63 Colloquial and Li.. - Ganino.com

Possessive pronouns in Plautus 97
four more times; by the same constellation I mean a first- or second-person
subject in agent function followed by a direct object in the same clause
with suus referring to the latter. 37 Note also that the construction is not
excluded if the subject is a third person as well:
(53) nam is illius filiam | conicit in navem miles clam matrem suam.
(Pl. Mil. 111–12)
For this soldier puts that woman’s daughter onto the ship behind her
mother’s back.
This construction is ambiguous only in theory; only in theory could matrem
suam refer to the soldier’s mother rather than the girl’s, while within the
context of the narrative it is perfectly clear whose mother is being referred
to. 38
The following case looks deceptively similar to previous ones, but here
the rationale for choosing a reflexive possessive modifying the subject may
be different:
(54) iubet salvere suus vir uxorem suam.
Her husband is greeting his wife.
(Pl. Mer. 713)
The reflexive suam modifying uxorem is natural and expected, as it indicates
a connection with the grammatical subject. However, suus modifying this
subject and indicating a connection with the direct object is rather odd.
Perhaps the context can help to explain this oddity. The speaker is a
husband hiding away his neighbour’s mistress. Now the speaker’s wife is
returning unexpectedly early. He is embarrassed and tries to gloss over the
awkward situation he is in by addressing his wife in this facetious manner.
It is not inconceivable that he uses the same possessive type twice in order
to underline the close bond between himself and his wife.
Finally, there are also cases in which there is a grammatical subject and
a dative, and the reflexive possessive is governed by this dative:
(55) mittam hodie huic suo die natali malam rem magnam et maturam.
(Pl. Ps. 234)
Today, on his birthday, I’ll send him a big and full-grown hard time.
Again the reference of suus is unambiguous. It can only refer to the person
in the dative, as the subject is a first person. Equally unambiguous is the
similar constellation in Men. 973. InAm. 194 nominative and dative are
both third persons, but the context disambiguates the passage.
37 The tokens are in Aul. 639, Bac. 849, Men. 903, Mos. 1171.
38 A similar constellation, disambiguated by the context, occurs in Rud. 1225.