Talk:Ancient Greek/Archive 1

Archive 1

Roman alphabet

I noticed the Grammar section of this article has all the Greek transliterated into the Roman alphabet. I really think that the Greek alphabet should be used; any thoughts on this? I don't think I'd feel comfortable doing the transliteration, since Koine Greek is the type of Greek I'm used to.  –Benjamin  (talk)  03:22, 2 November 2005 (UTC)

Consonant system

The transition from aspirated plosives to fricatives occured during the time covered by Koine Greek. Therefore, the consonant system of Ancient Greek cannot be equated with that of Modern Greek. For a full discussion, see Talk:Ancient Greek pronunciation. Andreas 21:30, 10 November 2005 (UTC)

Caragounis and other linguists and classicists say that the fricatives theta, fi and hi were always fricatives since the time of the first Greek inscrptions. Caragounis has presented plenty of evidence to show that the fricatives were fricatives in both Greek and Latin when the Greeks colonised Italy in the 8th century BC therefore you cannot claim that the Erasmian pronouncation is either Classical or Ancient Greek pronunciation nor can you fix a date to it as 5th century. --Thrax 16:10, 11 November 2005 (UTC)

Thrax: Please do not start this whole discussion again. Your arguments have already been amply discussed in Talk:Ancient Greek pronunciation. Andreas 00:05, 12 November 2005 (UTC)

Ancient greek subordination rules and verbs meaning

I ask help to clean this part of the article , anyone who has grasp with some greek syntax is well accepted . Philx Philx 14:07, 14 November 2005 (UTC)

A section on subordination rules and aspect represents a bit of a challenge for a relatively short encyclopaedia article. Nevertheless, I suggest a treatment in three sub-sections:

• A general overview of greek tenses and moods where the tenses and moods are enumerated and a satisfactory definition of aspect is given.
• A treatment of the main uses of tenses and moods in principal clauses with examples. These examples will clarify what we mean by aspect.
• A treatment of the use of tense and mood in subordinate clauses where the main verb is in a
  • primary tense, or a
  • secondary tense (This is where all the funny stuff happen).

To do this properly will be quite a challenge...Yannos 21:50, 4 December 2005 (UTC)

hellenikos

I am puzzled about the word Ελληνικός. Is this supposed to be how Ancient Greeks were naming their language? This seems to be an adjective to me, and why masculine? Would it not be better to say ʽΕλληνική γλώττα? In any case, this is the name of the Greek language as a whole, not just the stage in the history of the Greek language corresponding to Classical Antiquity. A source would be needed. Andreas 22:15, 31 December 2005 (UTC)

Herodotus, writing in the New Ionic dialect, consistently refers to the Greek language as Hellēnōn glōssan or less often Hellada glōssan or Hellada. What's the intention by the way, to transcribe how ancient Greeks referred to their language? That would probably be a list of terms.Alexander 007 00:27, 1 January 2006 (UTC)

I thought it was blatant to everybody that we've been using exonyms to describe the stages of the Greek language (and any language for that matter). If we had wanted to call the articles by the original language names, then we wouldn't have much of a choice:

• Ancient and Koine Greek: Ελληνική
• Byzantine and Modern Greek: Ρωμαϊκή

And obviously that would be inaccurrate. As Andreas said, 'Ελληνικός' is completely wrong because it's in masculin adjective form, and the noun that it refers to is of feminin gender (γλώσσα=language). "Ελληνική γλώττα" (Greek language) is also inaccurrate because it's a very general term written in Attic. Plain "Ελληνική" is already in use by the Greek language article, and it can also be confused with Koine Greek. Hellēnōn glōssan, is simply the noun Hellēn put into plural genitive, followed by Ionic glossa in singular accusative, signifying "Greeks' language". Hellada glossan (Greece language) means nothing on its own, it probably ties up with a dative in the rest of the sentence. I think the best thing would be the use of a capitalized 'ΕΛΛΗΝΙΚΗ' or the post-classic Greek term "Αρχαία Ελληνική" (Ancient Greek), or better yet nothing. Miskin 19:54, 2 January 2006 (UTC)

"I thought it was blatant to everybody that we've been using exonyms to describe the stages of the Greek language (and any language for that matter)"---mine was actually a valid question: are we looking to include an autonym(s) for the language in the article (of course, not User:Thorri's choice, which is as weird as using Romaikos to refer to the Latin language). I don't think Sanskrit language (Classical Sanskrit, contemporary to Ancient Greek, though still spoken) is rendering an exonym. Looks like an autonym (see Sanskrit#History). In other words, it would not be against Wiki practice to list an autonym or autonyms for "Ancient Greek" if we find authoritative sources, but that may not add much to the article. Alexander 007 02:31, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

Time to split this article?

I think this article is getting unbalanced and too long. May I suggest that the grammatical sections be moved to a new article Ancient Greek grammar? --rossb 23:12, 16 January 2006 (UTC)

Agreed Andreas 23:27, 16 January 2006 (UTC)

• Split The current article is getting too long. Many sections have too much detail. --Macrakis 23:31, 16 January 2006 (UTC)
• Also split. Especially the grammar section is too detailed fot an ordinary language article. Caesarion 00:21, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

  Done. The sections have been moved to Ancient Greek grammar. Caesarion 10:26, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia in Ancient Greek

Is anyone interested in starting a Wikipedia in Ancient Greek?--Ravenous75 12:00, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

Oh yes, this idea has been expressed several times by different people. Check meta:Requests for new languages and meta:Requests for new languages/Ancient if you want to post you request. In order to gather contributors, look what user have a grc babel box on their pages (see Category:User grc) and ask some of them). A message at the Latin village pump (la:Vicipaedia:Taberna if I'm right) would probably also be very fruitful. Especially nl:User:Gpvos is in favour of beginning a Wikipedia in ancient Greek, he'll surely concur. I probably won't: my Greek is unfortunately much worse than my Latin. Regards, Steinbach (fka Caesarion) 12:21, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

Thanks Steinbach, useful info! --Ravenous75 12:58, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

Far more useful to begin would probably be grc.wikisource: at the moment, we only have source texts in translation (as far as I know), which is pretty disgraceful.--Nema Fakei 13:41, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

Source texts in Ancient Greek are (together with modern Greek) in :el:wiksource, see wikisource:el:Κατηγορία:Αρχαία_και_Κλασική_γραμματεία, see also wikisource:el:ΙΛΙΑΣ. Categories are in Modern Geek and are not well organized yet (:ΙΛΙΑΣ is in no useful category), so there is still some work to be done there.   Andreas   ^(T) 14:03, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

Ah. I'd just posted a request, as well. Hm. Well, I'd still argue to move them, but that's a discussion for the other page.--Nema Fakei 15:54, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

