Spoken Greek

Extract

It has been suggested that there is less difference between ancient Greek and modern Greek than between present-day English and Chaucer's language. The suggestion is somewhat questionable. Broadly speaking, apart from dialects and local variations, there are presently three languages in Greece, the Kathareuousa, the Demotiki, and the popular newspaper language, which is a blend of the two.

The Kathareuousa is the official and formal language, used in Government publications and statements, business correspondence, non-fictional books and treatises, law courts, University lectures, and in formal conversation. And although its grammatical structure is analytic as opposed to the synthesis of ancient Greek (a change which constitutes the main difference between classical and modern Greek, as it does between other modern and ancient languages), in the Kathareuousa the most strenuous attempt has been made to maintain the accidence and vocabulary of the ancient language.

Words are declined and verbs conjugated (without some of their more difficult and less used moods and tenses) as in Attic Greek, pronouns and prepositions and the cases governed by them are the same, and while, naturally, many terms which describe things known only to the modern world are not to be found in Liddell and Scott, they are generally legitimate and intelligible compounds of words which are to be found in Liddell and Scott. Ἀɛροπλἁνoν for aeroplane, ἀɛρòσTαtoν for balloon, are instances which come easily to mind.