Talk:Greek language

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Archives
September 2004 – May 2006

Contents 1 Broken links 2 Big restructuring needed? 2.1 Current article scope problems 2.2 Other issues 2.3 Proposal 2.4 What to do 2.5 Not sure 2.6 Comments 2.7 Legacy of Greek Language 3 Need help 4 Special Ancient Greek characters 5 Gamma+Kappa befor [e] and [i] 6 Orthography??? 7 Restructuring 8 Categories 9 Greek language spoken in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia 10 Linear B 11 Macedonia 12 Greek in Wikipedia 13 Greek language as an Indo-European language 14 Greek words in Turkish and vice versa 15 Note

[edit] Broken links

The links to http://www.uoxantiqua.com/ in the literature section, http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/resolveform in the dictionaries section and the link to Lorem Ipsum in the typography section seem dead. --213.66.0.38 21:07, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Big restructuring needed?

I think the whole set of articles on the Greek language suffers from some problems of scope. Much of this seems to be because an originally fairly well-planned series of articles has grown into unexpected directions, not least because there is uncertainty whether the term "Greek", when used on its own in an article title, should primarily refer to Ancient Greek (A.G.) or Modern Greek (M.G.). I'd therefore like to propose a rather large restructuring project for discussion:

[edit] Current article scope problems

• Greek language seems to have been originally designed as a diachronic overview article, but has now been changed into a sketch of M.G., with a diachronic section rather awkwardly attached to it.
• Confusingly, there is now both:
  • Modern Greek language, which redirects to Greek language, (fixed   Andreas   ^(T) 14:15, 1 June 2006 (UTC)) and
  • Modern Greek, which however deals only with dialects and diglossia.
• Greek dialects, in turn, deals with A.G.
• In contrast, there's another series of articles where "Greek ..." deals with M.G., and the corresponding article about A.G. is titled "Ancient Greek ...":
  • Greek grammar vs. Ancient Greek grammar
  • Greek phonology vs. Ancient Greek phonology

[edit] Other issues

• Ancient Greek: duplicates a lot of material also in Ancient Greek phonology.
• Ancient Greek lacks a treatment of syntax.
• Koine Greek duplicates other parts of Ancient Greek phonology.
• Attic Greek duplicates a lot of Ancient Greek grammar
• Arcadocypriot is a stub and should be expanded on the model of Aeolic Greek, Doric Greek, Ionic Greek
• History of Greek is another overview article doing very much what Greek language does or could do.
• Material about phonological change is distributed across Ancient Greek phonology, Iotacism, Koine Greek.

[edit] Proposal

1. All articles titled "Greek ..." should be either overview articles dealing diachronically with the whole of Greek, or dab pages pointing to corresponding "Ancient Greek ..." and "Modern Greek ..." pages.
2. Greek language should be turned back into a pure overview article, discussing things like genetic classification, history, periodization, diachronic unity of the language, geographical distribution etc.
3. All detail articles that deal with only one of the stages should be prefixed "Ancient Greek ..." and "Modern Greek ..." respectively.
4. The main articles for the language-system sketches should be Ancient Greek and Modern Greek, with Ancient Greek language and Modern Greek language as redirects.
5. Both should have a series of corresponding sub-articles, e.g.:
   1. Ancient Greek phonology vs Modern Greek phonology (plus Greek phonology as dab page)
   2. Ancient Greek grammar vs Modern Greek grammar (plus Greek grammar as dab page)
   3. Ancient Greek dialects vs Modern Greek dialects (plus Greek dialects as dab page)

[edit] What to do

1. Merge M.G. language-system sketch material out of Greek language into Modern Greek
2. Redirect Modern Greek language to Modern Greek (done   Andreas   ^(T) 14:20, 1 June 2006 (UTC)).
3. Move Greek phonology to Modern Greek phonology, recreate as dab page.
4. Same with Greek grammar.
5. Move Greek dialects to Ancient Greek dialects, recreate as dab page.
6. Merge M.G. dialects material out of Modern Greek into new Modern Greek dialects article.
7. Merge A.G. grammar material out of Attic Greek into Ancient Greek; rewrite Attic Greek and Acradocypriot on the model of Doric Greek, Aeolic Greek and Ionic Greek.

[edit] Not sure

1. What to do with the discussion of the phonological changes between Ancient and Modern Greek? It's now mainly in Ancient Greek phonology (and quite big there, after a rather trollish big dispute last year), but much is duplicated in other articles. I think it's good to have it in one place, but as it is a topic that cuts across the different stages of the language, it should perhaps have its own diachronically oriented page, perhaps History of Greek phonology, or be merged into History of Greek.