Ablative Case

Does Ancient Greek not have an ablative case like Latin? If not, how would they use prepositions such as "in," "for," "by," and "with?" Christopher 04:51, 6 November 2005 (UTC)

No, the ablative case uses get put in different cases. Prepositions take the accusative, dative, or genitive depending on the preposition. Instead of an ablative absolute like in Latin, there's a genitive absolute. Etc. 69.5.132.235 03:50, 8 November 2005 (UTC)

Wouldn't 'of' be used with the genitive, 'to/for' with the dative, and no preposition with the accusative, since it denotes the object of the sentence? Where do 'in' and 'by' and 'with' fit in? Also, out of curiosity, how is a genitve absolute translated? Christopher 03:41, 9 November 2005 (UTC)

That is a very rough approximation. But in fact most ancient Greek prepositions can be used with all three cases, and have a different array of meanings with each case. Septentrionalis 04:02, 9 November 2005 (UTC)

There are fragments of the IE locative case in AG, and that is also one of the sources of the Latin ablative; but not in any other sense of "ablative". Septentrionalis 04:02, 9 November 2005 (UTC)

And such fragments of cases like θεν, φι, δε, etc? In Mycenaen -φι was almost a regular feature of the languageBruno Gripp 23:28, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

I'll have to confirm with my copy of Smyth, however -φι- is a non-productive instrumental ending (compare Latin plural dative/plural ablative 3rd declension noun ending -ibus.)

It should be noted that Ancient Greek ablative merged with the genitive, and so did the prepositional functions (so when you express an idea such as motion away from, you use the genitive--a notion of motion generally reserved for the ablative in other IE languages). Echternacht 12:54, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Actually, φι seems to be a regular feature of mycaenaean greek and is quite present in Homeric, Lesbian and "hard" doric of Alcman, egg. σὺν ὄχεσφι, Μῶσα ὠρανόφι. Its an important feature of the Greek language, not, for sure, from attic, and I don't know wheater this article should mention this suffixes or not.

Most standard formulation

Such terminology implies an author skilled enough in the subject to know what the most standard is or whether there is one. That would have to be a published professor of some years standing in the field. No offense intended but I doubt you are that, author. I would say, this sort of language would require a reference, even more than one. The article on Greek dialects is a bit more sophisticated and does not have this problem. If you have a reference I for one would love to see it, as Attic is not usually stated to be a dialect of Ionic. If not, perhaps you could make the language a little less like a red flag and more suitable to the Greek Dialects article? Thank you so much. Bonjour, Dave 12:39, 12 October 2006 (UTC)

Definition of "pros"

I'm trying to get confirmation on the definition of the word "pros" (pi, rho, omikron, sigma, I think). I am told by one source I consider to be very reliable that the word means to, toward or going toward. Nearly every other translation has it as "with". I don't believe "pros" can ever be used as "with" as accusative or genitive and I'm fairly certain it has not other declention. Most people translate "pros" as "with" because of the biblical passage "In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God..." If anyone with no theological imperative to defend could shed light on this problem I would be very appreciative.

προσ? (unsigned comment by 150.101.158.203, 2006-10-13T02:15:16)

Thanks for your interest, but Wikipedia Talk pages are not the appropriate place for queries like this. --Macrakis 02:39, 13 October 2006 (UTC)

It depends what case it takes. Pros can take a lot of different meanings depending on context and what case it takes.

Mycenaean Greek should be included

I almost changed this article just now but I noticed it seemed to be a team effort so I thought I would bring this to your attention first. Let me say first of all how pleased I am to be among you momentarily. Now to business.

Mycenaean Greek is being excluded as ancient Greek. This is wrong.

• First of all, it does not reflect general usage. The classification of Mycenaean Greek as a dialect of ancient Greek certainly bears this out.
• Second, splitting the supposed "ancient Greek" from Mycenaean Greek is an original proposal. No one else that I ever knew does that. It seems like a quick but wrong solutuon to a Wiki space problem or someone's over-hasty innovation. Usually scholars try to place the Mycenaean among the subsequent dialects and local cultures.

• And, there are no events to warrant such a split. The mythology depicts a cultural continuation and the literature of the classical period asserts a continuation. There is nothing at all like the Slavic invasions and culture mixing that ended ancient Greek and started the language that was to become modern. That's right. The Slavs settled in the Peloponnesus. There was some population replacement after 1200 BC but it was of Greeks speaking one dialect of ancient Greek by Greeks speaking another.

• Third, lumping of Mycenaean greek with Proto-Greek is not logical. Proto-Greek is entirely reconstructive, its provenience is not known, and there has to be a large time lapse between Proto-Greek and Mycenaean Greek.

• Lastly, there is a naming problem. If Mycenaean is not ancient, just what would it be? You see, you are treading on the waters of rewriting Hellenic language history and this is not the place to do it. Mycenaean is a dialect of ancient Greek. Moreover, the rest of Wikipedia treats it that way.

This situation can be fixed with just a few sentence changes, which I was about to do. We need to drop the idea that Mycenaean is anything substantially different and put it back among ancient Greek. So, there will be a Mycenaean historical period, ca. 1400-1200 and Linear B counts as written Greek, even though only business records. This isn't going to lengthen the article because Mycenaean Greek has its own article and so does Linear B.

Thanks so much for your ear.Dave 22:41, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

I took the liberty of moving these comments to a separate section according to their importance. The question whether the term "Ancient Greek" includes Mycenaean has to be discussed. Some sources should be quoted here. If there is consensus, this cannot be "fixed with just a few sentence changes". This article would have been renamed "Classical Greek", "Ancient Greek" would have to be a disanbiguation page, and the template "History of the Greek language" has to be amended accordingly.   Andreas   ^(T) 00:07, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Classification

The current classification (probably ripped from the amateur linguistics of ethnologue) is the following:

• IE
  • Attic
    • Ancient Greek

Am I the only one who's noticing what's wrong here? Miskin 01:57, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

I guess so. Anyway, Ancient Greek was branched under one of its own dialects, I'm correcting this. Miskin 15:51, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

It's the same way with Attic-Ionic. Attic is not a subdivision of Ionic. Not only that but big northwest Greek needs to be West Greek. I'm going to change it as soon as I get a minute. What the author was shooting at is the Encyclopedia Britannica's formulation; hence "most standard." Give me a few hours and I will fix it.Dave 13:09, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

Syntax?

