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Modern vs. classical Greek | ||
Tags: Dead Languages | Greek | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| JW Hexaglot Senior Member United States youtube.com/user/egw Joined 6121 days ago 1802 posts - 2011 votes  22 sounds Speaks: English*, German, Spanish, Ancient Greek, French, Biblical Hebrew Studies: Luxembourgish, Dutch, Greek, Italian | Message 17 of 65 02 September 2009 at 8:48pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
Yes, precisely. Having studied it extensively in German (although I realize I still make mistakes with it) made learning it in Greek a breeze. Conversely, learning it in Greek actually reinforced my understanding and appreciation of it in German. Previously, I just considered it a necessary evil in German but relearning it from scratch in Greek heightened my awareness and reminded me of how flexing the word order for emphasis is pretty nifty—ah, the benefits of language cross training :) Edited by JW on 02 September 2009 at 8:49pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
 Fasulye Heptaglot Winner TAC 2012 Moderator Germany fasulyespolyglotblog Joined 5846 days ago 5460 posts - 6006 votes 1 sounds Speaks: German*, DutchC1, EnglishB2, French, Italian, Spanish, Esperanto Studies: Latin, Danish, Norwegian, Turkish Personal Language Map | Message 18 of 65 02 September 2009 at 8:54pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
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Yes, I know that it can be very useful transferring a certain structure of grammar from one language to another. For Germans it's much easier to deal with cases anyway.
Fasulye 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| drfeelgood17 Bilingual Hexaglot Groupie United Kingdom Joined 6448 days ago 98 posts - 117 votes Speaks: English*, Tagalog*, French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Japanese, Latin, Arabic (Written) | Message 19 of 65 02 September 2009 at 9:19pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
Except that Modern Greek has evolved rather less drastically from Ancient Greek than the Romance languages in relation to Latin. For example, Modern Greek has preserved some of the case endings and many words are still easily recognisable from their classical origins. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| Lingua Decaglot Senior Member United States Joined 5575 days ago 186 posts - 319 votes Speaks: English*, German, Italian, Spanish, Swedish, Danish, French, Norwegian, Portuguese, Dutch | Message 20 of 65 02 September 2009 at 9:36pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
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I think you could compare the difference between Modern Greek and Ancient Greek to that between Modern English and Middle English (Chaucer).
As for pronunciation, since I had already learned Modern Greek to tourist level, I thought it would be easier to retain that pronunciation for Ancient Greek. However it turned out that some important distinctions were lost, so I changed over to reading with the Ancient Greek pronunciation. On a side note, I learned Ancient Greek before learning Latin, and I found Latin more difficult. This was mainly because I found that the definite article in Ancient Greek helped a lot in understanding what was what. Edited by Lingua on 02 September 2009 at 9:37pm 3 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| JW Hexaglot Senior Member United States youtube.com/user/egw Joined 6121 days ago 1802 posts - 2011 votes 22 sounds Speaks: English*, German, Spanish, Ancient Greek, French, Biblical Hebrew Studies: Luxembourgish, Dutch, Greek, Italian | Message 21 of 65 02 September 2009 at 10:01pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
Yes, that is very apparent. I became interested so I started studying Modern Greek and I was struck by how easy it is to identify the meanings of words based even on my basic level of Koine Greek. On the other hand, I have a much more advanced knowledge of Romance languages and, while I can still triangulate the meaning of Latin to some extent (never having studied it formally), it seems much further away, i.e., Ancient/Modern Greek seem like Father/Son whereas Romance Languages/Latin seem like second cousins twice removed…
Good analogy. However, to me it seems even a bit closer. Not as close as King James Bible to Modern English but not quite as distant as Chaucer….
Meaning Erasmian pronunciation? Edited by JW on 02 September 2009 at 10:03pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| Lingua Decaglot Senior Member United States Joined 5575 days ago 186 posts - 319 votes Speaks: English*, German, Italian, Spanish, Swedish, Danish, French, Norwegian, Portuguese, Dutch | Message 22 of 65 02 September 2009 at 11:54pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
Yes, that's probably a good analogy.
Maybe. It was the pronunciation described in READING GREEK published by Cambridge. Edited by Lingua on 02 September 2009 at 11:56pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| NikolGr Newbie Greece myspace.com/hnikoleiRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5573 days ago 19 posts - 23 votes Studies: English* | Message 23 of 65 05 September 2009 at 1:24am | IP Logged | |||||||||||
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JW,(if i understood correct your question)when we were having an Ancient Greek lesson,the book was written in Modern Greek and the essays we had to study were written in Ancient Greek and you had to translate them according to your knowledge from grammar/vocabulary..lots of words from the vocabulary are similar to the Modern ones and so it was easy to translate..but the idioms are very different..and also the way to you put the verb etc in each sentence(don't know that in English in one word :P)
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| JW Hexaglot Senior Member United States youtube.com/user/egw Joined 6121 days ago 1802 posts - 2011 votes 22 sounds Speaks: English*, German, Spanish, Ancient Greek, French, Biblical Hebrew Studies: Luxembourgish, Dutch, Greek, Italian | Message 24 of 65 26 September 2009 at 6:04pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
I've been interested in this topic lately, enough so that I actually started studying Modern Greek (in addition to putting in a lot of time on my Koine studies). I am really shocked at how close Koine is to Modern Greek. Here is a comparison that really shows how very much closer Koine Greek is to Modern Greek than Romance Languages (in this case Italian) to Latin. Note: I used John 3:16, a Bible verse, since that was readily available in all four languages: Modern Greek: Διοτι τοσον ηγαπησεν ο Θεος τον κοσμον, ωστε εδωκε τον Υιον αυτου τον μονογενη, δια να μη απολεσθη πας ο πιστευων εις αυτον, αλλα να εχη ζωην αιωνιον Koine Greek: ουτως γαρ ηγαπησεν ο θεος τον κοσμον ωστε τον υιον τον μονογενη εδωκεν ινα πας ο πιστευων εις αυτον μη αποληται αλλ εχη ζωην αιωνιον Italian: Poiché Dio ha tanto amato il mondo, che ha dato il suo unigenito Figlio, affinché chiunque crede in lui non perisca, ma abbia vita eterna Latin: Sic enim dilexit Deus mundum ut Filium suum unigenitum daret ut omnis qui credit in eum non pereat sed habeat vitam aeternam The Koine Greek verse was written in the 1st century A.D. while the Latin verse is from the 5th century Vulgate translation, thus the Latin is even closer in time to the Italian than the Koine Greek is to the Modern Greek, but much further away in form. I wonder if this distinction is due to the fact that the Eastern (Greek speaking) Roman Empire (Byzantium) continued until the 15th century while the Western (Latin speaking) Roman Empire fell in the 5th century? 3 persons have voted this message useful |
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