Fut.Perf. ☼ 07:22, 1 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Comments

• I wholeheartedly agree with this proposal. Let Greek language be in Wikipedia:Summary style, the central article facilitating navigation to the topic you are looking for. I think the material on Ancient Greek phonology is at home where it is, while of course there should be a summary and a {{main}} template on History of the Greek language pointing to it. Yes, especially on linguistic articles, trolls are the driving force of Wikipedia. The worst trolls often spur the best editors into creating a brilliant article with watertight references where without the trollish ecapades we would only have a brief stub :) dab (ᛏ) 10:22, 1 June 2006 (UTC)
• I would suggest that Greek language should be the modern language (with a dab phrase at the top) because it is the living language. We also have English language and Old English but not Modern English (this article gives only an outline of the development of the modern language), same with French, German etc. This issue also came up with the request for an Ancient Greek Wikisource. It is a fundamental question that should be decided by consensus.   Andreas   ^(T) 14:43, 1 June 2006 (UTC)
• In English, almost all modern languages are referred to using the simple name, not "Modern xxx". But a book entitled "Greek Grammar" or "Greek Literature" is almost certainly about Ancient Greek. This may be changing. The title of the recent and authoritative Philippaki-Warburton/Holton/Mackridge grammar does start out "Greek", but the subtitle clarifies: "An Essential Grammar of the Modern Language". There are similar problems with other languages with a long literary tradition, such as Arabic, Hebrew, and Chinese, though perhaps in none of them is the identification of X as Ancient/Classical X as clear. This is annoying for us Greeks (or should I say modern Greeks?), but I think it is the current state of the world. For Wikipedia to be completely clear, I would suggest that we stick with using "Greek" to mean the whole diachronic system of Greek varieties and clearly specify "Modern Greek" or "Ancient Greek" otherwise. --Macrakis 19:47, 1 June 2006 (UTC)
• I agree with dab, I disagree with Andreas. Unlike most other european languages, Modern Greek is always prefixed by 'modern' for two reasons:

1. Modern Greek is an evolved stage of the 3000-year old Greek language, and not an independent language of its own (such as the child of a dead language). In that respect 'Modern Greek' refers to a historical period of a living language, which strictly speaking, contains numerous different dialects and not just Demotic. That is not the case with modern French and English.
2. There's by far more people learning ancient than modern Greek.

Some time ago I had tried to organise the Greek language articles almost exactly as Future proposed above. Dab had agreed with me back then so he probably remembers. While everything seemed to be in order, some other people started complained about how the article didn't follow wikipedia's guidelines (using pretty much the same arguments as Andreas) and thus all the linguistic information from Modern Greek was moved to the Greek language, leaving the former in a much poorer condition. Miskin 20:44, 1 June 2006 (UTC)

• Just to chime in here again with the others, my rationale in proposing this was that (1) A.G. has a special claim to being treated on a par with M.G. when it comes to the scope of Greek language, because of its exceptional historical role in European culture, and (2) that if we move both A.G. and M.G. at equal distance from Greek language, that article will still have enough interesting stuff to deal with. And besides, even Macrakis and Miskin agree with each other on this one, it would be a shame to let that consensus go to waste ;-) -- Fut.Perf. ☼ 17:03, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
• Is it possible to go back and see who those "some other people" are and see their arguments and possibly get their present opinion? It may be impossible to get a stable result if those editors intervene again, and all the work my be for nothing.   Andreas   ^(T) 22:05, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
  • Looking back into the talk archive of last summer, I can see Peter Isotalo as the principal proponent of "Greek language=M.G." Perhaps that's what Miskin meant? Fut.Perf. ☼ 22:19, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
    • I was asked by Future Perfect to give my opinion on the proposal. My main argument stands; even if the number of people who study Ancient Greek is higher than those studying Modern Greek, and perhaps even higher than the number of native speakers, the importance of the language to the native speakers is immeasurable, especially when we're talking at least 12 million of them. A dablink and a reasonably clearifying intro should, in my opinion, satisfy the AG buffs. But if consensus leans towards keeping the currently spoken language at Modern Greek, then I don't quite see why this should be an overview article instead of a straight-up dabpage. / Peter ^Isotalo 11:32, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the comments. Just a quick reply:

• The measure is, I think, not so much the importance of this or that aspect of the topic, but people's expectations on coming to the article - be it when they type the term into the search box or when they are led here by a link. If you see a book titled "Greek", what do you expect it to deal with? When WP editors use "[[Greek language|Greek]]" somewhere in an article, what do they have in mind?
• The incoming links also make the solution of a dab page unworkable. There are thousands of links to this page, and they are extremely heterogeneous. In the majority of cases, I'd guess, the intended target is really AG more than MG. Thus the present situation, favouring MG, is suboptimal for them, but a dab page would make it even worse because it would force us to disambiguate manually. Dab pages shouldn't be link targets. And then there'll be many cases where the distinction will be pretty much irrelevant to the context. We need a page that can serve as a link target for people who need to refer to "Greek as a whole", be it because they don't know better or because that's really what they want to refer to, and which deals gracefully with the unavoidable vagueness by offering something interesting for everybody. That's what the diachronic summary article can do.
• As for the argument of native-speaker preferences implicit in your comment, I think we needn't worry: Greek speakers are typically quite fond of the idea that AG and MG are closely connected, so for the primary article to balance between AG and MG by speaking primarily about their essential unity should actually serve these readers' interests quite well.

