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Ancient Greek Language

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  Quote akritas Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Topic: Ancient Greek Language
    Posted: 16-May-2006 at 15:58

The decipherment of the clay tablets in the script known as   Linear B has revealed a Greek dialect of the 15  to 13 cent. B.C.

 
This dialect, which we have provisionally named Mycenaean after the archaeological culture with which it is associated, is found in documents from Mycenae, (Messenian) Pylos, and Knossos.
 
Owing to the clumsy script and the scanty remains so far known it is impossible to determine its treatment of all the important linguistic features which would enable us to classify it in relation to the historic dialects. But there is enough clear evidence to show its affinities, and what is more to confirm some of the dates proposed above.

 

The ancients, from Hesiod on, distinguished generally three  major families of Greek speaking peoples : Dorians, Ionians, and Aeolians.

 

Modern scholars accepted this as a rough basis, for the Doric and Ionic dialects were plainly recognizable.
 

It proved necessary to split Doric or West Greek into North-West Greek (Phocian, Locrian, Macedonian, Epirotan  and Elean) and Doric proper or Peloponnesian Doric (including all the Peloponnese together with Corinth and Megara, but excluding Elis and Arcadia; also the southern Aegean islands, Crete, Melos, Thera, Rhodes, Cos, etc.)

 
Ionic was divisible into Attic and Ionic, and in the latter three regional
 
Aeolic was less easily identified, but generally Lesbian, Thessalian, and Boeotian were grouped under this label, though the latter two were distinguished by being 'mixed' dialects, which had suffered strong Doric or North-West Greek influence.
 
Furthermore, it was necessary to postulate a fourth group, clumsily named Arcado-Cyprian, to account for the remarkable coincidences between the historically isolated areas of Arcadia and Cyprus. This was closely linked with Aeolic.

 

 

Source:

http://www.cambridge.org/uk/catalogu...8#contributors
http://www.alpha.edu.gr/general/100106591789633.shtml

 


Edited by akritas - 16-May-2006 at 16:03
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  Quote dorian Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 17-May-2006 at 12:48
The Attic dialect was more refined while the Doric was the opposite. What about the Aeolic?
 
 
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  Quote akritas Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 17-May-2006 at 14:10

Aeolic language also was not refined. E.g the strategos  called as strotagos, malthakos called as molthakos. Also the tones point out in the last syllable and not  in the first as the first one.

 
Also there are differences and between the aeolic dialects.

Attic language =tetartos-tessara

Thessalic dialect=petropos-pettara

Boeotian dialect=petratos-petrata

 
The Aeolic language (paricularly the Thessalian dialect )shows many archaisms specially with those that were relative in the NW Greek  dialects such as Epirotan,Locrians and Macedonian.


Edited by akritas - 17-May-2006 at 14:13
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  Quote dorian Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 18-May-2006 at 17:36
I've read a text written in the language of Tsakonians (some peasants in Peloponnisos) which consists of the relics of the ancient doric dialect. It's extraordinary and generally speaking I think that the doric dialect (and all its branches like Phocian, Locrian, Macedonian, Lakonian etc) is very interesting maybe because we haven't been taught about it.

Edited by dorian - 18-May-2006 at 17:39
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  Quote akritas Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 19-May-2006 at 05:07

I want also to add some thinks as about the ALPHABET

As is known the Greeks adopted many letters from the Phoenicians. The major difreent between Phoenician and the Greek is that the first is Consonantal Alphabetic when the second is a C&V Alphabetic.

Phoenician alphabet has no vowels.  Both scripts belong in Proto- Sinaitic family tree.From the shape of the letters, it is clear that the Greeks adopted the alphabet the Phoenician script, mostly like during the late 9th BC.

In fact, Greek historian Herotodus (5th BC) called the Greek letters "phoinikeia grammata" (foinikia grammata), which means Phoenician letters.  When the Greeks adopted the alphabet, they found letters representing sounds not found in Greek. Instead of throwing them away, they modified the extraneous letters to represent vowels. For example, the Phoenician letter 'aleph (which stood for a glottal stop) became the Greek letter alpha (which stands for [a] sound).
There were many variants of the early Greek alphabet, each suited to a local dialect. Eventually the Ionian alphabet was adopted in all Greek-speaking states, but before that happened, the Euboeanvariant was carried to the Italic peninsula and adopted by Etruscan and eventually the Romans.

Early Greek was written right-to-left, just like Phoenician. However, eventually its direction changed to boustrophedon (which means "oxturning"), where the direction of writing changes every line. For instance, you start on the right of the tablet and writes leftward, and when you reach the leftmost end, you reverse your direction and starting writing toward the right. Even more confusing is that the orientation of the letter themselves is dependent on the direction of writing as well. In the above chart, the letters are drawn as if they were being written from left-to-right. If I were to write right-to-left, I would horizontally flip the letters (like in a mirror).
Boustrophedon was an intermediate stage, and by the 5th century BCE, left-to right was the de-facto direction of writing.

The Greek alphabet was also the basis for Glagolitic, Cyrillic, and Coptic scripts among others.

Strangely, the ancient Greeks tried writing once before. Between 1500 and 1200 BC, the Mycenaeans, an early tribe of Greeks, has adapted the Minoan syllabary as Linear B to write an early form of Greek.

However, the syllabary was not well suited to write Greek, and leaves many modern scholars scratching their heads trying to figure out the exact pronunciation of Mycenaean words. The alphabet, on the other hand, allowed more precise record of the sounds in the language
More informations as about the scripts into:
http://www.ontopia.net/i18n/scripts.jsp
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  Quote dorian Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 19-May-2006 at 10:48

The ancient Greeks did something unique by forming a marvelous alphabet from the initial phoenician one, for a so demanding language like the greek. 

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  Quote akritas Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 02-Jun-2006 at 12:05

This the most ancient Greek inscription.Is call Olympia Stone. Found in the Olympia and estimated from 17th cent B.C.  , the script is Linear B.

There  are three words but only one we can sure what is the meaning. Is the name of Haropos.
Haropos mean this that " has happy appearance"
 
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