Re: Castillian Greek was Re: Slovanik, Enamyn, and Slavic slaves

On 4 Aug 02, at 9:21, Thomas Leigh wrote:

> The perfective stem is derived ultimately, from the old s-future
> (I think; I haven't studied ancient Greek, but there's a tense formed by
> adding -s to the stem, I think it's the future).
I think those forms came from the old aorist subjunctive. The forms are
nearly identical to the future (except for the vowel length in the
ending -- aorist subjunctive has o:, e: vs o, e in the future
indicative) except in the passive voice -- a.s. has e.g. lithó [ModG
pronunciation] vs f.i. lithísome from lío (ModG líno).

> I don't think it was mentioned before, but there's a whole other set of
> endings for the passive voice.
And middle voice. The two were distinct (though similar) in Ancient
Greek but have merged in modern Greek. (To use the paradigmatic verb
"lío" = "to loose, untie", the middle voice is "I loose myself" while
the passive is "I am loosed".)

Only the passive forms are used in ModG, even when a middle meaning is
intended (and there are quite a few verbs which only have a middle
voice but an active meaning -- e.g. skéftome "I think", proséfxome "I
pray", lipáme "I am sorry").

Cheers,
Philip
--
Philip Newton <Philip.Newton@...>