Greek Word Order Research Articles

Now you saw it, now you didn't: the perception and reception of word order in ancient Greek and Latin texts

Abstract Not many of us ever get to see an actual papyrus roll, codex, or manuscript of a Greek or Latin literary text, though increasingly we are able to see digital copies of them online. The differences of format between any of the above and the texts we are accustomed to seeing are striking. This article is concerned with the effect that the format of a text had on the reception, written or aural, of word order as a literary device in the ancient world. We pay great attention to word order, but our reception of it is based on the format of the modern text, not on the format of the text as it was experienced in the ancient world.

『새한글성경』의 번역 배경과 주요 특징 — 신약을 중심으로 —

This paper aims to explore and highlight translation backgrounds and characteristics of the New Korean Translation (hereafter NKT) with its New Testament in focus. There are already the New Korean Revised Version which pursues the principle of formal correspondence, the Korean Common Translation which is based on the principle of dynamic equivalence, and the Revised New Korean Standard Version which attempts to optimize merits of these two translations. There seem to be all kinds of translations ranging from more literal to more reader-friendly ones. Then, why do we need another new translation? There are two main reasons for any new translation or revision of existing translations: changes of language and developments of biblical scholarship. These two factors taken into account, periodic update of existing Bible translation is needed to make it possible for people to read the Bible more accurately and easily. In case of the NKT, there was another significant factor in deciding to launch the new translation project, which is the change of media. Korean Bible Society thought that new generation familiar with new media such as smart phones and other electronic devices require a new Bible translation optimized for their unique needs. Thus, Korean Bible Society referred to the BasisBibel which is designed for the same kind of target audience in Germany. BasisBibel is the first Bible translation in the world that considers the change of media to be a significant factor impacting on the Bible readers. As the result, the NKT came to have several characteristics in two dimensions. One dimension is related to coping with the change of language and media: (1) short sentences composed of less than 16 words and (2) linear delivery of information. The goal of these features is to enhance readability and communication. The other is related to an essential principle of translation, which is faithfulness to the original text: (1) use of the most recent critical edition of Greek New Testament (UBS 5SUPth/SUP edition), which shows 33 changes in the Catholic Letters, and (2) meticulous attention to the etymology of the Greek words, word order, tenses (especially historical present), and special usages of Koine Greek. It is now at readers’ hands to evaluate how much the NKT has achieved its goal to satisfy two fundamental goals of all Bible translations: being more readable and more faithful to the original Greek New testament.

Regular and Irregular Variable Questions in New Testament Greek

The formation of variable questions in direct speech is remarkably regular in Hellenistic Greek. There are, however, a few exceptions to the standard rule that the Greek New Testament exhibits. These exceptions occur for rhetorical and social reasons and in such a way that they affect the information structure and meaning of these interrogatives. Questions that follow the rule—and the exceptions—both evidence the regularity of word order in New Testament Greek.

“Nobody else”: word order in Greek funerary inscriptions from Asia Minor and in Lycian

A large number of Greek funerary inscriptions from Asia Minor prohibit unauthorized burial by stating that, apart from those the funerary monument is intended for, “no one else” is allowed to be interred in it. The phrase is formulaic, but the internal word ordering of the constituent varies apparently at random, figuring either as ἕτeρος/ἄλλος οὐ-/μηδeίς or as οὐ- /μηδeὶς ἕτeρος/ἄλλος. A full survey of the corpus provided by the Searchable Greek Inscriptions shows that there is a consistent preference for one alternative over the other depending on the position the constituent occupies within the clause. It is shown that Greek phrasing and word order in all likelihood goes back to Lycian funerary inscriptions, where a constituent with synonymous elements (kbi tike or tike kbi) shifts its internal word order according to its relative position in the sentence

Case marking and word order in Greek heritage children.

This study examined the linguistic and individual-level factors that render case marking a vulnerable domain in English-dominant Greek heritage children. We also investigated whether heritage language (HL) children can use case-marking cues to interpret (non-)canonical sentences in Greek similarly to their monolingual peers. A group of six- to twelve-year-old Greek heritage children in New York City and a control group of age-matched monolingual children living in Greece participated in a production and a picture verification task targeting case marking and (non-)canonical word order in Greek. HL children produced syncretic inflectional errors, also found in preschool monolingual children. In the comprehension task, HL children showed variable performance on the non-canonical OVS but ceiling performance on the SVO conditions, which suggests influence from English. Linguistic factors such as case transparency affected comprehension, whereas child-level factors such as proficiency and degree of (early) use of Greek influenced performance on both modalities.