Fut.Perf. ☼ 13:34, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

• Maybe there is a way forward for this discussion. I believe a good idea is to follow the guidelines provided by the Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Languages, an active WikiProject which seeks and manages, more or less, to bring consistency to articles on languages. They have come up with Wikipedia:WikiProject Languages/Template, which in my opinion is comprenhensive, informative, plus the users of wikipedia can have a, more or less, standard way to navigate through language articles. The idea -as I understand it- is as follows: There is a main, comprehensive article for its living language, which points to the related, more specific articles, but it is not just a page proposing links to other pages, far from it . And this page is about the modern, standard language. See Portugese language, English language, Turkish language.

So, in my opinion, there should be an aricle headed "Greek language". "Modern Greek language" should redirect to it". In the first line, in italics, it should be mentioned that this article is about the modern language and about the ancient language click "Ancient Greek Language". Then "Greek language" should have the sections proposed at Wikipedia:WikiProject Languages/Template, each pointing to the respective main article. The length of "Greek language" should be comparable to, say, Portugese language. The "Greek language template" will make navigation easier.--Michkalas 18:19, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. I believe this is exactly the position Peter Isotalo was advocating last year. I can see your point, but I'd still prefer the solution I sketched out above.

• Greek is truly unique among the world's languages insofar as it's (almost) the only language that comes to mind where an ancient and a modern form (a) share the same name, (b) are nevertheless sufficiently different that at least two separate articles are necessary, (c) the name, unqualified, refers more frequently to the ancient than to the modern form. Are there others? Aramaic, perhaps. That means the use of the WikiProject standards might legitimately have to be modified (not necessarily abandoned completely) here.
• A typical WikiProject-standard language article has a "synchronic system sketch" part (phonology, grammar etc.), and a "diachronic" part (history, classification etc.). The diachronic part in this case is relevant to AG and to MG to the same degree. Why should discussion about Greek's position within IE be in an article that is essentially about MG for the most part, and the article about AG should lack that discussion?
• Look at it this way: We will in fact be using the template, but we'll expand it through even heavier use of the summary-plus-subarticle feature then normal. We'll have a single diachronic portion, kept centrally in the main article, and not one but two synchronic-sketch portions, both integrated in the general template pattern through links from main article but delegated into two separate sets of subarticles. I believe that's a fair way of dealing with it, compatible both with the expectations of a reader used to the WikiProject pattern and to those of a reader who's come to the article through an AG-related link. Fut.Perf. ☼ 18:41, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the response. I think the main problem is with the term "Greek language". Besides this, Greek isn't that particular. I believe that the line in italics I proposed above solves this problem. But your "follow the template with modifications" proposal is a very good basis. In my view, this article should include a "systemic system sketch" of MG, but not a "systemic system sketch" of AG (which would imply tables of phonemes, vocabulary, etc.), though I fully understand that AG's section will be more extended than usual. Anyway, let's begin and I firmly believe that even these divergences will be proved in practice even narrower. --Michkalas 19:05, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

I agree with Fut.Perf. that the main Greek language article should be a diachronic overview, and that Modern Greek, Ancient Greek, etc. should cover the specific periods. This is for four pragmatic reasons: 1) there should be some place which presents an overview, and an article devoted specifically to Modern Greek is not the right place to do it; 2) the term "Greek" on its own often refers to ancient or koine Greek; 3) there are many existing wikilinks that would need to be disambiguated; 4) there is simply a large amount of material that needs to be divided in some logical way.