Anyone know anything about Ancient Greek syntax? We've got nothing. We don't even have whether it is SOV or SVO. Someone out there must know something. The bellman 10:36, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

This is a simplistic generalization, but a typical Greek sentence (if there is such a beast), like Latin, puts the verb or verbal phrase at the end. If it were that simple, though. It's not just SOV though, for instance, the beginning of the Apol. 17a, OSV - Whatever impression, men of Athens, has been made on you by my accusers, I do not know. The literal order: That by you had been felt/impressed by my accusers, not I know. This is easy syntax compared to the rest of the dialogue, particularly given the interruptions and returns in Socrate's arguments. As a highly inflected language, the subject is often within the verb (in this case "I know" is one word, oida). Like Latin, the declinations and conjugations determine the syntax rather than word order. Zeusnoos 16:32, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

Definition of "Ancient Greek" Period

Where is this definition of Ancient Greek without Koine coming from?

Koine is definitely the same language, linguistically speaking, as Homer. They are different, mutually-comprehensible (in writing at least) dialects, of the same language, which has a name.

Ancient Greek is that name. Homeric/Epic, Classical/Classical Attic, and Koine/Biblical are dialectical divisions of it.

Mycenaean, and Medieval-Modern Greek, are separate languages in the Hellenic language family which are not mutually comprehensible with Ancient Greek. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 75.7.2.42 (talk • contribs).

Well, the matter is somewhat controversial. In many respects, Koine is closer to modern Greek—and definitely to Byzantine Greek—than it is to classical Greek, so it's usually considered its own period. But I agree that the phrase "Ancient Greek" is ambiguous. Perhaps this article should be renamed to something like "classical Greek" instead, although it's really about both Homeric-era and classical-era Greek, but not about Koine Greek, which has its own extensive article. --Delirium 09:14, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

This is simply false. Koine is always included in the category of "Ancient Greek" -- and is based on and is (in its written, educated form) very similar to Classical Greek. The standard divisions are Ancient, Medieval, Modern. 2nd Millenium Hellenic (including variously "proto-Greek", "prehistoric Greek", "Mycenaean") does not have clear conventional naming and categorization. I am correcting the definition of "Ancient Greek" in the intro paragraph to include Koine -- but stating this article treats the earlier phases only and referring to the Koine article.

Orthography

Allegedly Ancient Greek had no interword separation? This is not mentioned in the article, and if true the existing transliterations are misleading. There may be other interesting aspects of the othrography worth mentioning. -- Beland 19:50, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

Quite right. Ancient Greek was written without punctuation, spaces, accents, breathing marks, or a capital/small distinction until much later (same is true of most languages until the Middle Ages, by the way). A 4th-century BCE text of the sample would have looked like:

  ΟΤΙΜΕΝΥΜΕΙΣΩΑΝΔΡΕΣΑΘΗΝΑΙΟΙΜΕΜΟΝΘΑΤΕΥΠΟΤΩΝΕΜΩΝΚΑΤΗΓΟΡΩΝΟΥΚΟΙΔΑΕΓΩΔΟΥΝΚΑΙΑΘΤΟΣΥΠΑΥΤΩΝ...

I've added a brief section on orthography with a pointer to the main article. --Macrakis 20:49, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

Syntax

I've made a few suggestions about the treatment of syntax in general, and participles & particles in particular, at Talk:Ancient Greek grammar#Partic(ip)les. Some discussion of syntax, however brief, would be useful here too, it seems to me: it would make the language rather more interesting. --NigelG (or Ndsg) | Talk 09:55, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

proto-greek is a historical form of Greek and not a set in the classification of Greek.

Classification is not the same as history. Proto-Greek did not exist at the time when Ancient Greek was alive. Birds are not dinosaurs.  Andreas  ^(T) 14:08, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

What does 'Deimos' mean?

Hello, this is a request from an astronomer seeking help with Deimos (moon). This article is about a moon of Mars, called 'Deimos' (Δείμος), named after a character in the Iliad. In the article, the name is translated as both 'dread' and 'panic'. But these seem to mean quite different things ('dread' means fear that something bad might happen soon, while 'panic' means fear of something bad that is happening right now!) Which is more accurate? I would be grateful for any advice, and a reliable source would be helpful too. Rubble pile 15:31, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

Ancient vs. modern Greek

This article does not really address the similarities and differences between ancient and modern Greek. How similar the two are seems to be a somewhat common question. I know nothing about Greek myself (I'll spare you the cliche from Shakespeare), but I'd recommend an expert include an answer in this article. -- Mwalcoff 06:27, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

This is duscussed at Greek language#Evolution from Ancient to Modern Greek.  Andreas  ^(T) 12:20, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

Thanks -- that's a start, although it doesn't answer the question as to just how similar Ancient and Modern Greek are, or whether modern Greeks can understand Sophocles the way modern English-speakers can (kind of) understand Shakespeare. -- Mwalcoff 23:00, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

I give you an explanatin here, although it is more or less origina research: Modern Greeks cannot understand Sophocles, but can understand most of the New Testament, although that is in Koine Greek. Most Greeks say their prayers in New Testament Greek. Greeks would also cite sayings in ancient Greek, such as "Γνῶθι σεαυτόν". A large part of the scholarly vocabulary of Modern Greek is directly taken from Ancient Greek.  Andreas  ^(T) 02:26, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. Sounds like Ancient Greek is like Old English but Koine Greek is like Early Modern English to native English speakers. -- Mwalcoff 23:33, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

Request for 'Actor' to be rendered in Ancient Greek

Hello. I've just added a quotation to the introductory paragraph of the article on Actor that refers to hypokrites. The original quotation says "the Greek word for actor--hypokrites (hypokrinomai)". Would someone here be kind enough to render this into the classical alphabet and place it on the article. Many thanks, DionysosProteus 20:47, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

Augment and reduplication

These should be moved to Ancient Greek grammar.  Andreas  ^(T) 19:35, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

The following discussion is an archived discussion of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the proposal was no copnsensus to move. Andrewa 11:14, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Requested move

Should this article actually be under the title Ancient Greek language, so as to conform to the convention used by other language articles, such as French language or German language? Robert K S 19:18, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I support this move for the sake of conformity. --Tλε Rαnδom Eδιτor (tαlk) 23:18, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Oppose - considering that the appendages on other languages are used to distinguish ambiguity and this isn't an article on the language, it's an article of the time period of the language. Reginmund 23:32, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

It has a language infobox and its sections include "phonology", "morphology", "sample text"... Robert K S 00:14, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Yes, but that is because it was different compared to know and readers might be curious as to the differences. Reginmund 05:33, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

So, the article is or is not about a language? Robert K S 16:48, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

It is about the phase of a language. The language article can be found here Reginmund 07:42, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

• Oppose per Reginmund, although we should of course have a redirect. Unnecesary disambiguation. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 19:02, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Oppose. Unlike the term "Greek" -- which could either be a language or a person -- "Ancient Greek" is unambiguous; I doubt anyone would think it refers to an ancient Greek, any more than "Old High German" would refer to an octogenarian from Bonn who puts reefer in his meerschaum. --SigPig |^{SEND - OVER} 05:11, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

Oppose, we've discussed this before. Fut.Perf. ☼ 09:54, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

• Support to place a dab page at Ancient Greek to reference Greeks from antiquity, Ancient Greece, the Ancient period of Greek history, the language phase labelled as Ancient Greek, etc. 132.205.44.5 22:17, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Spread

the spread of the Greek languagewanna use it?Megistias (talk) 22:24, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

Why was this removded? Its was sourced.diffMegistias (talk) 16:23, 8 March 2008 (UTC)

Name in infobox

The infobox gives the name of the language in Greek: "αρχαία ελληνικά".

