Abstract
It seems clear that the use of the optative mood declined after the classical period, so that it is less common in New Testament Greek and eventually disappeared, but there is room for some doubt about the rate and manner of its decline, especially as some of the evidence is potentially complicated by literary reminiscence, and the Attic revival apparently brought back some features that were no longer fully understood. A simple counting of occurrences is insufficient to establish statistical trends, for even in the classical period the possibilities for the use of the optative vary according to context: e.g. wishes may occur in dialogue and speeches, but are not normal in historical narrative.
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