The Power of Greek Words

We all know that the Greek language is the oldest of all of today's European languages. Although we are not able to define precisely its age, it is without any doubt far more ancient than what we were taught at school. That can be witnessed from the tablets that were concealed for thousands of years from the Greek land and have been revealed during the last century (the last tablet found at Dispelion -Castoria has been dated to be at least 7000 years old).

This evidence have made us realize that we really do not know much about the beginning of the Greek language. As the Greek saying goes "άγει εις φως την αλήθεια ο χρόνος", time brings everything to light, it is definite that at the very end the various misleading or false theories concerning the Greek language will be revoked and this already has started taking place.

It is not only well known but it is obvious, that all Arts and Sciences were born, developed and are still operating with a pure Greek vocabulary. The Greek language provides all those highly sophisticated words that can describe all abstract meanings.

Without any exception in all European (and not only) languages the vast majority of everyday's talking includes words of Greek origin. I refer to thousands of words which on first hearing can not be identified as Greek because of the alteration that has taken place through the years or because they are descended from ancient Greek words or names that the modern Greeks can no longer identify.



A word analysis, that is an etymological and historical analysis of a word, reveals the ancient but familiar Greek speech. Many times these Greek "protolexis", original words, return to the spoken Greek language as foreign. They are the so called re-loans. There is a large category of words, which through their own history, reveal the unknown Prehistory. That is the history that has not been officially recorded until now and it is usually confused with what we name Mythology. This is nothing else than the symbolic and thus the most pure historic truth. We can derive the conclusion that not only the Greek words but also the Greek Mythology and History have enriched the Western languages with terms and words, of which most of the times we ignore their Greek origins.

Names such Iberia, Italy, Egypt, Ethiopia, Spain, Celtics, Lisbon, Rome, Ireland have Greek origins. Words such as zante "ζάντες", which derives from the word "άντυγες", the wheels of the ancient Greek chariots. From the verb koreo "κορέω" derive words such as cure and sheriff, the ancient torno "τόρνος" gave name to tourism, tournament, tourney. In words such as palace, money, gondola, dollar, and ECU the infiltration of the Greek melodic sounds cause astonishment and amazement.

The question that comes up is how these phonological alterations take place so that some words are becoming unrecognizable orally but in written as well ? How did the Greek word "ναύκληρος", nafkleros, which the Latinos pronounced as NAUCLERUS end up as NOCHER in French ? How did the characterization "βάρβαρος", barbarous (barbarian), end up as BRAVE in English or BRAVO in Italian ? How did the word "ελεημοσύνη", eleimosyne, end up as ALMS in English? How did the word "βαλάνειον", valanion, end up in German as BAD and named the German city, which is famous for its healing baths, as BADEN BADEN ? Anthropogeography helps us to explain how the different expression of sounds depends on the mouth cavity, the vocal cords and the respiration, which is determined by the climate. By searching deeper we find that our ancestors from the very old times have given full explanation of the phenomenon Plutarch, Diogenes, Dionysios from Alikarnassos and Plato have all written about it. Here I will only mention an indicative remark from "Kratylos".

Socrates : "The first names have been alterated. Because of euphony they add or they remove some letters . . . They claim that they change them to make them nicer . . . they change through time . . ."

We must not ignore the fact that at the early times the only expression of the Greek language was taking place orally. The Greeks by being sea people "πολλαχή κατά θάλλατταν πλανώμενοι, γλώτταν την ελληνικήν επέβαλον", they imposed the Greek language. It is well known that over time the acoustic sounds tend to become short and loud.

The same alterations have taken place in Greek city names: Taormina instead of Tavromenion (Ταυρομένιον), Yalta instead of Aegialos (Αιγιαλός), Agd instead of Agathe (Agάθη), Durazzo instead of Dyrrachion (Δυρράχιον), Ambourias instead of Emborion (Εμπόρειον). Naples has become Napoli in Italy, Napoul in France and Nabel in Tunisia instead of Neapolis (Νεάπολις). That is why historians very often identify the people who were inhabiting a place by studying linguistically the names of the places.

The trip of Greek words becomes fascinating as the language is passing from one country to another, one generation to another, the pronunciation changes and sometimes so does the meaning of the words. For example "πυρρός μανδύας" pyrros mandyas (red cloak) has become in Latin "birrum mantellum" at the Italian it ended identifying the police-man ,"sbirro", because of his red uniform When a hood was attached to this "cloak" it became known in French as "beret".

The fertilization of the European speech from the powerful Greek "protolexis" (original words) took place gradually through various phases and stations in the Latin language and in other languages as well. The peak of all times was at the time of August when thousands of Greek words entered the Latin vocabulary. Large material of Greek vocabulary rushed once more in the West when the Gospel and others religious texts where translated in Latin, German, English, directly from the Greek prototype. It is the so called ecclesiastical vocabulary through which much of the formal and everyday's informal, speech entered in the western languages.

