Greek is spoken by 9,859,850 in Greece, 98.5% of the population (1986); 578,000 in Cyprus; 314,000 in Germany; 114,000 in Poland; 20,000 in Italy; 60,000 in Albania; 50,000 in Sweden; 4,000 in Turkey (1993); 4,700 in Armenia (1993); 106,677 in Australia; 60,000 in Egypt; 458,699 in USA (1970 census); 104,455 in Canada (1971 census); 100,000 in Georgia (1993); 47,000 in Kazakhstan; 1,800 in Paraguay 104,000 in Ukraine (1979); 105,000 in Russia (1979 census); 70,000 in South Africa (1993); 12,000 in Austria (1995); 2,000 in Malawi (1993); 1,600 in Djibouti (1993); 700 in Sierra Leone (1993); 400 in Congo (1993); 11,000 in Bulgaria; 200,000 in United Kingdom; 800 in Bahamas; 12,000,000 in all countries (1995 WA). Also in Corsica (France), Jordan, Romania, Tunisia, Zaοre.
GREEK, ANCIENT [GKO] Indo-European, Greek, Attic, Ionic, Doric Dialects.
KOINE GREEK. Koine Greek is the common language of all the people in the Kingtoms of the successor of Alexander the Great and the later appeared Romman Empire during the Hellenistic period. It is the language of the Septuaginst translation of the Old Teastment (the Translation of the Seventy, O'). It is the language of the New Teastment. It is the language of the first 300 - 600 years of the undivided Church. It is still used as the religious language by the Church of Greece (one of the sister Churches of the Eastern Orthodox Church).
PONTIC (PONTIC GREEK) [PNT] 200,000 in Greece (1993 Johnstone); 120,000 in western Georgia; 320,000 or more in all countries. Suburbs between Athens and Peiraeus Katerini. There may still be speakers on the Black Sea coast of Turkey. Also in Boston, Philadelphia, Canmton, Akron, USA; Toronto, Canada; and small communities in Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan. Indo-European, Greek, Attic. Brought to Greece in the 1920's and 1930's by immigrants from the Black Sea coast, which had been inhabited by Greeks since antiquity. Speakers of Standard Greek cannot understand Pontic, and Pontic speakers are reported to not understand or speak Standard Greek. Pontic clubs and centers exist in the Athens-Peiraeus suburbs. Young people may speak Standard Greek as their first language. Speakers in North America are reported to hold onto their language more zealously than those in Greece. Ethnic Greeks in Georgia called 'Rumka' speak Pontic Greek
Totay dialects: KATHAREVOUSA, DIMOTIKI, SARACATSAN. Katharevousa is an archaic literary dialect, Dimotiki is the spoken literary dialect and now the official dialect. The Saracatsan are nomadic shepherds of northern Greece. Greeks in Russian and Ukraine speak either Greek or Turkish and are called 'Urums'.
GREEK SIGN LANGUAGE [GSS] 42,600 or more users, including 12,600 deaf children and 30,000 active adult users (1986 Gallaudet Univ.). Deaf sign language. Roots in American and French sign languages and various indigenous sign languages, which came together in the 1950's.
The Greek Alphabet
The earliest Greek texts, such as the linear B tablets of Knossos, were written in syllabic scripts.
The Greek alphabet, from which we derive our own alphabet via the Etruscans and Romans, came into use in the 8th century B.C. being adapted from the Phoenician alphabet; since the Phoenician, a semitic language, had no vowels in its alphabet, the Greeks used consonants not needed for the representation of Greek for the six Greek vowels. A number of letters have disappeared from some of the early forms of the Greek alphabet, most notably wau or digamma which came between and . This is the reason that Greek numbering systems run , , , , , , etc - taking the place of the ancient digamma that `died' two thousand five hundred years ago! The earliest users of the alphabet wrote from left to right or right to left as the mood took them. The more indecisive used a curious system known as boustrophedon in which the text would run from left to right (or vice versa), reach the end of the line and double back to run right to left like the furrows of a plough! Boustrophedon is Greek for `turning of the ox'. These experiments were abandoned long ago in antiquity and Modern Greek, like Classical Greek, is written from left to right.
An early alphabetic inscription c. 650 B.C. - the top line reads from left to right, the second from right to left, and the bottom from left to right again
The Greek Numbers
Classical Greek used a numbering system based on letters. Nowadays the Arabic numerals, as used throughout the western world, are used in Greece. The ancient numbering system, as mentioned above, is still retained for numbering lists and is preferred over Roman numerals (e.g. i, ii, iii, iv etc) which are only very rarely used in Greek.
Accentuation of Greek Texts
Classical Greek did not have accents. The classical Greek Text did not have either accents or spacing betwen the words or sentences. The accents and breathings were a result of the radical transformation of the Greek language that occurred in the period 400 - 200 B.C., during the formation and introduction of KOINH. The Greeks of 5th century B.C. Athens did not need accents or breathings; they would have been brought up as children to speak Greek and knew when an initial vowel was aspirated or not and how to pronounce words correctly. The problem of correct pronuncation of Greek appears after the spread of the Greek language, mostly by Alexander the Great. During that period Greek was used by a much wider public, many not native speakers. It was to assist these that the accents and breathings were introduced (reputedly by Aristophanes of Byzantium in about 200 B.C.).A modern Greek text will have one accent and not breathing signs. To see a text with accents and breathings look a book of Classical writters of the writings of the Fathers and Mothers of the Church. Phonetically both are pronounced the same by a speaker of modern Greek.
References - Bibliography
Betts, Gavin and Alan Hernry: Teach yourself Ancient Greek a complete Course. NTC Publishing Group. Lincolnwood, USA. ISBN 0 340 42298 X.
Manoli Triantafillidi: Mikrh Neolinikh Grammatikh. OEDB. Athens, Greece.
The standard English work on Modern Greek is The Modern Greek Language by P. Mackridge (Oxford University Press 1985); it is a detailed and scholarly account and not intended for the beginner.
Should you wish to acquire a basic knowledge of Modern Greek there are a number of introductory courses including Colloquial Greek by N. Watts (Routledge 1994) for which there is an accompanying CD.
An excellent and detailed survey of Greek literature since 1821 is to be found in An Introduction to Modern Greek Literature by R. Beaton (Oxford University Press 1994).
Greater detail on the development of Modern Greek icluding changes in grammar and vocabulary appears in The Development of the Greek Language by W. Moleas (Bristol Classical Press 1989).
If katharevousa is of special interest an article by P. Mackridge appears in Background to Contemporary Greece Vol I edited by M. Sarafis and M. Eve (Merlin Press - London 1990).
Books on Classical Greek are, as to be expected, far more numerous covering virtually every aspect of the language and its literature; most of the more important ancient Greek texts are available in paperback translation. Should you wish to acquire a reading knowledge it may be worth examining Reading Greek by the Joint Association of Classical Teachers (Cambridge University Press 1978) which comprises a series of extracts from classical texts of progressive difficulty together with an accompanying volume dealing with the grammar and vocabulary encountered in the texts.
More to come soon...