Michkalas mentions the WikiProject languages template, which is certainly handy, but I couldn't find anything in the related discussions which specified whether this template should be used for Greek, Modern Greek, Ancient Greek, Koine Greek, etc., or perhaps some or all of them. Perhaps there should be a discussion about Greek, but also Chinese and Arabic (where there is similar confusion), in the WikiProject.... --Macrakis 22:51, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Legacy of Greek Language

This comment is perhaps more appropriate for the "History of Greek Language" page but the author has not started a discussion page there. I would be interested to see a discussion in one of these pages regarding the relatively small Greek-speaking community today. The western Roman empire, which lasted into the middle of the first millenium, left a legacy of multiple Romance languages with a very large body of speakers all over Europe. This in spite of the fact that all of these areas were overrun by Germanic tribes which did not originally speak Romance. The eastern Roman empire was the most powerful nation in Europe into the beginning of the second millenium, and even while the western Roman empire still existed the eastern empire was the most significant and developed part of the empire. Yet today the speakers of languages derived from Roman Greek are mostly limited to the modern Greek republic with a few small pockets in other areas of Europe. One would think there would be more areas of Europe that speak Greek derivatives than Latin derivatives. Can anyone comment on the reasons this did not happen? That is, can anyone comment on why the western conquerors largely adopted the languages of the subjects whereas the eastern conquerors did not? MCorazao 26 July 2006

[edit] Need help

Can someone with expertise in the Greek language check the Greek word I've added in the first paragraph of Ennead for spelling and accuracy? Thanks, Badagnani 00:40, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

What is the diminutive suffix in Greek? Crazy 29 21:39, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

-άκι (changes gender to neutral), for persons: -άκης (masc.), -ούλα (fem.)   Andreas   ^(T) 00:33, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

also - ίτσα (fem.) and sometimes -ούτσικος -ούτσικη, -ούτσικο (the latter forming dimunitives of adjectives) All mentioned so far are modern greek suffixes. In classical greek a dimunitive suffix is (-ίδιον) or sometimes just (-ιον), both changing gender to neuter. Ε.g.: παππίδιον, μαμμίδιον, ιχθύδιον, λιθίδιον (daddy, mommy, little fish, little stone). Third declension nouns ending in ξ, use the dimunitive form -άκιον as in μειράκιον, κοράκιον (early adolescent, little crow). The modern greek -άκι continues this morphology. In classical greek there is also -ίσκος (masc.) as in παιδίσκος (=preschooler) Yannos 01:04, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Diminutives permeate the Greek language, and are formed with many suffixes and substantial regional variations. To the above I would add -ουλης, -ουλα, -ουλι in all three genders (as in μικρούλης, probably Byzantine Latin influence), -ακος (φοιτητάκος, likely Venetian influence), plus the regional -ουδι (Thrace, Thasos, Chalkidiki, Eastern Romylia) and -ελι (Crete, Ionian Islands, Lesbos, likely Venetian influence, also -rarer- -ελος and -ελα), plus male first name diminutive suffixes -ιτσος (Κίτσος; Slavic influence), -ουτσος (Ανδρούτσος--likely Venetian influence), -ικας (Γιωρίκας--in Pontian dialect) and -ικος (Αντρίκος, Σολομωνίκος--possible Ladino influence from Sephardic Jewish population).

In addition, countless modern Greek words were formed, starting in late Hellenistic and mediaeval times from koine originals through diminutive suffixes, as in -ι, -αρι, -ιδι, -αφι (παιδί, χορτάρι, λεπίδι, χρυσάφι). All these originally had -ον at the end. This ending is preserved in the Pontian dialect (παιδίον) and, in part, the Cypriot dialect (παιδίν).

There are probably more current and historical diminutive suffixes, especially in regional dialects.

In recent years the tendency to use diminutives, especialy by women and children, has strengthened to the point that some will utter scarcely a noun without one, and a few people have started expressing distaste at what could be called a creeping infantilization of the language. Yp57 19:57, 27 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Special Ancient Greek characters

Can I ask those who think of themselves as "average MSIE users" to help us evaluating the usability of different fonts @ special Ancient Greek characters? If some of you would like to help, please check this out. --Adolar von Csobánka (Talk) 14:23, 20 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Gamma+Kappa befor [e] and [i]

I would prefer [[ɲɟ] by assimilation. However, a source would be needed for either version.   Andreas   ^(T) 12:34, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Orthography???

Why is the section concerning orthography enterely dedicated to pronounciation? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 194.65.1.187 (talk • contribs).

Hi, good question. I can see what you mean. I guess the idea was for it to treat the relation between sound and orthography, but it could be done better. Feel free to edit if you have good ideas how to organise it better. Fut.Perf. ☼ 20:23, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Restructuring

Couple of months back I proposed a large restructuring of the Greek-related articles (see #Big restructuring needed? above.) The responses were largely positive but I never found the time and energy of actually doing it. Do you mind if I go ahead and do it now? I've also checked the objections brought forward against similar plans last year by User:Peter Isotalo - it was apparently just this one editor, and I now believe his objections don't stand against the consensus that emerged here, but I've asked him again for his input too, as Andreas suggested. Fut.Perf. ☼ 06:11, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

Note: Discussion continued in section above. Fut.Perf. ☼ 13:47, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Categories

We currently have Category:Greek language and Category:Hellenic languages and dialects. There's quite a bit of chaos about those, and they are mostly used indiscriminately. The second category is apparently a remnant of a time when someone wanted to include "Hellenic languages" as a cover term for several separate-language units within Greek, which is not a particularly common way of looking at things. Then the category became filled up with all sorts of things that should have gone to "Greek language". I suggest:

• either get rid of the second category altogether and merge its contents into Category:Greek language,
• or rename it from Category:Hellenic languages and dialects to something like Category:Varieties of Greek (conveniently neutral as to separate-language status) and then clean it out to contain only entries for actual varieties (the historical stages, ancient Greek dialects, Modern Greek dialects, Katharevousa, Demotic, etc.)

