Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2012 June 12

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June 12

"British Rail is poised on the edge of a precipice."

Is this a trope? Kittybrewster ☎ 14:18, 12 June 2012 (UTC)

Definitely, because the statement isn't literally true. I'd say it's a metaphor, but someone may say different. Itsmejudith (talk) 14:33, 12 June 2012 (UTC)

Being "on the edge of a precipice" seems to be a stock phrase or cliche for anything at a tipping point where total collapse or survival hang in the balance.[1][2][3][4][5] --Colapeninsula (talk) 09:45, 13 June 2012 (UTC)

Is the Hymn to Liberty in Dimotiki or Katharevousa?

That's really all there is to my question. :) 86.21.250.191 (talk) 23:28, 12 June 2012 (UTC)

I know relatively little about modern Greek, but I scanned down some of the verses looking for a few indicators (-ειν infinitive endings on the one hand, contracted article forms like στην or verbs ending in -ουν on the other hand etc.), and couldn't find any of either type. However, it's obviously in "polytonic" orthography with iota subscripts, and not fully modern in that sense... AnonMoos (talk) 16:47, 13 June 2012 (UTC)

The form that is commonly sung today is thoroughly Dimotiki. It might be slightly modernized, but as far as I understand the original was also Dimotiki. I'd have to search a bit to find an authentic text. In any case, Dionysios Solomos was a convinced dimoticist; there's something about that in the Literary influences and major works section of his article. Fut.Perf. ☼ 17:03, 13 June 2012 (UTC)

BTW, maybe the most salient demotic marker is in the rhymes "όψη" and "κόψη" in the first stanza (older demotic spelling in the original: "όψι"/"κόψι"; Katharevousa would have been "όψιν"/"κόψιν"). Also the contraction in "Ἀπ’ τὰ"; the verb "βγαλμένη" (both the grammatical form and the verb itself), and the accentuation on "ελευθεριά" (pronounced with final /-ˈja/) rather than "ελευθερία" (with /-ˈia/). Fut.Perf. ☼ 17:14, 13 June 2012 (UTC)

Largely correct analysis. It is indeed mostly early Dimotiki. Some forms such as "Ton Ellinon" and "ta iera" don't quite fit the Dimotiki version of the rest of the verses and could be taken as katharevousa so there is a slight trace of katharevousa. To really fit the Dimotiki version of the rest of the words, "Ton Ellinon" should have been "Ton Graikon". Example: "Ego Graikos yennithika, Graikos the na pethano" from Athanasios Diakos in early Dimotiki. Δρ.Κ. ^{λόγοςπράξις} 17:36, 13 June 2012 (UTC)

Here's a nice edition of the full original text [6]. The more I look, the more demotic it gets, actually. Lovely language. Fut.Perf. ☼ 17:45, 13 June 2012 (UTC)

Very interesting. Thank you. I had not seen the full-length poem. But indeed it has many archaic terms such as "Βασιλείς" instead of "Βασιλιάδες" including "υπογεγραμμένες" (Iota subscript) in various words which are found in ancient Greek. Δρ.Κ. ^{λόγοςπράξις} 18:18, 13 June 2012 (UTC)

Yeah, but if you mean the -ῃ spellings (instead of present-day -ει) in subjunctive verb forms, as in "Ἄργιε νἄλθῃ ἐκεινη ἡ ῾μέρα", weren't these just standard demotic spellings until well into the 20th century? Much like the "-αις" plurals of nouns that today are spelled "-ες", as in "Κλάψαις, ἅλυσσες, φωναῖς". But, speaking of the latter, now I must get back to the Holland-Germany match. :-) Fut.Perf. ☼ 19:54, 13 June 2012 (UTC)

I guess you caught me with "νἄλθῃ", even though I started suspecting that, since there were so many of these forms in the poem, something was going on with the earlier versions of Dimotiki. I just couldn't bring myself to believe this though, since I always thought that katharevousa was the closest to the ancient language and IMO it doesn't get any more archaic that the iota subscript. But I guess I was wrong. Anyway since you are the expert, I can feel better about not knowing this historical fact about Dimotiki. Have fun with the Euro cup matches. This is one Euro which at least has some future, unlike its numismatic counterpart. :) Δρ.Κ. ^{λόγοςπράξις} 20:46, 13 June 2012 (UTC)