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Ancient Greek composition | ||
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| mattvdm Newbie United Kingdom Joined 5215 days ago 15 posts - 19 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French, Ancient Greek, Spanish, Russian | Message 1 of 8 31 January 2010 at 8:28pm | IP Logged | ||
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I've been studying Ancient Greek at school for several years, and - like everyone - the education has been almost entirely passive in that it is centred around the reading of Greek literature and void of any 'English to Greek' language exercises.
Now my question is - is it too wildly ambitious to want to be able to express original thought in Ancient Greek? The idea of writing (even if largely mimicking) prose or poetry in the language is quite exciting - if only for the challenge. What do other Graecists think? Edited by mattvdm on 31 January 2010 at 8:29pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
 Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6497 days ago 9078 posts - 16473 votes  Speaks: Danish*, French, English, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, Esperanto, Romanian, Catalan Studies: Afrikaans, Greek, Norwegian, Russian, Serbian, Icelandic, Latin, Irish, Lowland Scots, Indonesian, Polish, Croatian Personal Language Map | Message 2 of 8 31 January 2010 at 10:47pm | IP Logged | ||
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I can't write in Ancient Greek myself, but I do dabble in Modern Greek and in another classical language: Latin. And I definitely think you should try to write in each and every language you know. It will be a totally different experience to have one more active language rather than just the skills to read the old texts.
However you may run into the same problem as I had with Latin, namely that the things I want to write can't be written without introducing a number of new words. I found some sources for Latin on the internet and a couple of dictionaries with newer (or totally new) words, and then I could start writing for fun. I can't give you any similar sources for Classical Greek or Koine, but maybe there are others who have suggestions. Edited by Iversen on 31 January 2010 at 10:49pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| JW Hexaglot Senior Member United States youtube.com/user/egw Joined 5916 days ago 1802 posts - 2011 votes 22 sounds Speaks: English*, German, Spanish, Ancient Greek, French, Biblical Hebrew Studies: Luxembourgish, Dutch, Greek, Italian | Message 3 of 8 31 January 2010 at 11:16pm | IP Logged | ||
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Are you talking about Homeric, Classical, or Koine?
If Koine, I would be interested in participating in a such a thread. Like you, I have never produced original writing. I have concentrated on reading and proper pronunciation only. The vocabulary limitation that Iversen mentions is valid, however, I would suggest using Modern Greek vocabulary as needed. Edit: Actually, I think Koine would be much more appropriate for this exercise as it was the common language of the people and is the direct ancestor of Modern Greek. Edit 2: Actually, I will start the ball rolling: θελω γραφειν ελληνιστι Edited by JW on 31 January 2010 at 11:38pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Faraday Senior Member United States Joined 5912 days ago 129 posts - 256 votes Speaks: German* | Message 4 of 8 01 February 2010 at 2:57am | IP Logged | ||
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Greek composition was once a key part of classical studies, though its emphasis has unfortunately since dwindled. It's a great way to strenghten your command of the language. In the link below, you'll find some popular texts on Greek composition.
http://www.textkit.com/greek_grammar.php 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| mattvdm Newbie United Kingdom Joined 5215 days ago 15 posts - 19 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French, Ancient Greek, Spanish, Russian | Message 5 of 8 01 February 2010 at 7:34am | IP Logged | ||
I've currently only studied Homeric and Classical, but I was intending on pursuing this with Koine for exactly the reasons you said. Not only is there the fact that it was a living, spoken language - and direct link to Modern Greek, but also that there would be one source of writing in the Bible that could make everything less confusing. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Captain Haddock Diglot Senior Member Japan kanjicabinet.tumblr. Joined 6562 days ago 2282 posts - 2814 votes Speaks: English*, Japanese Studies: French, Korean, Ancient Greek | Message 6 of 8 01 February 2010 at 8:36am | IP Logged | ||
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I've heard that in some places, Catholic seminary students are initially banned from speaking their native language
and forced to converse with each other in ancient Greek in order rapidly build up their skills. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Gusutafu Senior Member Sweden Joined 5315 days ago 655 posts - 1039 votes Speaks: Swedish* | Message 7 of 8 01 February 2010 at 9:26am | IP Logged | ||
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There's always the book "Greek Prose Composition". It's very ambitious, and I think it's in the public domain now, it's probably included in some "Greek learning pack" or other.
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| simonov Senior Member Portugal Joined 5383 days ago 222 posts - 438 votes Speaks: English | Message 8 of 8 01 February 2010 at 12:18pm | IP Logged | ||
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Try this website. It's all about using classical Greek now. All sorts, but mainly current news items. Also provides a page with modern vocabulary.
Excellent site! Very interesting indeed, worth visiting. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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