Fut.Perf. ☼ 22:03, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

Note: proposal filed at Wikipedia:Categories for deletion/Log/2006 September 10. I've tidied up the category a bit so that at least it's coherent now. Fut.Perf. ☼ 09:55, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

Do go ahead. I prefer the "Varieties of Greek" proposal, keeping articles on grammar, grammarians etc. in the "Greek language" supercategory. I am afraid there is really no standard way of doing this, there are very analogous problems all over, such as Germanic spirant law etc. in Category:Germanic languages, and if you have the nerve you might attempt a wiki-wide suggestion at Wikipedia:WikiProject Linguistics, Wikipedia:WikiProject Language families or some such place (better advertise it on the VP at the same time to get everyone's attention). dab (ᛏ) 16:45, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Greek language spoken in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia

By whom, and where is the source to confirm this? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Akula444 (talk • contribs) .

• Ethnologue [1] [2]. Also, the 2002 census found that 0,021% of the population of the Republic of Macedonia (small I know) self-identified as Greek. --Telex 18:06, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Linear B

Britannica [3] says language attested from 14th c. BC. More importantly, Brian Joseph (Ohio State University) says [4] "the earliest [Linear B tablets] coming from Knosos on Crete (where Mycenaeans had overcome the local Minoan rulers) dating from the 14th century BC".--Michkalas 13:28, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

Do we have a source for Vedic Sanskrit?--ΚέκρωΨ 13:31, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

There is something good: the section "Indo-Aryan (Sanskrit)" [5] from Brian D Joseph & Hans H Hock, Language History, Language Change, and Language Relationship: An Introduction to Historical and Comparative Linguistics, Berlin and NY: Walter de Gruyter, 1996. At p.55, [6] there is also reference to linear B attestation.--Michkalas 13:51, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

[Edit conflict:] Re. Linear B: FWIW, F. Bader in Langues indo-européennes, p.11, speaks of 15th-13th centuries, noting that these datings are subject to debate; G. Horrocks in Greek: A history..., p.3, puts its beginnings to "sometime towards the end of the sixteenth century BC." As for Sanskrit, my understanding is that the dates are even more hypothetical, because they refer to the age at which the oldest known works of literature took shape, orally; they were apparently written down much later. The person to ask for confirmation would be User:Dbachmann. Fut.Perf. ☼ 13:52, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

Britannica put Mycenaean at the same time period as Hittite, that is 14th c. BC. However there are Linear B inscriptions dating from 1500 BC [7], so it's possible that some of those sources are outdated. Earliest Hittite and Sanskrit also generally date from 1500 BC. Miskin 14:17, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

The current formulation is probably the one to go with. "Matched" instead of "preceded by" is a good way of avoiding the "mine is bigger than yours" argument entirely.--ΚέκρωΨ 14:20, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

Agree. The best references we've seen so far (Joseph/Hocks, Bader, Horrocks) differ from each other by about a century (c.1500 - c.1400), and Bader explicitly acknowledges incertainty. That means I wouldn't rely too much on the apparent certainty expressed in that Perlman webpage, which isn't technically a "reliable source" anyway. Fut.Perf. ☼ 14:32, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

Probably in Britannica there is a difference between the estimated period the language was spoken and the date of the linear B tablets. True, the exact datings are a subject of debate. But we cannot take into consideration the earliest possible dating estimations we can find about Greek and the latest possible about the other languages. Hittite language texts date from at least 17th c. BC [8] For Sanskrit, the texts available are consedered to represent at least the 15th c. BC language (see the reference above). Like the homeric poems, the language represented it is not considered being that of the time the text were written down. --Michkalas 14:35, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

There's also the Kafkania_pebble. It's fair to keep them on the same level, as most sources do. Miskin 14:46, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

Most sources do? The first link of the article says it is a possible forgery, the second says it is XV century b.C. Not to mention your previous argument "a wikipedia article is not a source".--Michkalas 15:03, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

Whatever, I don't really care. Miskin 15:30, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