The beginning of all these influxes is lost at the depths of history, when the Greeks, by being inventors and pioneers, flooded with their dialectical variety the poor neighbor languages of Hesperia (West), Hyperborea (South), the East and the South as well. This conclusion derives from the latest evidence which is being multiplied continuously year by year. With the use of the Computers the latest findings of Archaeology, Comparative Glossology and Scriptology , persuade the modern Science for what was well known not only to the Greeks writers but to the Latinos as well. Writers such as Kikeron, Takitos, Cointilianos, Tyrannion in their writings have clearly mentioned "Περί της Ρωμαικής Διαλέκτου ότι εστίν εκ της Ελληνικής", (the Roman dialect has derived from the Greek) or "Aeolica ratione est sermo noster simillibus" (our language is very similar to the Aeolic dialect). Previous and present scientists, writers and researchers are aware that the mother language of all of Western languages (and not only) is the Greek language. But this is another story . . .

The Indian professor of linguistics Mr. Sacramborty (he speaks 22 languages), President of the "Greek Cycle" and Director of the Indian Ministry of Education, declares without any reservation that the Greek language has not derived from the Sanscritic, but the exact opposite is true. The official periodical of the Greek-Indian Club is named "ΠΕΛΑΣΓΙΑ" and their newspaper is named "SAMELAN", that is "ΣΕΛΗΝΗ" (SELINE), "ΣΕΜΕΛΗ" (SEMELI), named after Dionysos mother. Dionysos was the first who at the ancient times civilized India. From the "Greek Academy of Baskonia" the conclusions of their scientific researches are coming one after the other. President of their scientific committee is the Bask Hellenist and professor of Eastern Languages, Fredericko Sagredo (Homer Award in 1989 from the Onasis Foundation). They have reached the conclusion that the so called mysterious Baskic language has Greek origins. It includes not only the roots but whole Protohellenic, Pelasgic words.

After personal, persistent, laborious and time lengthy studies on the comparison between Greek and the five major European languages, a Greek speaking Europe has been revealed to me, "Ελλάδος φθόγγον χέουσα", Aeschylus.

From the simple cells of the Greek prototypes until the multicell organizations of modern vocabularies, almost all conjunctions, prepositions and endings are Greek. Composite and derivative words are the faucets that have flooded the tanks of all European languages. Finally we have reached the conclusion that behind every Greek word lies another older Greek word. For the scientific researcher the belief that the Greek language was always present "ουκ ην καιρός ότε ουκ ήν", strengthens day by day.

The borrowing from the endless treasure of the Greek language has never stopped and it is not going to stop because new ideas, meanings, objects and situations are being born continuously. I will bring as an example two new words:

EFBIOSIS -- good living TANATONAUTA --The patient who briefly dies and then comes back to life.

The Greek language because of its plasticity and its mathematical nature, has the unique attribute to describe analytically or synthetically all minor meanings, details and gratings.

The fruits of the plasticity of the Greek language are the Greek vocabulary and the Greek proper names. From the most well known and glorious names to the most rare and scarce as they are being listed in the ancient texts. In order to be convinced someone can only take a look at the two volumes of Appolodoros Historical Bibliothic, this secret Greek Genealogy.

I am not willing to express euchologies but it is absolutely necessary to list, as soon as possible this unknown and neglected treasure of the Greek onomatology. This has to be done not only to admire the unique variety and wisdom of the ancient Greek names. By observing the identification of a person with his name, the projection of a person's character through his name, we can understand the modern scientific theories, which claim that the sound of a person's name, "το εφ΄ώ τις καλείται" (how one is called), affects someone's personality by awakening cellular memories.

A case that proves the historic value of the Greek names is:

It is well known that the Kalash who live at Afghanistan claim that they are descended from Great Alexander's soldiers. Their Greek origins can be found in their vocabulary, furniture, painting, music and customs. Nevertheless we have neglected the most important evidence and that is their name Kalash (ΚΑΛΑΣ) which up to know was considered to be Indian. This happened because we have not perpetuated up to our days the ancient Macedonian name, it can only be found at "POLYAINOU STRATEGEMATA"

Book E/44,5/ "POLYAINOU STRATEGEMATA"
 ". . . When Memnon attacked the Kyzicians, he wore on his head the Macedonian helmet. Seeing him from the city walls the Kyzicians took him for Kalash the Macedonian, their friend and ally . . ."

Kalash is a Greek name and not an Indian as we used to think.

The Greek names compose the picture, soul, identity and history of our nation.


By Anna Tziropoulou-Efstathiou, author and renowned Linguist.