Now, is that really the name for Ancient Greek in Ancient Greek?

First of all, did the Ancient Greek people refer to their language as "Ancient Greek"? More likely, they referred to it simply as "Greek", or perhaps "Contemporary Greek". So why is the word "αρχαία" there?

Secondly, "ελληνικά" is Modern Greek for "Greek", not Ancient Greek! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 212.247.11.156 (talk) 19:04, 12 June 2008 (UTC)

academic opinion of who?

The mainstream academic opinion is not that they were not Greek-speaking. The mainstream consensus is that we don't know, and never will. That is a very solid consensus indeed, and explicitly presented as the state of the art in all recent surveys I've seen. In any case, these authors never bother to put it on dialect maps. As long as we are talking about maps, I can only work with the models I have. I'm not going to falsify my sources by putting things on the map that they don't. Fut.Perf. ☼ 15:14, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

ok, since the macedonian were NOT greek speaking, please mention me ONE (just ONE) name of an ancient macedonian with no greek root and I will apologize. The hellenic ancestry of macedonians it cannot be challenged by any means, but only with goebbelsque propaganda.I can give thousend quotes,but only one would be enough. For example in the 4th book of Arrian, philosopher Kallisthenes has said to Alexander:

"...και εγώ της ελλάδος μέμνησθαι σε αξιώ,ω Αλέξανδρε,ης ένεκα ο πας στόλος σοι εγένετο,προσθείναι την Ασία τη ελλάδι."

(forgive me because this is not written in polytonic)

which means in simple words,

"...I demand from you to remember Hellas,Alexander,for her all the campaign was done,adding Asia (means conquering)to Hellas."

The message here is so clear, and the language used in that phrase is so simple (even a person without specific knowledge in ancient greek can understand.The specific meaning of that phrase cannot be challenged)that I would politely ask from people that they don't have any specific knowlegde to stop throwing unfortunate - to say at least- messages.

New version

Please review. Fut.Perf. ☼ 17:31, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

Ancient Greek dialects ("first millenium B.C."), after Woodard (2008: 51)

  NW Greek

  Achaean

  Doric

  Arcado-Cypriot

  Aeolian

  Ionian

  Attic

And, since Woodard also shows Italy:

May need some fixes about city names and positions. (Not shown in Woodard's source map, had to collect them from all sorts of Wiki sources.) Fut.Perf. ☼ 23:10, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

Spelling nitpicks:

• Sicily.
• Leontini.
• Callipolis.
• Rhegium
• Corcyra (or Corfu)
• Elis in Greece; and if Messene fits as a region name it would make the division of the Peloponnese clearer.
• Probably Casmenae, but I don't recognize the name, nor Pixous.
• Did you consider Naples? (There are reasons both ways, of course, so as long as you thought about it, I'm content. You do not modernize elsewhere, except Messana. ) Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:42, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

Should we add a note in captions to the effect that the colonies do vary? If my memory does not fail me, there were non-Ionian colonies in Chalcidice, for example. But this may be covered by a note in text saying that no map can be as complex as the actual dialect situation.

Possible omissions:

• Eryx - not colonized, but our article reflects EB 1911 that it was Hellenized, and before Alexander.
• Epidamnus.

Some omissions (Marseilles, Olbia, Naucratis) we will just have to live with; making this a map of the Mediterranean would make it useless for its purpose here. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:42, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

Nice map, as always. A couple questions from an ignorant: what are the differences between "Achaean" and NW Greek? on what grounds is NW Greek placed so far to the north in modern Albania? 3rdAlcove (talk) 17:50, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

• I will check (we should say more about it than we do), but IIRC Achaean is an east Greek dialect, which etacizes, although not as much as Ionic - not related, therefore, to the NW Greeks.
• Epirus did extend into modern Albania, and the Chaonians spoke Greek. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:16, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

I'm a bit confused about that too. Woodard says in the legend to his map that Achaean was "probably Northwest Greek". Why "probably", is it so poorly attested? All other maps that I've seen include it in NW. If it's the same as NW Greek, why have it in an extra colour? But then in the body of his article he doesn't seem to mention Achaean at all (or it's hidden somewhere in the small print where I haven't found it yet.) About the reach into Albania, yes, this map already stretches a good deal further up than the previous one. Fut.Perf. ☼ 18:21, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

The problem with Achaea and Epirus is the same: virtually no evidence (See Buck's Greek Dialects p. 10). Almost all of the inscriptional material in Achaea is from the Achaean League, which used the Doric of Corinth and Sicyon. Buck also thinks it natural to suppose the actual speech was NW Greek, but we cannot know. Similarly, the inscriptions in Epirus and Acarnania always used the Corinthian alphabet, presumably borrowed from colonies like Corcyra, and by the time there is enough material to tell what dialect it's in, they've regularized to Corinthian. So we do not know the Chaonians spoke NW Greek, although it is overwhelmingly likely. Nor do we know their northern bounds.

One problem in all this is that Achaean was also used by some people for a stage in the evolution of East Greek (presumably as Homer's Achaeans). Be careful. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 14:30, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

Ah, okay, thanks for clarifying that. Makes sense now. Given that all other sources seem to group Achaean simply under NW, and the text of our article does the same, do you think we should unify them on the map too? Fut.Perf. ☼ 16:02, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

a hatched brown, of the same shade as NW Greek, might do for both; but it would have to cover almost everything NW of Locris. But if we go to that level of detail, we run into such problems as: Ambracia is a Corinthian colony, and spoke Doric. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 18:36, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

Good thing then that I learned just today how to do hatched areas in Inkscape. Might be a good idea, I'll think about it. Fut.Perf. ☼ 18:42, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

Much better... but still, if we want to have Macedonia in the picture then it should either be termed as a "Macedonian" Greek speaking land or if you think that consensus and the certain linguistic determination of Macedonia after the 6th or 5th century BC make a hatched area that will be termed "Macedonian (see ...) - Attic after 5th century BC". As it is will still cause unwanted and unneeded problems. If we need quotes of linguists and historians I can provide many (many are already provided within the article) but I think that we all know it is well supported. Please, FPaS, you have done a remarkable job and I commend you for your promptness and quality of work, do not allow this to deteriorate into another unneeded debate. The same uncertainty on the "Macedonian dialect" exists as to most Greek subdialects. I am also compiling a list of dialects spoken in different cities and areas and will sometime in the near future give it here, although I understand that depicting it all on map will not be helpful. Maybe we could use it as a list or something. And as far as the quoting of the map is concerned, maybe it should now read "based on.."? Thanks in advance.