OK, I made a change based on "matched". Just for the record, FPaS, Horrocks in Greek: A history..., p.3, puts to "sometime towards the end of the sixteenth century BC." the beginnings of the Mycenaean civilization not the first attestation of Mycenaen language/linear B. But, OK, the issue is controversial.--Michkalas 18:50, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

Is there actually ANY viable proof that Linear B was used by the Hellene tribes that migrated to the region sometime after it lapsed from use due to extinction of its user culture? It is neither scientific nor logical to make the assumption that a language was 'rediscovered' because linguists since late 19th century CE know only too well how difficult it is to rediscover a dead language, particularly for a culture that had no concept of writing prior to arrival in the area. I would suggest that the linkage of Ancient Greek writing usage from 9th century BCE to Linear B should not be in the article as it is misleading.--Mrg3105 08:17, 25 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Macedonia

Since this is an English language Wikipedia, I think the fact that both the US and the UK (the biggest english speaking countries in the world) recognize the "ΠΓΔΜ - FYROM" under its constitutional name does make a difference regarding this matter, and even though this article is related to Greece, "FYROM" should be replaced with Macedonia (or Republic of Macedonia, to prevent mix-ups between the greek region and the country) and the source that the user Telex gave us refers to "FYROM" as Macedonia. To my personal opinion is that if this wouldn't be changed, this wikipedia would be a nationalist place where every nationality is NOT equaly treated, let alone a sovereign country. Guitardemon666 15:12, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

And of course, your own nationalism would have nothing to do with this at all, would it?--ΚέκρωΨ 15:17, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

As far as I know, the UK does not recognize the "constitutional name" of this state, and nor do Australia, New Zealand and Canada. The UN doesn't either, and according to the Greek Foreign Minister, Dora Bakoyannis: "...the Hellenic Parliament, under any composition, will not ratify the accession of the neighbouring country to the EU and NATO if the name issue is not resolved beforehand" [9], so quite obviously, the name FYROM is not unheard of or rarely used in the English language, nor does it seem to be dissapearing. --Tzekai 15:40, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Greek in Wikipedia

A guideline on whether or not to italicize Greek (and all scripts other than Latin) is being debated at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style (text formatting)#Italics in Cyrillic and Greek characters. - - Evv 16:30, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Greek language as an Indo-European language

I disagree that Greek language is one of the Indo-European family. I actually disagree that the Indo-European family indeed existed or is an unscientific solution to scientific deadlocks but this is another discussion. I want only to mention that Indo-European theory was a Hitler-time "invention" to support the superiority of the Arie in contrary with the Slavs Communists of Russia.

From the time that Linear A and Arcadocypriot are the ancestors of Linear B and the written Greek Language and if we take for ground that Minoan Cretans were not an Indo-European tribe then how is Greek Language linking with the Indo-European family. I agree that Greek Language may be a "loan" from the Phoenicians as Herodotus also says, but a more careful study to Linear A and B will convince as that this "loan" is actually a loan of a loanword. That means that Phoenicians "borrowed" Linear A during their trade relations with Minoan Cretans, "work it out" and then during the Mycenaean or during the First Greek Expansion, when they came in touch with the Greek people again, gave back the "new" language. In supporting to this is the example of Cyprus (a part of the Greek nation where Greeks and Phoenicians always coexisted in some analogies) where Linear A and Linear B developed to the dialect known as Arcadocypriot which remain in use until about the classical era.

So my points are that Indo-European language family did never exist and that Greek language is not one of its languages (you will have to choose whether it is an Indo-European language or it is Phoenician) and that Greek language is a develop from the languages of Minoan Cretans and prior to them the ProtoHellenic tribes. The question is logic. Why do we have to search the roots of Greek language away from Greece? What makes as believe that the language of ProtoHellenes, Minoan Cretans and Mycenaeans by a magic way disappeared and gave its sit to an imaginary Ino-European language communty or to a Phoenician invention? —preceding unsigned comment by 80.1.72.245 (talk • contribs)

This is original research, and therefore does not belong in the Wikipedia. --Macrakis 02:57, 6 November 2006 (UTC)

