Author: Nick Nicholas

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

What word in ancient Greek would be used to describe scientific discoveries like when the laws of physics were first worked out?

By: | Post date: 2016-12-18 | Comments: No Comments
Posted in categories: Ancient Greek, Linguistics

Ancient Greek for scientific discovery, eh? Well, don’t go to Google Translate, man. That’s Modern Greek. Start here instead: English-Greek Dictionary “Discovery” gives us heuresis, aneuresis; mēnysis (disclosure), heurēma and exeurēma (invention, thing discovered). Mēnysis is “messaging”, so it’s not what you’re after. The others are all derived from the verb heuriskō “I find” (as […]

What is the ancient Greek word for “love for food”?

By: | Post date: 2016-12-18 | Comments: No Comments
Posted in categories: Ancient Greek, Linguistics

Philositos “fond of food, fond of eating” occurs in Plato’s Republic 475c. (It’s ambiguous with “fond of wheat”, which is how it is used in Xenophon.) The related noun philositia “fondness of food” turns up at least in Gregory of Nazianzen. Answered 2016-12-18 [Originally posted on http://quora.com/What-is-the-ancient-Greek-word-for-love-for-food/answer/Nick-Nicholas-5]

If somebody with no Arpitan heritage wanted to learn the Arpitan language, which dialect of Arpitan would you recommend that they learn?

By: | Post date: 2016-12-18 | Comments: No Comments
Posted in categories: Linguistics, Other Languages

All other things being equal, I’d be heading for a dialect that has had significant literary production (so you can find things to read in Arpitan), and a dialect that still survives to at least some extent (so you can at least theoretically find someone to talk to in it). I’m biased, as my bio […]

If I learned modern Greek, would I be able to read the New Testament in its original language?

By: | Post date: 2016-12-18 | Comments: No Comments
Posted in categories: Linguistics, Mediaeval Greek, Modern Greek

Like the others said: no. Certainly not the more educated writing, like Paul or Luke. You’d know what was going on, more or less, but you would be liable to be confused, by the syntax or by the false friends. I’ve just gone through an exercise in Nick Nicholas’ answer to How much of a […]

How did Greek language survive despite centuries of foreign domination?

By: | Post date: 2016-12-18 | Comments: No Comments
Posted in categories: Linguistics, Modern Greek

For all that Greek was spoken in areas of foreign domination, It was the prestige and government language in the East Roman Empire—Latin never had a serious chance of displacing it. It was the acknowledged and prestige language of the Rum millet under the Ottomans—Turkish never had a serious chance of displacing it, except in […]

Why are OSV order languages so rare?

By: | Post date: 2016-12-17 | Comments: No Comments
Posted in categories: General Language, Linguistics

Brian Collins says: Those are the type of questions only a few people like Bob Dixon are willing to touch with a 17ft pole. Only Dixon, may his soul be blackened (or indeed blacklisted)? Surely not. Surely we haven’t run out of functionalists in Australia! Here’s a functionalist take, though it will have some holes […]

What is the relationship between Greek nationalism and the Greek Orthodox Church?

By: | Post date: 2016-12-17 | Comments: No Comments
Posted in categories: History, Modern Greek

Before the Greek War of Independence: the Orthodox Church was hostile to nationalism. Nationalism was this newfangled, godless French thing that set the people against their god-appointed ruler. The Patriarchate was particularly outspoken against it, and described it as a heresy. That’s nationalism. Yes, you can say the Orthodox church helped preserve a notion of […]

How have English punctuation conventions changed over the centuries?

By: | Post date: 2016-12-17 | Comments: No Comments
Posted in categories: English, Writing Systems

David Crystal’s recent book Making a Point has a rundown of the changes and a very clear framework for discussing them. I’m not going to do it justice, especially because I don’t remember every bit of it. But: There has been a tussle in the history of English punctuation from the invention of printing on, […]

Why are Greek cities so ugly?

By: | Post date: 2016-12-16 | Comments: No Comments
Posted in categories: Culture, Modern Greek

As usual, there is a better answer than this answer. Vote #1 Yiannis Papadopoulos: Yiannis Papadopoulos’ answer to Why are Greek cities so ugly? Two factors that have to be added though: The deluge of refugees coming to Greece in 1924. Athens was a beautiful city in the 19th century, as you can tell if […]

Should I take that some Cypriot Greek speakers do call Pounds sterling as “λίρες εγγλέζικες” (English pounds) because the notes…?

By: | Post date: 2016-12-16 | Comments: No Comments
Posted in categories: Linguistics, Modern Greek

Cypriots refer to English pounds, for the simple reason that colloquial Greek refers to English rather than British exclusively. Note that your phrase uses the colloquial εγγλέζικη, rather than the formal αγγλική for “English”. The formation of the United Kingdom never made much of a popular impression on Greeks. In fact even in more formal […]

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