GK1973 (talk) 22:01, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, but no mainstream academic survey of ancient Greek dialects that I know of treats Macedonian as part of its subject area. The works I used as models, including Woodard, explicitly exclude it. (Of course, the map is supposed to be representative of the underlying spoken varieties, not just of the inscriptional written koinés.) Fut.Perf. ☼ 08:08, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Out of interest, and for context, what languages where spoken in the non-Greek (light yellow) parts of the map? Shinobu (talk) 11:39, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

The principal languages to the north would have been Illyrian (NW) and Thracian (NE). Also, the fabled Ancient Macedonian language, about which nobody really knows what kind of animal it was (or whether it was a single language at all, for that matter). In Asia minor, there would have been various IE languages such as Phrygian, Lydian and other Anatolian languages. Fut.Perf. ☼ 11:59, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, Fut.Perf.! Do you have the background to do the same for the Italian map? Shinobu (talk) 08:13, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

... what???? "no mainstream academic survey of ancient Greek dialects that I know of treats Macedonian as part of its subject area"?? So, according to you, the mainstream academic opinion is that the Macedonians were not a Greek speaking people....OK... then I will compile sources and we will come back to this...

GK1973 (talk) 14:11, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

The mainstream academic opinion is not that they were not Greek-speaking. The mainstream consensus is that we don't know, and never will. That is a very solid consensus indeed, and explicitly presented as the state of the art in all recent surveys I've seen. In any case, these authors never bother to put it on dialect maps. As long as we are talking about maps, I can only work with the models I have. I'm not going to falsify my sources by putting things on the map that they don't. Fut.Perf. ☼ 15:14, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

And, by the way, don't bother compiling sources again. We've seen those compilations a million times. It's not a new issue. Fut.Perf. ☼ 15:24, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

On reflection, here's my compromise solution: in the next corrected version, I'll exchange the geographical names ("Illyria", "Macedonia", "Thrace") with the corresponding language names ("Illyrian", "Macedonian", "Thracian"), print the name "Macedonian" in some different colour from the clearly non-Greek ones, and in the legend at {{Greek dialects}} (now templated thanks to Dbachmann) we can include a legend entry saying "Macedonian (status unknown)". I think that's accurate enough, and I can even source that "status unknown" to the same source, Woodard, so we have no OR issue about deviating from our sources. Fair? Fut.Perf. ☼ 07:22, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

That's all anyone ever asked for, a simple statement of recognition of the fact that Macedonian was not in the same league as Illyrian or Thracian. But if a Greek proposes it, he gets branded an "obsessed" nationalist. ·ΚΕΚΡΩΨ· 07:47, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

Exactly what I asked for. Although I clearly disagree with your opinion on the inability to determine the Greekness of the Macedonian idiom, I concur that it still is a debated issue and, as already stated, this should be obvious on this map too. And one more clarification. The date is again changed to "4th century BC". To be safe, move it back to 7th century BC. Thanks.

GK1973 (talk) 11:30, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

the Ancient Macedonian language article has stated the various difficulties with classifying the dialect in clear terms, for several years now. I am sorry, but nobody but a Greek nationalist would push for replication of this very marginal item in a template transcluded to completely unrelated articles. Look: this template is based on Woodward (2001). No, it doesn't show the situation of the 7th century BC. It shows the situation during the "classical" period, that's 5th to 4th centuries BC. Unlike the Hall map, it shows the Chalcidice and LesbosLemnos as already Hellenized, so it clearly shows the later part of the classical period, on the eve of Hellenism. It is bad enough to deal with the pov-pushing nonsense on the Macedonian related articles, but it is unacceptable to let this petty quibbling spill to articles dealing with the Greek language in general. Fwiiw, I recommend dropping the adjectival -N from the labels, i.e. the map should list Thrace, Illyria, Macedonia, Lydia and Caria as toponyms, just like Ionia, Attica, etc., not as labels indicating languages. --dab (𒁳) 09:56, 14 September 2008 (UTC)

Discussion continued at Template talk:Greek dialects. I've taken the freedom of correcting "Lesbos" to "Lemnos" in your posting above, I guess that's what you must have meant? Fut.Perf. ☼ 10:31, 14 September 2008 (UTC)

It still amazes me how as-if specialists when studying other languages are ready to develop whole theories based on a mere few lines text and when talking about Macedonian dialect for which we have enough texts to even know what type of dialect it was within the Greek language, they are not able to see the obvious. We know much more about Macedonian dialect that about many other Greek dialects for which we have no texts at all (but are accepted as Greek since propaganda was not interested there!). So is it a problem that we have Macedonian texts (obviously Greek) from the 5th B.C. century onwards? Just think of it, how many 7th B.C. century texts do we have in other dialects, say in "Western Greek" (Epirot - Aitolian...). Why do we accept it as Greek then? And how can we accept it as Greek since Macedonians and Aetolians accepted the fact that their dialects were really very close! Anyone that wants to jump over 10s of 1000s of evidence (grave writings, common people's names etc.) just to put a grey colour on the map is obviously serving political propagandistic motives, anyone that falls in the trap is not just aware into what errors of common logic he falls. Anyone that is genuinely interested to know the form of the Macedonian language he may refer to the "katadesmos" text, a later text written in Roman times clearly showing a genuine Greek dialect, an evolution of a dialect resembling Dorian and Aeolian (which unsurprisingly with the reality that Dorians and Aeolians descended from the area of Macedonia). Unless anyone here thinks that this ancient writer was a barbarian that learnt a foreign language, Greek, actually all of Greek dialects, then wrote a mixture of them just to convince some people 2000 years later that his tribe was Greek speaking... unimaginable! I will not even comment on the "complete failure" of Macedonians to leave a single testament of their "barbaric dialect" from Macedonia up to India and that of Persians that they could not see that Macedonians were another nation and not Greeks... Saying that they did not speak Greek defies common logic205.167.7.18 (talk) 10:17, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

