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Category: Ancient Greek
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 […]
Did the ancient Greeks use a different language for a special purpose like it was the case with Latin in Europe and Sanskrit in India?
Did the Ancient Greeks have a different *language* for sacred purposes? No, Ancient Greek was their language. But the Ancient Greeks did use different dialects for different genres of literature, to an extent that has not been paralleled since. Epic dialect (a mix based on archaic Ionic) for epic poetry, and allusions to it, is […]
Is there any language that uses the Greek Alphabet other than Greek?
Currently, no. Historically, Greek has been used routinely to write other languages, including the Bactrian language (hence Sho (letter) ), Karamanli Turkish, and Albanian. Answered 2016-01-13 [Originally posted on http://quora.com/Is-there-any-language-that-uses-the-Greek-Alphabet-other-than-Greek/answer/Nick-Nicholas-5]
What is the answer to a multiplication problem called? Who coined the term?
Product (mathematics) . The Greek for it is the participle γενόμενον, “what has become, what has come into existence”, which I would assume was calqued into Latin as “what is produced”. The LSJ dictionary lists the participle “what has become” for product as being used in Euclid ; but the verb “becomes” for “adds up […]
Where is Minoa today?
Um. Per Minoa, there are several sites that have been known as Minoa, mostly in the Aegean. But in the sense Minoa is used on Quora, as a shorthand for “site of the Minoan civilisation”, that would be Crete. In fact, since the Classical survival of non-Hellenic Eteocretan language was in easternmost Crete, where I […]
Why does the Old Testament (in the English versions) use Greek names instead of Hebrew names?
Well, this won’t sound pleasant, but: The normative version(s) of English, as with most European languages, are culturally influenced by Christianity more than other religions. (Jewish Englishes will in fact use Hebrew names, just as Yiddish does. But standard English unsurprisingly uses Christian forms.) Christian knowledge of the Hebrew Scriptures was mediated through the Septuagint, […]
In ancient Greece, in place of “Sire” or “Your Grace,” how were people of stature addressed? Is there a gender neutral term?
The relevant monograph is: Greek Forms of Address: From Herodotus to Lucian (Oxford Classical Monographs) (9780198150541): Eleanor Dickey. See review at Bryn Mawr Classical Review 97.11.09 The male defaults were anax/basileu (king), despota (lord, master), and kyrie (ditto). If you were talking to a king in antiquity, I think you just called them “king”: the […]
What is Tutankhamun’s greek name?
King Tut is famous now, but his memory had been quite effectively erased by his successors. Manetho wrote a Greek history of Egypt listing pharaohs, whose names only kinda sorta line up with the names we find in Egyptian documents. The pharaoh he lists corresponding to King Tut is Rathotis. See the paper Manetho’s Eighteenth […]
How can I learn to individuate ancient Greek verbs?
No substitute for rote, I’m afraid. But there are patterns and regularities, and you’ll need to make them your friend: If anything looks like a preverb (prepositional prefix), strip it off. It’s usually a safe bet that it is in fact a preverb. The endings do have patterns (the final vowels/consonants, the thematic vowels, the […]
What does the Greek proverb “nothing done with intelligence is done without speech” emphasize? And how to interpret it culturally?
I don’t have the answer, but this will help narrow it down: This is not a proverb as such, but is a quotation from a speech by the orator Isocrates. Nicocles, section 9: οὐδὲν τῶν φρονίμως πραττομένων εὑρήσομεν ἀλόγως γιγνόμενον The emphasis out of context is not quite as obvious, because the same word logos […]