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Category: Modern Greek
What do Greeks think of Italians and Italy?
Half of Greece (the islands) was a colonial outpost for various Italian republics—mostly Venice and Genoa. But that was a very, very long time ago, and Greeks have forgotten that, for example, Cretan villagers welcomed the Ottomans as relief from Venetian feudalism. What was left behind was significant cultural transmission from Italy to Greece: a […]
What is a cool way to say “friends” or “group of friends” or “small circle” in other ways or languages?
Parea παρέα in Greek. Cool because it’s the only word in Greek with an Iberian origin. It comes from either Ladino parea or Catalan parella, cognate with Spanish pareja. The Catalan derivation is probably too good to be true: it refers to the Catalan Company, mercenaries who ran bits of Greece (including Athens) in the […]
Why do Greeks love Russia so much?
Greeks (OK, Byzantines) gave the Russians Orthodoxy, and feel a bond with them out of that. During Ottoman rule, the Russians saw themselves as the Third Rome—the successor state to Byzantium, which the Greeks felt was their lost empire. The Greeks in turn longed to be rescued by the Russians: Ακόμη τούτην άνοιξη (ραγιάδες, ραγιάδες)τούτο […]
Is “κάπου και που” in Greek about time or about place?
I’ll start by saying that the expression (lit. “somewhere and where”) is unfamiliar to me. Which makes me curious when it became common. The related question, αραιά και που “sparsely and [some]where” refers to time: “occasionally, now and again”, rather than “in scattered locations, here and there”. The metaphorical use of spatial for temporal expressions […]
What is the etymology of name Mavronis (Μαυρώνης)?
It’s an old surname: a scribe Niketas Mavronis is recorded in 1285: Σημειώματα-Κώδικες – View Simeioma The stem is pretty clearly μαύρος “black, swarthy”; the -vr- is something of a giveaway, and the name doesn’t particularly look Slavonic or Aromanian. (1285 is too early for Arvanite or Turkish.) The -ώνης could mean the surname is […]
What would have world lost (apart from some more password combinations) if it had not used capital letters?
Not a whole lot. Consider: Only very few scripts even have a case distinction: Roman, Greek, Cyrillic, Armenian. Georgian and Cherokee are picking up case now, but that’s not because they need to, that’s because they’re being culturally influenced from hegemonic scripts. Languages vary wildly in what they choose to capitalise. German capitalises nouns; most […]
Are there any Greek towns built along the Acheron river in Greece?
I don’t know the answer, but I do know how to read Greek Wikipedia: Αχέρων – Βικιπαίδεια The Acheron was considered a river of Hades in antiquity. Which makes sense, given that Epirus, where it is located, was nowheresville to the Ancient Greeks. This also exaggerated their sense of its importance: far from being the […]
What do the Turkish loanwords merak and meraklı mean in your language?
http://m.nisanyansozluk.com/?k=merak In Greek, μεράκι means: yearning love-sickness pride in one’s work (in the phrase με μεράκι “with merak”) A μερακλής on the other hand is a bon vivant, a connoisseur, someone who knows how to have a good time and who appreciates the finer things in life. And the verb μερακλώνομαι is to be in […]
Which of the Greek dialects sound harsh to a standard Greek speaker?
A most commendable question; and you’d think a Greek dialectologist would be ideally placed to answer this. You would be wrong. Precisely because I’m used to dialects, it’s hard for me to make aesthetic judgements on them. But let me attempt to at least posit why certain dialects might be considered harsh. 1. Cappadocian It’s […]
What role does belly dancing play in Greek culture?
I’ve read Dimitris M Papadakis’ response, and I’m quite happy to vehemently disagree with him. And of course… Many modern Greek citizens may, of course claim otherwise, but there ought to be a distinction between those who happen to be Greek citizens and those who have a Greek mind and adhere to a Greek, that […]