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Month: January 2016
Is there anywhere on the Internet a scheme of the Greek names and of the elements of which they are formed?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Germanic_name Lexicon of Greek Personal Names, University of Oxford , the online dictionary of all attested Ancient Greek names (which are overwhelmingly from inscriptions) has some materials on their publications list and announcements list, but nothing as methodical as what you have in the Wikipedia page you gave. The most awesome Dr. W. PAPE’s Wörterbuch […]
What are the pros and cons of the Erasmian pronunciation?
For this answer, bear in mind that there are three current pronunciations of Ancient Greek: Erasmus’ reconstruction of Ancient Greek phonology, as modified in practice for teaching Greek in Western schools: Pronunciation of Ancient Greek in teaching The scholarly reconstruction of Ancient Greek phonology: Ancient Greek phonology Modern Greek pronunciation applied to Ancient Greek (“Reuchlinian” […]
What is the equivalent of Do Re Mi for other languages/cultures?
In the 1832 revision of Byzantine music, Chrysanthus of Prusa came up with a Greek equivalent of solfège, using the same derivation from acrostics of a hymn. So: Pa Vou Ga Di Ke Zo Ni. To my surprise, there’s no decent online source on this (https://thmodocumentation.files…. p. 6 has the info in Greek). EDIT: I […]
What is the name for the ‘condition’ that sometimes occurs when people wake from a coma and can speak a foreign language without any prior study?
There is indeed Foreign accent syndrome . And the simplest explanation is the easiest: people wake up with a kind of speech disorder, which listeners match to whatever accents they are familiar with. It does not mean they are speaking a different languages, or that they have been exposed to another accent natively. Pareidolia, the […]
What is the best Greek New Testament?
The Textus Receptus is the traditional Orthodox Greek bible, as passed down from Byzantine copyist through Byzantine copyist (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/By… ), into one particular manuscript that Erasmus got hold of, and missing one page that Erasmus translated from the Vulgate. It is distinguished for being the first widely disseminated Greek text in the age of printing. […]
What does the Romanian language sound like to a foreigner?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NUnFDbRClBI My prejudice going in, as someone exposed through Greek linguistics to written Aromanian language (which I know is not quite the same thing): Too many diphthongs Central vowels? How odd It’s Romance, it’s just got some odd sound changes My prejudice on hearing this: Too many diphthongs. I can’t hear the Romance at all. […]
How did Greece manage to hold on to all of their islands throughout all of the wars?
Good answers from my fellow respondents. So: For a long time, there was no Greece, so there was noone to do the holding on. For a long time after that, Greece didn’t have most of the islands: it had to get hold of them: The Cyclades and Euboea, and the Saronic Gulf islands, were part […]
How can I translate “talent” into Ancient Greek?
Well… Talent as is in the ancient coin is τάλαντον, as Haggen Kennedy said. Talent as in being talented, not so much. The googles tell me that the modern sense is Mediaeval Latin, with an allusion to a parable in the Bible: Online Etymology Dictionary . As far as I know, that metaphorical extension did […]
What alphabets are not used in mathematics and why?
Not a mathematician, but: Mathematics as practiced in the West is a European invention, and it calls for its symbols on European patrimony. That means: Roman (italics, to differentiate from text) Including Fraktur if you want to spice things up And avoiding diacritics, not because they aren’t old (disagree with Martin Ekman’s answer to What […]
Was Latin spoken in the Byzantine empire, even though the official language was Greek? And did Byzantines study Latin texts?
What Steve Theodore’s answer to Was Latin spoken in the Byzantine empire, even though the official language was Greek? And did Byzantines study Latin texts? said, and what Steve Theodore’s answer to Were the medieval Byzantines familiar with the famous figures of Roman antiquity, like Cato the Elder, Scipio Africanus, or Cincinnatus? said. In particular, […]