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Archive:
Day: October 21, 2016
Where in the Balkan sprachbund did the invariable future tense marker originate?
A capital question. You were right, Zeibura, in the discussion that prompted this: the Balkans is a big mess of not continuously attested languages and dialects; and the only hints of whether a feature originated in one place rather than another is whether the feature is also present in Koine Greek or Old Church Slavonic—both […]
What is the origin of the surname Piliafas?
Interesting. Pilafás is a real Greek surname. Googling, the most famous instance of a Pilafas is some businessman’s son cum DJ who’s married the actress Katerina Papoutsaki. Παναγιώτης Πιλαφάς βιογραφικό – iShow.gr Whatevs. Pilafas means, straightforwardly, “Pilaf guy”. and the -as suffix weighs towards “Pilaf maker”. Pilaf, rice in broth, is an exceedingly popular dish […]
Is Facebook called a different nickname in your country?
The literal calque Fatsovivlio has shown up in Greek, but only in jocular use. (47k hits on Google.) It’s all the more jocular, because it uses the Italian loanword fatsa < faccia, rather than the Greek prosopo, for face. Loanwords are usually pejorative; Fatsovivlio sounds more like “ugly mug book”. SLANG.gr went one better, using […]