Author: Nick Nicholas

Website:
http://www.opoudjis.net
About this author:
Data analyst, Greek linguist

Ancient Greek: why is there no neuter first declension nouns?

By: | Post date: 2017-03-12 | Comments: No Comments
Posted in categories: Ancient Greek, Linguistics

The original Indo-European declensions were thematic (corresponding to the Greek second declension) and athematic (corresponding to the Greek third declension). The first declension was a late innovation in Proto-Indo-European, involving a suffixed –e[math]h_2[/math] > -ā. It postdates the split of Hittite. The masculine first declension nouns were an even later innovation, and they were specific […]

Why are miaphysite/ old Oriental churches called Orthodox when they are not Orthodox and not related to (Eastern) Orthodoxy?

By: | Post date: 2017-03-12 | Comments: No Comments
Posted in categories: Culture, History, Mediaeval Greek

Well, OP, at least you’re not calling them Monophysites. 🙂 The Greek Wikipedia, and as far as I can tell the Greek Orthodox Church, refers to Oriental Orthodoxy as Pre-Chalcedonian Orthodoxy (Προχαλκηδόνιες Εκκλησίες – Βικιπαίδεια). Of course, a church who thought Chalcedon got it wrong is not going to call itself that. Orthodoxy – Wikipedia […]

On the YouTube channel “Χριστιανισμός”, which Modern Greek Bible version do they read from? Gallipoli? Seraphim?

By: | Post date: 2017-03-10 | Comments: No Comments
Posted in categories: Literature, Modern Greek

OP, you know about the first translation of the New Testament into Modern Greek by Maximus of Gallipoli, in 1638! That is awesome! And it would be awesome if that was the version that the channel used in the video: But no. The text is Neophytos Vamvas’ translation, and you can read along here: N. […]

Which languages have changed the most drastically in the last 1000 years?

By: | Post date: 2017-03-10 | Comments: No Comments
Posted in categories: Linguistics, Other Languages

When Bergsland and Vogt (1962) debunked the assumption in Glottochronology that core vocabulary is lost at a constant rate among languages [Bergsland, Knut; & Vogt, Hans. (1962). On the validity of glottochronology. Current Anthropology, 3, 115–153], the lexically conservative language they brought up was Icelandic. The lexically innovative language they brought up was Inuit, which […]

eudaimonistic

By: | Post date: 2017-03-10 | Comments: No Comments
Posted in categories: English, Linguistics

Michael Masiello’s answer to Which would be better for humanity in the long run, everyone being a Catholic Christian or everyone being an atheist? I would argue that what would be better for humanity in the long run has something to do with the cultivation of eudaimonistic virtues — ethical and civic values that aim […]

How far did the influence of Ancient Greek spread?

By: | Post date: 2017-03-09 | Comments: No Comments
Posted in categories: Ancient Greek, Linguistics

OK, let’s dispense with hora quickly. Not to belabour it, but yes, coincidence. Probabilities add up pretty quickly in real life, in a way that clashes with our seeking of patterns: See Birthday problem – Wikipedia. If you put 23 randoms in the same room, there is a 50% probability that two of them will […]

If “gnothi seauton” is “know thyself”, what would “love thyself” be in ancient Greek?

By: | Post date: 2017-03-09 | Comments: No Comments
Posted in categories: Ancient Greek, Linguistics

OK: ἀγάπα σεαυτόν agápa seautón. That’s the imperative. Konstantinos Konstantinides’ ἀγαπᾶν σεαυτόν agapân seautón is the infinitive “to love yourself”. The quote from St Matthew in Evangelos Lolos uses the future indicative agapēseis: “you shall love your neighbour like yourself.” Chad Turner went with the middle voice imperative of philéō: φιλέου “be loved [by thyself]”. […]

Are there languages which refer to the President of the USA as “ruler of the planet”?

By: | Post date: 2017-03-08 | Comments: No Comments
Posted in categories: Linguistics, Modern Greek

As OP hinted, Greek is one. English is not one. The difference between the two is, I believe, instructive. Greek planitarkhis πλανητάρχης means “planet ruler” (or “planet leader”); the Classicising form of it in English would be planetarch. The term was coined in Greek in the early 1990s, when the fall of the Soviet Union […]

What are some languages/dialects whose speakers call male bus drivers “master”?

By: | Post date: 2017-03-07 | Comments: No Comments
Posted in categories: Linguistics, Modern Greek, Other Languages

Russian: Addressing taxi/bus driver by “шеф”/”командир” – where does it come from? A taxi, and particularly a bus driver, is the “chief” or “commander” of a small mobile unit with a lot of “horsepower.” Such a driver is also responsible for the safety of several passengers. At least in New York City, this person is […]

Why are the Latin and Greek alphabets the only ones with capital/minuscule letters?

By: | Post date: 2017-03-07 | Comments: 2 Comments
Posted in categories: Ancient Greek, English, Mediaeval Greek, Modern Greek, Writing Systems

There are a few others, but they are mostly neighbours of Greek and Latin, or else motivated by them. Letter case – Wikipedia Writing systems using two separate cases are bicameral scripts. Languages that use the Latin, Cyrillic, Greek, Coptic, Armenian, Adlam, Varang Kshiti, Cherokee, and Osage scripts use letter cases in their written form […]

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