There appears to be a significant bias in the article which contradicts linguistic discipline as a whole, and logic in particular. Development of Greek is presented as something evolved in 1) a linguistic vacuum through efforts of Greeks alone, and 2) as the most sophisticated system of communication available. None of these suggestiosn are logicaly true. Firstly it is commonly attested that the Hellene/Greek in "The modern English adaptation of Greek is derived from the Latin Graecus, which in turn originates from Greek Γραικός (Graikos), the name of a Boeotian tribe that migrated to Italy in the 8th century BC, and it is by that name the Hellenes were known in the West." This is confirmed by general study of the area in the ancient times that attests to significant population movements that continued with arrival of other Ionian tribes, Scythian tribes, Celts, Goths, etc. There is no evidence that nomadic populations anywhere on the globe and throughout history had been able to develop writing on their own. However there are ample examples of nomads borrowing writing. In fact there were several societies in the region which had writing, yet there is no mention of Ionian tribes borrowing from them although in example of the Japanese it has been estimated that 60% of their current vocabulary is borowed. Secondly the Greek language is not as sophisticated as the article suggests. It had 28 letters to Punic/Hebrew 22, evidently to enable reproduction of vowels exactly. This is not required for consistent users of writing since they have a limited choice of vowels, which is the case in modern usage of Hebrew. The need to record vowels also makes the writing less efficient, further requiring grammar rules. This inefficiency is highlighted by the relative illiteracy of the ancient Ionic populations given attested cost of reproduced literature. Nor is there evidence of oral transmission outside of operatic tradition. There is also consistent evidence that cultures which tend to borrow linguisticly also participate in migration to source of borrowing. There is a significant attestation for large scale resettlement of Ionian population to ancient Israel to a level of saturating local culture with Hellenic practice. This is consistent with observed phenomena elsewhere in regions and histories of other past and current societies. I therefore suggest the article be changed to reflect these facts of history and introduce greater objectivity into the content.--Mrg3105 09:00, 25 November 2006 (UTC)

Sorry, but all of this is blatantly "original research", and very poor folk linguistics at that. Please do not try to insert thoughts like this in the articles. The articles on the Greek language and writing system currently reflect the relevant scholarship adequatley. Fut.Perf. ☼ 09:52, 25 November 2006 (UTC)

Actually this is REVISIONIST research which suggests that the original research was wrong. This is substantiated by the fact that the IET continues to be a theory for over 150 years now. There is no concrete proof of the 'Greek' tribes being from their current location, or having literacy at the time claimed. Given the 'Greek' alephbet is clearly Phoenician in origin, there is however actual proof of widespread borrowing by the 'Greeks'. The link made between Sanskrit (hence Hindu) and 'Greek' can only explain remnant/legacy elements in 'Greek' and therefore the origin of tribal migration. 'Greek' mythology in itself attributes Europe to a Phoenician origin. Do you suggest that old research is always correct? Debunking takes place in science every day, and yet this foolishness of 'Greek' pre-eminence in Europe continues. --Mrg3105 20:44, 26 December 2006 (UTC)

Man wake up, there are no Phoenicians left on the planet for the last 2000 years. You're obsessing over something to which you're linked by fiction. And I don't think you understood what original reseach is. Miskin 03:03, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Greek words in Turkish and vice versa

Does any one know how many words the Turkish language has borrowed from Greek and vice versa? Helladios 14:57, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

Vocabulary counts like this are difficult for many reasons. One is that the "Turkish language" and the "Greek language" are not well-defined. They have changed over time (both Greek and Turkish have "purified" their vocabulary, so for example γύρος -- a calque of the Turkish word -- is now more common than ντονέρ), they vary by region and by register, etc. Many dictionaries are purist or prescriptive, and tend to avoid loanwords. Another reason is that the detailed history of words is often difficult to establish. Another is that the history of words is often complicated and roundabout: how do we count the Turkish word sinema: it is obviously borrowed from French, and 'cinematographe' was coined in modern times, but the roots are ancient Greek. Do you count καφενείο as Turkish? Well, clearly Greek got it from Turkish, but it comes from the Persian compound kahve-hane (coffee house), and the first part, kahve, comes from the Arabic qahwah. How about φιστίκι? It is borrowed from Turkish fıstık, which is in turn borrowed from Greek πιστάκη, but that in turn is probably borrowed from Persian.... Turkish iskele comes from Greek σκάλα, but that in turn comes from Latin scala. I think the only consistent, sensible way to count is by immediate loans, which indicate cultural connections, so that sinema in Turkish (and in Greek for that matter) counts as a loan from French, iskele counts as a loan from Greek, and φιστίκι counts as a loan from Turkish. --Macrakis 17:15, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

By the way, when I say the "vary by region", I'm alluding to the varieties of Greek spoken in Asia Minor (Cappadocian, Pontic, etc.) which had many more loanwords from Turkish, many of which will not be found in general modern Greek dictionaries. Also, Greek before 1820 had many more Turkish words.

You might be interested in Kostas Kazazis's article "Greek Reactions to an Ancient Greek Primer for Turks", Modern Philology 73:2:162-165 (Nov., 1975)at JSTOR. Here he discusses the "stylistic demotion" that Turkish borrowings underwent as a result of 19th-century Greek "purification". One interesting case of a round-trip loan is Turkish zor 'violence' which becomes Greek ζόρι, which in turn gives the Turkish metazori 'by threats' from Greek με το ζόρι.

