" protases "

[Noun]  | "prot*a*sis" | \ ˈprä-tə-səs \

1: the introductory part of a play or narrative poem

2: the subordinate clause of a conditional sentence

Origin: circa 1568 ;

 Late Latin, from Greek, premise of a syllogism, conditional clause, from proteinein to stretch out before, put forward, from pro- + teinein to stretch {mat|tenant:1|};