Ancient Greek (language)

Ancient Greek refers to the language spoken by the peoples of Greece and its colonies from the fourteenth century BCE to the sixth century CE. During the language’s long history, it passed through four main forms: Mycenaean, Archaic, Classical, and Hellenistic. This last form, also called koine (or "common") Greek, is the direct ancestor of the Modern Greek language, spoken in the early twenty-first century by over thirteen million people in Greece, Cyprus, Great Britain, the United States, and elsewhere. Over the course of its development, the Ancient Greek language was established as the chief means by which Greek culture and knowledge rose to prominence in the history of Western civilization. Highly important literary, artistic, historical, philosophical, and scientific ideas originated and were communicated in Ancient Greek; it was central to the formation of numerous Western institutions and patterns of thought, and has continued to compel great attention.

Brief History

Ancient Greek is a member of the Indo-European language family, and although it was a single recognizable language wherever used, it was spoken and written in a number of dialects, depending on time and place. The earliest version of the language is known as Mycenean Greek, and evidence of it exists in clay tablet inscriptions found at Knossos and other archaeological sites on the island of Crete. These examples date back to the fourteenth century BCE and were written in a script known as Linear B, not authenticated as the oldest version of Ancient Greek until the mid-twentieth century. This early form of the language evolved into Archaic Greek (sometimes referred to as Pre-Classical Greek), in use from c. eleventh century to c. eighth century BCE. This phase was significant for the appearance of key works in the Western literary tradition, notably Homer (with the Iliad and Odyssey), Hesiod, and a number of lyric poems. Archaic Greek was followed by the period of Classical Greek, widespread between the c. eighth and c. fourth centuries BCE. It was during this era that many of the foundations of Western civilization and culture were first established, and it was in the Classical Greek language that these landmark works and discoveries were originated, preserved, and transmitted.

It was, therefore, the language in which many basic tenets of philosophy, history, science, mathematics, and politics—including early forms of democracy, itself a Greek word in origin—were for the first time set out in communicable ways, which have evolved and endured into the modern world. In the principal regional dialects of Attic, Doric, Ionic, and Aeolic, the language was the method by which Greek culture attained its highest and best-known achievements. In its fourth version, Hellenistic Greek (c. fourth century BCE to c. sixth century CE), the language was disseminated even further, partly via economic expansion and trade, and partly by the colonial campaigns of Alexander the Great (356–323 CE). Its broad usage meant that it was known as common Greek. In written form, this was the language of the New Testament, in which the Gospels and writings of the apostle Paul were originally written.

Impact

Many of the cornerstones of Western culture are of Greek origin, and Ancient Greek, in its historical phases and geographical dialects, ranged widely across multiple disciplines, creative arts, and areas of study. Epic and lyric poetry rose to prominence in the Archaic period and flourished in the Classical era, which also saw the emergence of drama as a cultural and political entity (in the tragedies of Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides, and the comedies of Aristophanes). Equally, in historiography (Herodotus, Thucydides), philosophy and politics (Socrates, Plato, Aristotle), mathematics and science (Euclid, Archimedes), and many other fields of discovery, it was Ancient Greek that enabled these ground-breaking achievements to be conceived and transmitted.

Ancient Greek has exerted a vast influence on written culture in the Western world, and by extension the configuration and many of the core assumptions of that world. The prizing of logic, reason, and dialectic are among those assumptions; and, because Greek was the language in which the New Testament was composed, it has had an incalculable role in the history of Christian thought. The cultural predominance of the language came about because it was an exceptionally efficient mode of communication. It was influential in its use of alphabetic script, a practice adopted thereafter by all other European cultures, and was supremely flexible, lending itself not only to clarity of expression, but also the conveying of complex emotions, nuances, and shades of meaning, equally adaptable to poetry and prose. Not only a means of communication, it was also a defining mark of identity. Only those whose native language was Greek were considered true Greeks, and its use is associated with early expressions of national identity and patriotism.

The renewed interest in Ancient Greek that occurred during the European Renaissance had a considerable impact on the vocabulary of European languages from the fifteenth century onward, when not only ideas and concepts, but the terms used to express them, were imported from the Greek texts then being studied. English was a particularly notable beneficiary of this lexical influence. As its importance became recognized, Greek (along with Latin) was associated with the formation of elites and was used as a badge of educational and cultural superiority. It was fixed as one half of the area of study traditionally known as "classics" in European school curricula from the sixteenth to the early twentieth century. Although its elitist connotations faded during the late twentieth century, Ancient Greek has continued into the twenty-first as part of school and college courses in history, culture, and civilization. This impact extends far beyond the purely pedagogic. Its capacity for word formation, and hence the expression of new ideas, has fitted it for the expression of everyday technical and technological concepts in the modern world.

Officially, it may be classed as a dead language, but its legacy is very much alive. Scientists began working in the early 2020s to record the Romeyka language before it became extinct. Romeyka is a dialect that evolved directly from Hellenistic Greek rather than Medieval Greek, making it a unique language closer to ancient Greek than all other modern-day dialects. Linguists note the importance of this dialect in interpreting ancient writings as archeologists discover them.

Bibliography

Bakker, Egbert J., editor. A Companion to the Ancient Greek Language. Wiley-Blackwell, 2014.

Christidis, A. F., editor. A History of Ancient Greek: From the Beginnings to Late Antiquity. 2nd ed., Cambridge UP, 2007.

Colvin, Stephen. A Brief History of Ancient Greek. Wiley-Blackwell, 2013.

Giannakis, Georgios, editor. Encyclopedia of Ancient Greek Language and Linguistics. Brill, 2014. 3 vols.

Giannakis, Georgios, et al. Synchrony and Diachrony of Ancient Greek: Language, Linguistics and Philology. Walter de Gruyter, 2021.

Green, Tamara M. The Greek and Latin Roots of English. 6th ed., Rowman & Littlefield, 2020.

Horrocks, Geoffrey. Greek: A History of the Language and its Speakers. 2nd ed., Wiley-Blackwell, 2014.

"Last Chance to Record Archaic Greek Language ‘Heading for Extinction.'" University of Cambridge, 4 Apr. 2024, www.cam.ac.uk/research/news/last-chance-to-record-archaic-greek-language-heading-for-extinction. Accessed 25 Nov. 2024.

Moleas, Wendy. The Development of the Greek Language. Bloomsbury Academic, 2004.

Ostwald, Martin. Language and History in Ancient Greek Culture. U of Pennsylvania P, 2009.

Palmer, Darryl. Intermediate Ancient Greek Language. ANU Press, 2021.

Palmer, Leonard R. The Greek Language. U of Oklahoma P, 1996.