Hellenistic Greek for the Modern World
Posted: September 13th, 2015, 4:20 am
Choosing and adapting Modern Greek vocabulary can be handled by following some fairly straightforward guidelines, but it is not an easy or quick thing to deal with.Chris Servanti wrote:(My ultimate goal is to be able to speak and write [K]oine fluently, of course combined with the necessary [M]odern [G]reek vocabulary wedded with [K]oine grammar)
Take "glasspane", "pane of glass" for an example. There are two words for "pane of glass" in Modern Greek. They are υαλοπίνακα and τζάμι. The etymological section of the dictionary gives the following:
τζάμι wrote:τζάμι το [dzámi] ... [τουρκ. cam -ι]
The first is of Turkish origin and the second a word-formation based on English. The processes of enrichment and adaption that we see in those two words of different origins are a starting point for creating a plausible "Koine" word.υαλοπίνακας wrote:υαλοπίνακας ο [ialopínakas] ... [λόγ. υαλο- + πίναξ > πίνακας μτφρδ. αγγλ. glass pane]
For the spelling of the word υαλοπίνακας, πίνακας is the Modern Greek conjugational pattern for what was πίναξ in the earlier periods. Looking in the dictionary for the element υαλο-, gives the etymology as ὑαλο-. Between the variants in spelling, ὕαλος and ὕελος, what is one to do? LSJ remarks that ὕαλος is Attic, while ὕελος is Hellenic. Knowing that the Modern Greek literary word for "window pane" is υαλοπίνακας, and noting that the adjective in the New Testament is ὑάλινος "made of glass", I would prefer to use and memorise ὕαλος. (I take it as a "You say tomato, I say tomato." situation rather than a serious problem.)
What is the character / idiom of the language at the time you are trying to sound like? Imagine for a moment German ans English - German stringing together words to form others and English using "of" or other words in grammar to put things together. Is the Koine period of the language like one or the other? How can we find out? Let's do a couple of searches.
The first search, for the range of meaning of πίναξ. Easy enough...
Glass is specifically mentioned a little further down in the entry "πίνακες ὑέλινοι", in reference to a piece of glass being used horizontally. [As discussed above, however, I would give preference to the form ὑάλινος over ὑέλινος, because the Koine that we are aiming to become conversant with is the Attic Koine, (from which most Modern Greek dialects were derived, which in turn formed the basis of the standard Modern Greek language) and the New Testament uses ὑάλινος.]LSJ πίναξ wrote:board, plank, ... hence of things made of flat wood, metal,
The second search is to see what meaning the addition of an element to the front of -πίναξ would have? ἀρτοπίναξ is presumably a platter for carrying bread, rather than a platter made of bread. None of them use the prefixed element to mean the material from which the πίναξ was made. Searching the other way yields a seemingly promising looking ὑαλουργεῖον as "glass-house", but we know from experience that that is not the place for growing vegetables and flowers in the cooler months, but rather the (work)shop for ὑαλουργός "glass-worker". So then, as far as the evidence we've looked at from LSJ informs us, we could postulate that ὑαλοπίναξ would mean a platter for carrying glass, if read by one of the ancients, and that they might refer to "the pane of glass" as (ὁ) πίναξ ὑάλινος. Combinations of words by suffixing seems to have been more popular in the sightly later Byzantine period.
Another question: How about if we live in a house like my my late grandmothers with wooden frames and small pieces of glass besides the larger ones that we are used to in modern aluminium-framed windows? A wider search based in the genitive of πίναξ turns up the diminutive of πίναξ as πινάκιον. In full, that could be (τὸ) πινάκιον ὑάλινον "the little pane of glass".
Another resource that Modern Greek provides is possible collocations that our πίναξ ὑάλινος could be used with in speaking or writing. The obvious question is whether a πίναξ ὑάλινος is primarily a πίναξ or primarily ὕαλος? Seeing as the θυρίς "window" consists of the πίναξ ὑάλινος just sitting there in the τὸ πλαίσιον (μεταλλικὸν ἢ ξύλινον) θυρίδος (a description) (Mod. technical word - ὑαλοστάσιον) "window frame" with is fitted ἐναρμόζειν into the θυρίς "opening in the wall", "window" as part of the process of θυριδοῦν, we can fairly well assume that for most purposes the πίναξ ὑάλινος can be thought of as ὕαλος. The adjectival collocations used in the Revelation are καθαρός "pure" (not dirty - surface (ἐπιφάνεια) or inside (σῶμα, or more philosophically οὐσία / ὕλη) ), and διαυγής "transparent" (the light goes through) (Revelation 21:18,21). In addition to that, the dictionary entry for the Modern Greek word τζάμι gives a number of other collocations that may be worth exploring.
It seems from the pairing (if that is what is intended) that θολός is a temporary state for ὕαλος that can be changed to καθαρός. In LSJ θολός it is simply said to be equal to θολερός ( a word, which I am more familiar with,mentioned as being used of οὖρα "urine", ἀήρ "air" αἷμα "blood", χυμοί "humours", νεφέλαι "clouds", χρώς "skin". In Modern Greek, the word θολερός has the much narrower / specialised meaning of "που δεν είναι τελείως διαυγής" "which is not entirely transparent / clear (not letting all the light through)", which seems a little divorced from its etymological connection with θολός as substantive "mud". So... which one to use? Another consideration to take into account is βρωμικός (cf. "eat up your grub" and "grubby (hands, etc.)"), which in the Modern tongue has a wide range of uses for "dirty", whereas, θολός is used very specificly sense here for glass that has had its opacity affected by having dirt on the surface. There is case for learning and using both words, one with the meaning that the glass is dirty, and the other that the light has trouble getting through it.τζάμι wrote:τζάμι το [dzámi]
Tζάμια θολά / καθαρά. Kαθαρίζω / πλένω / κάνω τα τζάμια.
Dirty window panes, clean window panes. Clean / wash / make the window panes. (My rendering).
As for the other collocations; I assume that there is no problem with καθαρίζειν "to clean", in its literal sense (like . Modern Greek πλένω is what we would say as πλύνω "wash". Modern Greek κάνω is used like we use ποιεῖν.