Order of polytonic characters

I have proposed a different ordering for the Greek polytonic characters in the insert box below the edit box on the talk page of WikiProject Greece.  --Lambiam 04:37, 19 July 2010 (UTC)

Aorist

The article Aorist is in need of editors who can help develop it. If you watch this page and can spare some time, your input would be very much appreciated. Cynwolfe (talk) 20:50, 16 September 2010 (UTC)

Labiovelars

Are labiovelars transcribed with those bisegmental combinations <κϝ, γϝ, χϝ> Greek pronunciation: [kʷ, ɡʷ, kʷʰ]? --Tyranitar Man (talk) 01:02, 30 November 2011 (UTC)

To be added by someone

Lexical details: a discussion (with examples) of loanwords into ancient Greek (such as from Persian, etc.); and a discussion with examples of the (presumably) pre-Indo-European/non-Indo-European words in the lexicon, etc. Zipped through the article and didn't notice these topics mentioned. Alexander 007 09:37, 7 November 2005 (UTC)

The non-IE, pre-Hellenic vocabulary is present in a great part of the Attic vocabulary (including most toponyms) and it's consider part of the Greek language. It should be mentioned in Proto-Greek in order to point out the transition to Mycenaean Greek. As for the loan words into Ancient Greek from Persian, I've never heard about it. Do you have any examples? Miskin 19:00, 8 November 2005 (UTC)

I disagree. Proto-Greek is unattested, so lexical items (e.g., the actual words themselves) cannot be listed there except in a totally hypothetical sense. And if a given word is not attested in Mycenean, again that would not be the right place for such a lexical item. Many non-IE Greek words are not attested in Mycenean yet. As for loanwords---I said such as from Persian, not only from Persian, though there are several from Persian also. From Persian: magos, which after borrowed became a part of regular vocabulary and came to have the general meaning of "wizard" or "enchanter" (see Perseus); from Egyptian: baris, a flat-bottomed boat. From some Semitic language: kamēlos, "camel". Many more. Alexander 007 19:16, 8 November 2005 (UTC)

I don't want anyone to write up an exhaustive list, but a discussion with a number of examples given seems fine. Alexander 007 19:41, 8 November 2005 (UTC)

The pre-Hellenic vocabulary that was assimilated by Mycenaean and Ancient Greek is not considered by anyone as a "loan". However I agree that it should be mentioned in both Mycenaean and Ancient Greek articles as an important transition factor from Proto-Greek. Proto-Greek doesn't really have an attested vocabulary but in most cases linguists are able to distinguish the Ancient or Mycenaean vocabulary that does not derive from it. "Mag-os" has a PIE root and I don't know whether it can safely be assumed as a Persian loanword. The case of "kamelos" and the various Semitic loanwords should be at some point explicitely mentioned, but I wouldn't give them the highest priority. Miskin 13:18, 10 November 2005 (UTC)

True. Magos is traced back to a PIE root. But it is traced back to PIE *magh-, "to have power". According to my table of sound-changes from PIE to Proto-Greek, PIE gh became the chi sound in Greek. And sure enough, Doric machos ("a device, a remedy, a means") and Attic mechos (id.) are traced back to PIE *magh-os <PIE *magh-. Magos is from the same root, but unanimously considered to be from Persian magush. Another anc. Gk. Persian loan is angaros, which came to have the general meaning of "courier". The Greek cognate is angelos. Alexander 007 13:32, 10 November 2005 (UTC)

Could use more explanation and illustration of grammatical terms; also, relation of Ancient Greek to other languages of Europe. How many forms does one Greek verb have? I've read 5,000. Does Germanification of Ancient Greek pronunciation by 19th C. German scholars still pervade modern explications?James Hercules Sutton 20:12, 4 February 2012 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by JamesSutton (talk • contribs)

Does Ancient exclude Koine?

Ancient Greek seems to be defined in several ways here on Wikipedia. In the lead section of this article, Ancient is defined as including Greek from about 900 BC to 600 AD (Archaic, Classical, Hellenistic or Koine). A similar definition is also used by Ethnologue, which lists Classical and Koine as "dialects" of Ancient Greek. However, the infobox of this article says that Ancient Greek developed into Koine in the 4th century BC, which implies that Koine is not included, and the documentation page for {{Lang-grc-gre}} uses this definition, since it suggests that Greek words from the Koine period should not be labeled as Ancient Greek, but merely as Greek. Thus, there are two definitions of Ancient Greek, one that includes Koine and one that does not.

Since evidently some editors operate using the narrower definition, I'm curious, are there sources to be cited that use it? — Eru·tuon 23:12, 29 December 2014 (UTC)

Ancient Greek Wikipedia

In case anyone is interested, there is a proposal for an ancient Greek Wikipedia currently running, as well as a test wiki that has plenty of articles. Gts-tg (talk) 19:37, 17 March 2016 (UTC)

I fear that due to the recent discoveries in Sardinia, we will have to revise everythingh.. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Paolobod (talk • contribs) 07:10, 26 July 2016 (UTC)

External links modified

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Boiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii

Bruh — Preceding unsigned comment added by 165.139.131.52 (talk) 20:24, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

Rubber duck

The Rubber duck was first created in ancient greece, but it was at first made out of sticks — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2406:E007:8EDA:1:5C7A:AF80:27F1:64D0 (talk) 08:14, 23 February 2017 (UTC)

Why is Sicily excluded? This map takes a narrow modern view of the spread of Ancient Greek

Νάξος was founded in 735BC, any time frame we use will include Sicily, and some other colonies. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Paolorausch (talk • contribs) 06:04, 15 August 2017 (UTC)

drama — Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.69.7.1 (talk) 23:28, 24 August 2017 (UTC)

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Sourcing

The article is in poor shape with respect to sourcing. Of the 22 references, 17 are in Modern use section, Dialects has four, and five other sections (Lead, Phonology, Morphology, Writing, and Sample texts) have three references among them. Mathglot (talk) 03:11, 10 January 2019 (UTC)

I looked at Wikipedia:Content_assessment#Grades and no way is this is a B class article with respect to inline citations. Mathglot (talk) 03:38, 10 January 2019 (UTC)

Image is incorrect

The image that accompanied the article was totally wrong. It shows Macedonia as a barbaric land and this in 400 BC??? Chalkidiki??? The Greek towns of Thrace??? This image had to come down. I hope someone offers a better one.