A paper Kazazis cites is "The Status of Turkisms in the Present-Day Balkan Languages" in Aspects of the Balkans, ed. Henrik Birnbaum and Speros Vryonis, Jr., but I haven't seen it. --Macrakis 18:05, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

I have not been able to find much about Greek loanwords in Turkish. I do know that many nautical and fishing terms -- especially the names of fish -- have been borrowed from Greek into Turkish: barbun(ya) (Venetian > Greek > Turkish); σκουμπρί > uskumru; τσιππούρα > çipura; λαβράκι > levrek; αστακός > istakoz; etc. although interestingly there is kalkan 'shield' > καλκάνι 'turbot'.

About nautical terms, an interesting study, Henry and Renee Kahane, "Turkish Nautical Terms of Italian Origin", Journal of the American Oriental Society 62:4:238-261 (Dec., 1942) JSTOR shows that "almost all of the Italian nautical terms in the Turkish language came from Greek."

I have found a couple of relevant articles which you might want to consult:

• Gustav Meyer, "Türkische Studien I (Die griechischen und romanischen Bestandtheile im Wortschatze des Osmanish-Türkischen", SB Wien. phil.-hist. Classe 128:I;72-85, 1893.
• A. A. Papadopoulos, Τα εκ της Ελληνικής δάνεια της Τουρκικής, Αθηνά 44:3-27 (1932)

Perhaps you could read them and summarize them in the relevant WP articles? --Macrakis 19:26, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

The majority of Turkish and Italian loan words that entered Modern Greek have not survived in the standard language. It's not that they were replaced by Greek words via purification, they just didn't make it to the standard language, as was the fate of many archaisms that existed in various dialects. Therefore a 1932 source might be worth quoting for historical purposes, but not in order to describe the state of the living language. That's my opinion. Miskin 19:36, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

Miskin, you really need to read my messages more carefully. The 1932 source is for Greek loanwords in Turkish, not vice versa (Τα εκ της Ελληνικής δάνεια της Τουρκικής). The sources for Turkish loanwords in Greek are all more recent than that.

As for how Turkish loanwords in Greek "didn't make it to the standard language", there are certainly many forces, of which purification is one important one:

As a result of (mostly) nineteenth-century efforts to "purge" the Greek language of its Turkisms, several Turkish loanwords were replaced by Ancient Greek or Ancient Greek-sounding terms... [footnote:] The removal or stylistic specialization of Turkish loanwords did not always result from a conscious purge, but has just as often been a consequence of the reorientation of Greek society toward the West....

Kazazis, op.cit.

It is certainly true that some dialects (notably Cappadocian) were very heavily Turkicized in vocabulary and even syntax (take a look at R.M.Dawkins, "Modern Greek in Asia Minor", The Journal of Hellenic Studies 30:109-132 (1910)[10]) and that almost none of that made it to standard modern Greek.

On the other hand, there definitely has been purification, some successful (a recent example is γύρος for ντονέρ), and some not (who says υπόδημα for παπούτσι 'shoe' or βαφέας for μπογιατζής 'painter'?). And I guess the purifiers didn't get around to ντουλάπα 'closet'; or should we use ερμάρι (< Latin)? --Macrakis 20:49, 28 February 2007 (UTC) --Macrakis 20:49, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

I didn't misunderstand Macrakis, but I meant what I said for both languages. Due to extensive purification and reconstruction, Modern Turkish is arguably a different language from Ottoman Turkish, and I'm pretty sure that a 1932 source would refer to the latter. I think that many Turkish words were lost from Standard Modern Greek for the same reason that many Latin words were lost from Medieval Greek, i.e. reduced contacts with the speakers of the other language (and not because of purification). Miskin 01:41, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

I agree that Turkish has changed more in the past 75 years than Greek. In any case, the article is no doubt interesting.

As for your theory that words of Turkish origin were lost from Standard Modern Greek because there were "reduced contacts with the speakers of the other language", I'd love to see some sources for that. It's a lovely theory. --Macrakis 02:05, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

Helladios, here's a source for Greek loanwords in Turkish (which I'm afraid I haven't seen):

Christos Tzitzilis, Griechische Lehnwörter im Türkischen: mit besonderer Berücksichtigung der anatolischen Dialekte, Wien: Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1987.

Let us know what you find out.... --Macrakis 20:38, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Note

Please restore any ISBN-numbers you may find deleted by user:Iblardi, or numbers connected by a hyphen in general. I appear to be pestered by some kind of malware. Iblardi 01:59, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

Apparently my browser did no longer recognize those numbers as Wikipedia text after installation of this dialing program. I assume it is just a bug. I've uninstalled the program and hopefully the trouble will be over now. Iblardi 05:01, 29 March 2007 (UTC)