The Aeolic dialect shows manyarchaisms in comparison to the other Ancient Greek dialects (Arcadocypriot,Attic,Ionic, andDoric), as well as many innovations; it is, consequently, considered to be—for the modern reader—perhaps the most difficult of the dialects.[3]
Aeolic Greek is widely known as the language ofSappho and ofAlcaeus of Mytilene. Aeolic poetry, which is exemplified in the works of Sappho, mostly uses four classical meters known as theAeolics:Glyconic (the most basic form of Aeolic line),hendecasyllabic verse,Sapphic stanza, andAlcaic stanza (the latter two are respectively named for Sappho and Alcaeus).
Similarly PIE/PGk*gʷ always becameb and PIE*gʷʰ > PGk*kʰʷ always becameph (whereas in other dialects they became alternatingb/d andph/th before back/front vowels).
A Proto-Greekconsonant cluster withh (from Indo-European*s) and a sonorant (r, l, n, m, w, y) changed to the double sonorant (rr, ll, nn, mm, ww, yy) in Lesbian and Thessalian (sub-dialects of Aeolic) byassimilation. In Attic/Ionic, Doric, and Boeotian Aeolic, theh assimilated to the vowel before the consonant cluster, causing the vowel to lengthen bycompensatory lengthening.
Lesbian Aeolic lost initialh- (psilosis "stripping") from Proto-Indo-European *s- or *y-. By contrast, Ionic sometimes retains it, and Attic always retains it.
In Thessalian and Boeotian (sub-dialects of Aeolic) andDoric, the Proto-Indo-European and Proto-Greek semi-vowelw (digamma) was retained at the beginning of a word.
Compensatory lengthening ofa, e, o in Lesbian givesai, ei, oi (in Attic, it would beā, ei, ou) for example in the accusative plural of a and o stem nouns, or in many 3 Pl verb conjugations.
In the Lesbian dialect this ending also extends to the thematic conjugation, where Attic/Ionic has-ein. All three of these Aeolic endings occur in Homer.
Below is a list of several words in the Aeolian dialect, written in the Greek alphabet, along with a transcription in the Latin alphabet. Each word is followed by its meaning and compared to similar words in other ancient Greek dialects. The "notes" section provides additional information, and if applicable, an etymology is given.
Derives from PIE*kleh₂u- 'lock', although Beekes suggests the original meaning must have been 'nail, pin, hook', as in, instruments to lock a door.[28]
ὀνάλαonala,ὀνάλουμαonalouma (Atticanalōma expense cost) (on- in the place of Attic prefixana-,ongrapsantas SEG 27:202
ΠετθαλιαPetthalia 'Thessalia';Petthaloi 'Thessalians'; Koinethessalisti 'the Thessalian way'. Cf. Atticἐντεθετταλίζομαιentethettalizomai become a Thessalian, i.e. wear the large Thessalian cloak (Thettalika pterafeathers),Eupolis.201.)
ταγεύωtageuō to be tagosarchon in Thessalyταγευόντουν τοῦμ Πετθαλοῦν
^Sowa, Wojciech (2018).Studies in Greek Lexicography. De Gruyter. pp. 189–190.ISBN978-3-11-062274-4.Such an assumption would certainly agree with certain current views on the status of Ancient Macedonian, according to which it should be interpreted as a Greek dialect of Northwest provenance which absorbed non-Greek elements (Brixhe/Panayotou 1994, 205–220), or perhaps of an Aeolic provenance, with strong influences from the northwestern dialectal area as well as from the non-Greek languages of the Northern Balkans (e.g. Peters 2000, 383) – an assumption which seems to be supported by the analysis of the material yielded by ancient literary sources. Cf. also the claims of classical historians such as Hammond, that "the Macedonians from Lower Macedonian spoke an Aeolic dialect, those from Upper Macedonia a "north-western" Greek dialect" (Hammond 1994, 131–134).
^Roger D. Woodard (2008), "Greek dialects", in:The Ancient Languages of Europe, ed. R. D. Woodard, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, p. 51.
^abCrespo, Emilio (2018). "The Softening of Obstruent Consonants in the Macedonian Dialect". In Giannakis, Georgios K.; Crespo, Emilio; Filos, Panagiotis (eds.).Studies in Ancient Greek Dialects: From Central Greece to the Black Sea. Walter de Gruyter. p. 329.ISBN978-3-11-053081-0.
^Dosuna, J. Méndez (2012). "Ancient Macedonian as a Greek dialect: A critical survey on recent work (Greek, English, French, German text)". In Giannakis, Georgios K. (ed.).Ancient Macedonia: Language, History, Culture. Centre for Greek Language. p. 145.ISBN978-960-7779-52-6.
^Sowa, Wojciech (2007). "A note on Macedonian ἄλιζα".Greek and Latin from an Indo-European Perspective. Vol. 32. Cambridge Philological Society. p. 182.ISBN978-0-906014-31-8.Nowadays, ancient Macedonian is treated as one of the dialects of Greek, originally of Aeolic provenance, with strong influences from the north-western dialects as well as from the non-Greek languages of the northern Balkans. The inscription from Pella published by Dubois in 1995, considered to be the first native epigraphic monument of Macedonian, seems to confirm such an assumption (cf. the use of characteristic Dorisms, e.g. the preservation of the long /a:/, οποκα 'as soon as' with an optative and τελος in the meaning of γάμος 'marriage'). Unfortunately, owing to the lack of other epigraphical or literary evidence, we are left with glosses as our chief testimony of the vernacular speech of the region. This group of c. 150 lexemes comprises forms which are obviously Greek (of Attic origin), Macedonianhapax legomena, and forms which 'have Greek cognates, but differ from them in their phonemic shape to an extent which goes far beyond the limits of dialectal variation in ancient Greek' (Katičić (1976) 111). It seems, however, that many of these Macedonian features can be explained also within the frames of Greek dialectology; in particular, there are interesting links between Macedonian and Thessalian vocabulary (García Ramón (2004) 236 n. 2, 242, 253; Sowa (2006) 118).
^Sowa, Wojciech (2018).Studies in Greek Lexicography. De Gruyter. pp. 189–190.ISBN978-3-11-062274-4.Such an assumption would certainly agree with certain current views on the status of Ancient Macedonian, according to which it should be interpreted as a Greek dialect of Northwest provenance which absorbed non-Greek elements (Brixhe/Panayotou 1994, 205–220), or perhaps of an Aeolic provenance, with strong influences from the northwestern dialectal area as well as from the non-Greek languages of the Northern Balkans (e.g. Peters 2000, 383) – an assumption which seems to be supported by the analysis of the material yielded by ancient literary sources. Cf. also the claims of classical historians such as Hammond, that "the Macedonians from Lower Macedonian spoke an Aeolic dialect, those from Upper Macedonia a "north-western" Greek dialect" (Hammond 1994, 131–134).
^Sowa, Wojciech (2022)."Macedonian glosses and their Balkan context: the linguistic assessment of the secondary evidence".In recent scholarship, however, especially in dialectology of the Ancient Greek, the Macedonian has been interpreted as one of the dialects of Greek (a sort of para-Greek), originally of an Aeolic provenance, with strong influences from the north-western dialectal area as well as from the non-Greek languages of the Northern Balkans. It seems also possible that the inhabitants of the Lower Macedonia spoke an Aeolic dialect, and those from Upper Macedonia a north-western Greek dialect. The inscription from Pella published in 1995, which is the single epichoric monument of Macedonian, seems to verify positively such an assumption, cf. the use of characteristic Dorisms, along with some 'local' features.
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