Word Order Flexibility and Adjacency Preferences: Competing Forces and Tension in the Greek VP

The present paper aims at further investigating the relative degree of flexibility of constituent order in Greek, which has been classified as a free word order language (Tzartzanos 1946, 1963; Greenberg 1963; Philippaki-Warburton 1982, 1985, 1987; Lascaratou 1984, 1989, 1994, among others). In this study we present additional evidence in support of the view expressed in Lascaratou (1989, 1994, 1999) that, though very flexible, Greek word order is not completely free, but rather it is the result of tension between competing forces determining linear arrangements. Focusing on the analysis of various VP structures drawn from the Hellenic National Corpus (HNC)™, we observe that no single (syntactic and/or lexical/semantic) factor appears to override the others in a salient manner, the relative strength of each individual factor not always being clearly and reliably measurable. In particular, it seems that constituent length does not constitute a more important factor than the syntactic and/or lexical/semantic relations holding between elements in the Greek VP. What is more, with respect to the concept of “adjacency” put forward by Hawkins (2001, 2004) to interpret the preference for certain linearization patterns vs. others, we propose that constituent length essentially operates in a substantially different way and direction than syntactic and/or lexical/semantic dependency relations. More specifically, while—for parsing efficiency—constituent length may often be responsible for the postposition of heavy constituents thus resulting in the disruption of adjacency by separating elements which “belong together”, syntactic and/or lexical/semantic relations, on the other hand, intrinsically motivate the adjacency of elements which “belong together”, thus resisting any rearrangement that would bring them apart.

Clause Intertwining and Word Order in Ancient Greek

AbstractIn Ancient Greek complex sentences consisting of a main and complement clause, constituents which semantically and syntactically belong to the complement clause can be placed in a position preceding or interrupting the main clause. This phenomenon is referred to as clause or sentence intertwining. This paper examines the pragmatic factors involved in the preposing of contituents in sentences containing an in initival complement clause. It will be argued that the specific pragmatic function of the preposed constituents is Theme (left dislocation), new/contrastive topic or narrow focus. Preposing can be analyzed as a device to pragmatically highlight the involved constituents. The paper also addresses the position of new, contrastive and given topics and of adverbs and clauses with Setting function.

Genitive word order in Ancient Greek: A functional analysis of word order freedom in the noun phrase

This paper investigates the principles affecting word order variation in the genitive phrase of Ancient Greek. We refuse syntactic and metrical explanations, and rather relate such a variation to the semantic heterogeneousness of the genitive, which can represent relations of kinship, part-whole, material and content, measure, etc. Different semantic relations select different word orders, and the same semantic relation selects different word orders in different contexts, according to the degree of specificity and topicality of the genitive referent. Topicality, which cross-linguistically has been proven to be a major factor in determining word order in the clause, appears also to be a valid criterion to explain the competition between opposite orders of the same noun phrase.

On the historical core of V2 in Germanic

This paper focuses on the origin of the V2 property in the history of Germanic. Considering data from Gothic and Old English (OE), it is suggested that the historical core of the V2 phenomenon reduces to V-to-C movement that is triggered in operator contexts. Therefore, the historical system shares basic properties with limited V2 in Modern English. It is shown that apparent deviations from this pattern that can be observed in Gothic can be attributed to the influence of Greek word order. Concerning the apparently more elaborate V2 properties of OE, it is claimed that a large part of them in fact do not involve a Spec-head relation, but rather result from linear adjacency between the clause-initial element and a finite verb located in T0. Special attention is paid to the placement of pronominal subjects in OE, which are claimed to occupy SpecTP. This contrasts with a lower position of full subjects due to the absence of an EPP in OE. Finally, the loss of superficial V2 orders in the Middle English period is attributed to the development of an EPP feature in T.

Some remarks on word order and information structure in Romance and Greek

This paper is a preliminary comparative study of the relation between word order and information structure in three Null Subject Languages ((NSLs) Spanish, Italian and Greek). The aim is twofold: first I seek to examine the differences and the similarities among these languages in this domain of their syntax. Secon, I investigate the possible derivations of the various patterns and attempt to localize the differences among these languages in different underlying syntactic structures.

Herodotus Grammarized - H. Dik: Word Order in Ancient Greek: a Pragmatic Account of Word Order Variation in Herodotus. (Amsterdam Studies in Classical Philology, 5.) Pp. xii + 294. Amsterdam: J. C. Gieben, 1995. Hfl. 135. ISBN: 90-5063-457-5.

Herodotus Grammarized - H. Dik: Word Order in Ancient Greek: a Pragmatic Account of Word Order Variation in Herodotus. (Amsterdam Studies in Classical Philology, 5.) Pp. xii + 294. Amsterdam: J. C. Gieben, 1995. Hfl. 135. ISBN: 90-5063-457-5. - Volume 47 Issue 2

Word Order in Ancient Greek: A Pragmatic Account of Word Order Variation in Herodotus

Word Order in Ancient Greek: A Pragmatic Account of Word Order Variation in Herodotus

Exploring Discourse Conditions on Word Order Phenomena in Greek

Studies of Greek word order have largely ignored explanations that refer to discourse. This paper illustrates an example of a textual approach to word order phenomena that relates the placement of adjuncts to local and global text-strategic motivations. Data are drawn from five different translations into Greek of an English text. Relevant suggestions are made with regard to the further exploration of word order issues within a discourse perspective.