GK1973 (talk) 20:43, 31 August 2008 (UTC)

The caption was incorrect; it must represent a date before the Athenian conquest of Lemnos. Those who want to edit war about Macedonia have a snake-pit of their very own to play in; go do it there. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 22:14, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

This has nothing to do with a Macedonian-Greek war of arguments. Still, Chalkidiki is not in and of course Macedonia is not in. Even if for some reason you belong to the minority supporting that the Macedonians did not speak Greek back then, the cities of Chalkidiki did.. Potidea, Stageira etc were already founded. And how about Samothrace? It was colonized by Samians in the 8th century BC. Byzantium? Epidamnus (modern day Dyrrachium)? So, instead of just scolding me, you should better research all my objections... And of course do not forget that the image was supposed to be showing the 400 BC spread of Greek dialects and of course it is still wrong.. So don't just change it to 800 BC now, OK? Just find a correct one...

GK1973 (talk) 22:49, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

• I don't know why you insist that this map was intended for 400 BC; it does not say so.
• In fact, looking at it shows plainly that since it excludes all the historic wave of colonization (as opposed to the hypothetical and mythical colonization of Asia Minor), it is much earlier. It is well-sourced, however, and shows the historic division of dialects well (and, in mainland Greece, that division did not change drastically for centuries, until the dialects collapsed into Koine under the Roman Empire).
• Similarly, one should note, it excludes Sicily altogether.
• Alternatively, we could make the caption something like "Greek dialects in the mainland of Greece and the Aegean."
• Explaining the distribution of dialects without a map is hopeless. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 22:27, 3 September 2008 (UTC)
• The assertion that Samothrace was settled from Samos is debatable. A. J. Grahame's "The Colonization of Samothrace" (Hesperia, 2002) defends the view, but even he says that the current view is that the colonists were Aeolian; more importantly, he holds that the colonization took place, not at the traditional date, but the first half of the sixth century. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 22:35, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

• I do not know what this map was intended for.. All I know is that at first it read 400 BC, then 600 and now 700 BC... Now.. what it may "plainly" suggest must be clear in a proper caption.

• I also do not know whether it is well sourced either since it is a creation of a Wiki user who claims that it is based on some other work. It would be very interesting to have a link to the original map, so that we can judge its source and its credibility. Unfortunately I do not posses the book sourced.
  • Then yiou violate a fundamental tenet of Wikipedia: assume good faith. Since the map strongly resembles other maps of the Greek dialects, for ezample that in Buck's Comparative Grammar of Greek and Latin, I have no doubt as to its essential accuracy. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 01:37, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

• I do not agree that there is anything mythical in the accounts of the Asian Minor coastline's colonization by the Hellenic tribes and I won't enter a conversation on the Koine since it is not the point here. We are clearly talking about a time long before the emergence of the Koine.
  • Oh, come on, the historical nature of the Ionian migration? Can you come up with a citation for that position from any peer-reviewed source in the past century? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 01:37, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

• What is of utmost importance is to decide on the century this map is referring to. I also agree that it should be noted that whatever the time period this map is supposed to depict, Sicily and Magna Graecia as long as other Greek colonies are excluded, should we come to the conclusion that it does depict a time period when these colonies existed. Of course this is not a problem as regards the lands not shown in this map. The question is what happens to the lands shown in this map? For "mainland Greece and the Aegean" clearly contains Macedonia and Chalkidike as well as parts of Thrace. Now.. should this map depict the distribution of the Greek dialects in 9th century, then it could be more close to the truth since at the time the Greek colonization was at its infancy and Macedonia (at least the Argead Macedonians) is included in the map, since it is highly unlikely that the Argeads had yet marched further north. But in this case (and in any case, just look at the map) the "Macedonia" caption on the map has to go. What is depicted there as Macedonia, a region clearly (according to the map)excluded from the Greek speaking world, could NOT be Macedonia up until the 4th century BC and this is clearly unacceptable. If there was no Macedonia mentioned, then we could laim that the map was about the 9th century BC and things would be historically acceptable but now... our map can only be dated in the 4th century, a time when Macedonia (whatever the maker of this map meant with it) was undoubtedly Greek speaking.
  • • • Its date is funddamentally unimportant; the four dialects did not shift within Mainland Greece, and the process of colonization was different in character than whatever the tribal formation process may have been: on this scale, the colonies of Greece will show up as a plaid. If Macedonian was a dialect of Greek, it was certainly none of these four; and that question is still debatable. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 01:37, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

• I really agree that a map is needed. But this map is both wrong and offensive. Being true and scientific is what matters and not advancing some guy's political agenda, even if this is inadvertent and accidental. We have already agreed that this map could be a close enough call for dialect distribution in the 9th century, but the name "Macedonia" has to go. I do not want to get into yet another discussion on whether the Macedonians spoke a Greek dialect or not, but this map conclusively states they did not and it also states that it is a 4th century map to anyone who knows what the historical extends of Macedonia were through time. As for Samothrace, there are theories as there are on every other historical matter. What we have to follow though, is the general scientific consensus and not the side theories (although of course they could be mentioned) and this applies as a rule to every other aspect of this or any other issue.

• So.. again... please... let us find another map or contact the maker of the map and have him make some changes. I won't delete it for some days so that we may find something better attested.

GK1973 (talk) 00:33, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

Hi, Pmanderson asked me to take a look at this. I don't think there's a problem with the map--a similar one is found in Jonathan M. Hall, Ethnic identity in Greek antiquity (Cambridge 1997) p. 154. You can find a similar map in almost any text on Greek history; it's utterly standard. I don't find GK1973's objections compelling, and see no reason to replace the map. --Akhilleus (talk) 02:21, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

Ok.. then tell me..

• what timeperiod is it depicting? What does Hall say in his image?
• if Macedonia was where the caption says at the time.

And if you could provide a link or sth of this image on which this image is based on, I would also be thankful. GK1973 (talk) 11:31, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

Hall, and other sources that use a similar map, do not give a time period. The point is not to show the dialect map at any one point in time, but to show the distribution of the dialect groups on the Greek mainland, islands, and Asia Minor. Obviously colonization isn't taken into account, nor the Hellenization of Macedon. Hall's map doesn't give the names of any of the geographic regions, so no Macedonia, but also no Thrace, Ionia, etc. etc. This is fine for a specialist work, but in an encyclopedia pitched at the general reader it's probably better to label the geography, we can't assume that everyone is familiar with the region.

Let me emphasize again that this is a completely standard map, and you can find ones like it in many scholarly monographs, college textbooks, etc. I don't see anything controversial about it. --Akhilleus (talk) 12:18, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

I agree that Macedonia should be presented as distinct from the indisputably non-Greek-speaking regions. The current map, whether on purpose or by omission, does appear to favour one side of the debate. ·ΚΕΚΡΩΨ· (talk) 12:26, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

So.. Akhilleus, your opinion is to just not give any time period and not even comment on these facts? Why not just remove Macedonia (since Macedonia did not exist in this part of the world back then, the map can safely be dated to the 4th century BC, since Macedonia is shown to comprise even Phillip II's conquests) and say "9th century"? And as to the "Hellenization of Macedon", of course you also know that there is some arguments against that too, which, I stress, would be of NO consequence if we just removed the name from the map. The name of a kingdom that was not even where it is depicted. Oh! And one minor mistake, "Milet" should be changed to "Miletos".

