really didn't get it.
Could anyone help me understand the logic here?
Thanks!

 

[Pacifica]

"Before he had (even) become an adolescent, the boy seemed suitable for farm work" makes sense to me... at least if I think in English. In Latin, though, antequam almost always takes the perfect tense and I'm not sure there's any compelling reason to deviate from the norm here.

 

[interprete]

Mmmm but even in English what's the point of saying 'before he had become an adolescent'? I mean there is no other past statement to contrast this with, if you see what I mean. Wouldn't you more naturally say 'before he (even) became a young adult" etc. ?
Thanks!

 

[Pacifica]

Well, I don't know. I think there's some leeway there. "Before he had become" = "when he had not yet become"... But "before he became" is fine.

 

[interprete]

Thank you!

 

[Pacifica]

I guess "before" with the pluperfect is technically redundant because the idea of anteriority is expressed twice (by the form of the verb and by the word "before" itself).

 

[Clemens]

I can't speak for Latin, but in English the pluperfect sounds perfectly natural here, but so does the simple past. The pluperfect simply emphasizes the anteriority, and can also imply a gap of time.

 

[interprete]

I can't speak for Latin, but in English the pluperfect sounds perfectly natural here, but so does the simple past. The pluperfect simply emphasizes the anteriority, and can also imply a gap of time.

But anteriority to what, in this specific instance?

Thanks!

 

[Pacifica]

To come back to Latin:

In Latin, though, antequam almost always takes the perfect tense

I mean in this kind of context, viz. in the past tense and in reference to something that did happen. It also takes the imperfect subjunctive relatively often, but that's usually when something was prevented from happening or unsure to happen, e.g. antequam adolesceret, mortuus est. And, of course, outside past-tense contexts it can also take other tenses.

I wouldn't be all that surprised to find it used with the pluperfect indicative somewhere, but that really isn't usual. I just looked and I couldn't find any instance of antequam with the pluperfect indicative in either the OLD or L&S (I did find some with the pluperfect subjunctive, but that's not directly relevant to the sentence we're dealing with here).

 

[Clemens]

But anteriority to what, in this specific instance?

Thanks!

Well now that I think of it, it doesn't sound incorrect, but I can't justify it logically. I can't help but think there's something idiomatic or aspectual going on here, because the English pluperfect carries aspectual meanings that the simple past doesn't. Or it could just be a question of sloppiness, which is also possible. Many younger Americans, especially toward the West Coast, use the pluperfect in place of the simple past at all times.

 

[Pacifica]

Maybe there's something aspectual about it, yes. I was thinking (without being able to quite explain it, either) that it felt like "being thrown back into the past", as when you use the imperfect (in languages where it exists) or pluperfect generally.

 

[Clemens]

I just had a flash of a insight about this topic in English: had in English can be a past tense form, but it can also be an irrealis form, as in, "If I had more money ..." In this kind of sentence, it looks like the past but it refers to a non-past, non-true act or state. (The only English verb in which the irrealis isn't totally identical to the simple past is to be.) This is why some modern English grammars don't refer to the simple past forms as such, but as "verb 2." Therefore, the form had become isn't a pluperfect, although it looks exactly like one, but a past irrealis. Any thoughts?

 

[Pacifica]

The past irrealis is basically a pluperfect subjunctive (though it looks identical to the indicative). It's possible that this "had become" is/would originally have been subjunctive; I don't know. But even if so, it seems a rather different usage from the "if I had been there" kind of stuff.

 

[Pacifica]

IIRC, in Old English, "before" clauses like this one typically took the subjunctive, but usually the simple past subjunctive (the pluperfect tense didn't quite exist yet; or it was at the embryonic stage at best).

 

[Clemens]

Thanks for clarifying.

 

[Clemens]

I don't think German would use a subjunctive there, although French would, yes? Avant qu'il ne devînt (in very formal French, that is)? You probably wouldn't phrase it that way, though, I don't think?

 

[Avunculus H]

I don't think German would use a subjunctive there, although French would, yes?

You're right. In that sentence, the subjunctive (Konjunktiv II in this case) would indicate irrealis, i.e., a condition that didn't come true.

 

[kizolk]

Avant qu'il ne devînt (in very formal French, that is)? You probably wouldn't phrase it that way, though, I don't think?

Yes, and a more usual way to phrase it that would preserve the overall structure of the sentence could be "avant qu'il (ne) devienne", but that's probably not how I would translate the original sentence, although I can't think of a good translation right now. I thought about "avaint d'atteindre l'adolescence", but it doesn't sound great.

 

[Clemens]

Yes, and a more usual way to phrase it that would preserve the overall structure of the sentence could be "avant qu'il (ne) devienne", but that's probably not how I would translate the original sentence, although I can't think of a good translation right now. I thought about "avaint d'atteindre l'adolescence", but it doesn't sound great.

Yes I was thinking you wouldn’t use a finite verb at all, but an infinitive or noun clause.