Introduction: Birmingham Colloquium on Modern Greek Linguistics

Introduction: Birmingham Colloquium on Modern Greek Linguistics The three papers that follow were presented at a Colloquium on Modern Greek Linguistics held at the University of Birmingham on 6 June 1992. In organizing the event, the Center for Byzantine, Ottoman, and Modern Greek Studies wished to dedicate to students of Modern Greek a day that would provide a forum for meeting, exchanging ideas, getting feedback from established researchers, and presenting a wide range of work in linguistics with emphasis on new insights into problems of the Greek language. The objective was to give a profile of current research—with all its possible inadequacies. Emphasizing the heterogeneity of branches of investigation, the colloquium focused on less wellresearched areas of Greek such as the prosodie and cognitive aspects of speech production, the textual and pragmatic parameters of discourse, the construction mechanisms and cohesion devices in narrative and non-narrative texts, along with the metaphorical uses of language. In the papers published here, Dionysis Goutsos addresses the issue of discourse explanations of Modern Greek word order by focusing on conditions governing the use of adjuncts in Greek texts. Villy Rouchota examines the semantics and pragmatics of no-main clauses in the light of Relevance Theory. Finally, Alexandra Georgakopoulou broadens the discussion by treating the situational and cultural constraints on formal devices in Modern Greek oral storytelling. The high quality of both the presentations and die ensuing discussion testifies to the vigor of Greek linguistics. Since the research interests of these young scholars involve new approaches to the analysis of the Greek language, we see the Birmingham Colloquium as a prelude to exciting prospects in the field. DiMITRIS TZiOVAS (convener) dionysis goutsos (organizer) ...

Written and Spoken Language: An Exercise in the Pragmatics of the Greek Sentence

Previous articleNext article No AccessWritten and Spoken Language: An Exercise in the Pragmatics of the Greek SentenceS. R. SlingsS. R. Slings Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUS Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail SectionsMoreDetailsFiguresReferencesCited by Classical Philology Volume 87, Number 2Apr., 1992 Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/367293 Views: 14Total views on this site Citations: 6Citations are reported from Crossref Copyright 1992 The University of ChicagoPDF download Crossref reports the following articles citing this article:Luz Conti La cortesía verbal en Sófocles: análisis del optativo potencial en actos de habla directivos, Emerita 88, no.22 (Dec 2020): 235–255.https://doi.org/10.3989/emerita.2020.11.1942Evert van Emde Boas, Albert Rijksbaron, Luuk Huitink, Mathieu de Bakker The Cambridge Grammar of Classical Greek, 35 (Sep 2021).https://doi.org/10.1017/9781139027052Emar Maier Reported Speech in the Transition from Orality to Literacy, Glotta 91E, no.11 (Apr 2015): 152–170.https://doi.org/10.13109/glot.2015.91e.1.152Barbara McGillivray, Alessandro Vatri Computational valency lexica for Latin and Greek in use: a case study of syntactic ambiguity, Journal of Latin Linguistics 14, no.11 (Jan 2015).https://doi.org/10.1515/joll-2015-0005David Goldstein Iterated modal marking and polarity focus in ancient greek, Transactions of the Philological Society 111, no.33 (Nov 2012): 354–378.https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-968X.12000Annemieke Drummen A constructionist approach to the potential optative in classical Greek drama, Glotta 89, no.1-41-4 (Sep 2013): 68–108.https://doi.org/10.13109/glot.2013.89.14.68

New Testament Greek Word Order

New Testament Greek Word Order

Sobre el orden de palabras en griego: el genitivo adnominal

The aim of this paper is to show that the relative order of Genetive and governing noun is determined, at least in Attic literary prose of ca . 400 B. C., by a syntactic rule, according to which, Ablative or Partitive Genetive follows the main noun, and Possessive Genetive goes before the modified noun. A selection from Lysias, Thucydides, Antiphon, Andocides, and Pseudo-Xenophon’s Resp. Ath . has been taken into account for the purpose. The syntactic determination of Greek word order being at any case taken for granted, a set of lexical rules is previously established in order to give a sounder account of the evidence; in the author's view, the disproving instances are due either to emphatic reasons or to the overlapping of two rules. A second class of lexical rules can be inferred from the position of the article. May the proposed syntactic rule be right, Classical Greek is a VO language as well an OV one.

The Demonstrative Adjectives in Herodotus

The year 1960 was something of a vintage for Greek word order; at least four relevant books appeared, the most specific being that of Jonas Palm, the most general that of Dover. Dover in his opening chapter shrewdly points out the dangers in customary procedure for the examination of the topic. Heeding his warning, I hope that I have steered a safe course between the Scylla of the particular and the Charybdis of the general, and that I have not been sailing in circles.

Greek Word Order

Greek Word Order

Greek Word Order

Greek Word Order