GK1973 (talk) 12:47, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

Next it'll be Milliyet. I mean, Thales was a great Turkish philosopher after all... ·ΚΕΚΡΩΨ· (talk) 13:04, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

I do not have an opinion on the map (I am an amateur classicist and I confess I do not know anything about whether such maps are standard as Akhilleus argues or not). I just noticed that before the edit-warring the map's caption was saying "400 BC". Now, it says "700 BC". Was the chronology better counted? Who decides and how about which period of antiquity this map represents?--Yannismarou (talk) 13:10, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

The point at issue is that these are the dialects in the area where Greek (at least the four usually recognized dialects of Greek) has been spoken throughout historic time. Within that area, the distribution of dialect hardly changed. The area of spoken Greek expanded with colonization, from roughly 700BC to the Hellenistic era, in some places later. But the colonies were different from the mother country, chiefly in that two adjacent colonies might well be founded by different cities and so speak different dialects, so a dialect map extending to the colonies would at first be a pointillist array of dots, and eventually be a blur of Koine. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 16:28, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

Okay, I'm the guy who drew the map. I only had time to throw a very brief look last night at the original in the book I was working from. It is cut off in the north roughly on the level of Thessaloniki and the Dardanelles, which means that most of the Macedonian and Thracian coast isn't even shown on it – implying, obviously, that it wouldn't have shown it coloured. AWhy the author decided to do it like that I don't know (and I have not checked the original article by Hull that Horrocks was referring to.) It also means that the legend "Macedonia" was my addition; it didn't occur to me at the time there'd be an issue about that, no objections against changing it. I can't at the moment check about Samothrace; its omission might have been a technical oversight on my part; I'll have to take another look. I have recently got another book with a map of a similar nature, from the Cambridge Encyclopedia of Ancient Languages. In that map, the Macedonian/Thracian coastal area is included, but apart from that I haven't made a close comparison of the details. (Again, Macedonian, explicitly, is excluded and shown as non-Greek.) I'd have no problem making corrections to the map on the basis of the second, if the time frames turn out to be compatible. If anybody has other, better source maps, let me know. Fut.Perf. ☼ 13:25, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

Thank you very much. In my opinion, depicting linguistic distribution in the 9th century BC would require no change other than the omission of the name "Macedonia", for it simply was not there and the correction of Milet into Miletos, and so we will avoid any unwanted trouble with the well known debate. Thanks again for your promptness.

GK1973 (talk) 13:52, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

Miletus would be an improvement. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 16:28, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

Agreed. That is the name in English. ·ΚΕΚΡΩΨ· (talk) 16:38, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

• And Rhodes; if it uses Ephesus and Epidaurus, as I would, probably Pergamum. Pergamon is a Germanicism. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 17:02, 4 September 2008 (UTC)

Just a note: Giorgos Tzimas was kind enough to dig out some links to maps on Google books. [1]. [2], [3], Number one is the original from which mine is indirectly derived (Hall's paper which was cited in my immediate source, Horrocks); number two is another adaptation from the same model. Number three is too low-quality for us (and used in a context where such details don't really matter). Some more discussion between Giorgos and me on my talk page. Fut.Perf. ☼ 13:35, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

Working on a revised version now. Will put something up here for review later. Fut.Perf. ☼ 14:26, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

Spoken Macedonian was a distinct dialect of Greek that was closely related and evolved from Doric Greek. Shortly before the conquests of Alexander the Great and the begginning of Koine Greek, Attic was adopted as the official dialect of the state. That is why all of the scripts left behind by the Macedonians were written in Attic.

LightningLighting (talk) 21:23, 18 May 2019 (UTC)

Check Ancient Macedonians Wikipedia

LightningLighting (talk) 13:40, 20 May 2019 (UTC)

Map of Greek dialects

Since when is Macedonian not a Greek dialect? Does this map even have any scientific evidence supporting this outrageous, and I'd say political, claim? If so, why does the other map in which wherever Greek was the people's mother tongue in antiquity was in yellow, include Macedonia with yellow too? This is quite contradicting, so I'd like some moderator to answer to this. LightningLighting (talk) 14:32, 12 February 2020 (UTC)

Would λove an answer to that too... 

1. Why is Macedonian in a separate "Related languages or dialects" part ? 2. How can it be (seemingly far related and) not marked on the map, when in the Ancient Macedonian article it says "Ancient Macedonian, the language of the ancient Macedonians, either a dialect of Ancient Greek, or a separate Hellenic language"???Einserschüler (talk) 22:51, 13 February 2020 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 17 April 2020

Please change this:

• Classical Greek Lessons (free online through the Linguistics Research Center at UT Austin)

to this:

• Classical Greek Online by Winfred P. Lehmann and Jonathan Slocum, free online lessons at the Linguistics Research Center at the University of Texas at Austin

This updates to currently maintained links and clarifies authorship and provenance. Thank you. ToddBKrause (talk) 11:59, 17 April 2020 (UTC)

 Done - QuadColour (talk) 00:06, 18 April 2020 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 08 August 2020

I'd like to open discussion to undo or dial back a pair of edits made on 09 June 2020.

In my (admittedly biased) opinion, the first edit (timestamped at 05:11) uses very loaded language to shoehorn in references to Christianity that are incongruous with the rest of the introduction. The second edit by the same user (timestamped at 05:31) about the study of Greek in modern education again inserts a Christian POV in a way that, to me, seems incongruous to the rest of the section.

I would suggest reversing these edits entirely, but perhaps someone with a less biased perspective might want to merely dial back the non-neutral language, especially of the first edit.

DocDevice (talk) 18:59, 13 August 2020 (UTC)

First one  Done for the blatantly loaded language, as you say. Something might be reasonable to add, but I'll leave that for someone else. Second one also  Done, although I was less concerned about the language here, but rather about the fact that it was entirely unsourced. A blurb here is probably reasonable, but it needs a reference attached. –Deacon Vorbis (carbon • videos) 02:02, 14 August 2020 (UTC)

Do we have tag or use box showing ....

Do we have Any tag showing that i am intrested in Ancient Greek History like this one (

This user enjoys films.

).??

Semi-protected edit request on 20 November 2020

! Bilabial ! Dental ! Velar ! Glottal JEOLIVER001 (talk) 19:15, 20 November 2020 (UTC)

 Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. --TheImaCow (talk) 19:53, 20 November 2020 (UTC)