Old Grekelin

Old Grekelin
Grekélin
Created by	Aggelos Tselios
Date	2023
Native to	Kingdom of Hungary, Ottoman Empire
Language family	Indo-European Hellenic Old Grekelin
Dialects	Danubian Savvian Slavic Western
Writing system	Latin

'Proto-Grekelin (Grekelin: Egycsi-Grekelin, [ɛˈɟu.t͡ʃi ˈɡrɛ.kɛɬin]) or Old Grekelin (Grekelin: Paleá Grekelénikin, [pɑ.ɫɛ.ˈɑ ɡrɛkɛˈɫɛnikin]) is the initial stage of Grekelin, when it first began splitting from Greek between the 11th to 16th centuries during the Greek migration to Hungary. While considered a single language, it was a dialect continuum stretching from Belgrade to Budapest.

The migration of Greek populations and their settlements in the Kingdom of Hungary created a massive distance between Greek and Grekelin, and with little education and linguistic isolation, the Greek populace began speaking a divergent dialect, with lots of Hungarian influence, that eventually made the language split from Greek. By the time of Greek independence (19th century), the Grekelin speakers had already a highly divergent language that didn't resemble Greek as much.

Old Grekelin is the linguistic link between the Byzantine Greeks that settled in Hungary, who spoke the vernacular Medieval Greek language, and Standard (Modern) Grekelin which is the final product of this dialect or proto-language.

History

In the 11th century, following the Battle of Manzikert and with the Byzantine Empire constantly declining, many Greeks from Asia Minor began moving to the Kingdom of Hungary, which offered them prestigious rights within the state in exchange for volunteering in the army and protecting the Kingdom's borders. As the number of them began increasing, they began founding Greek villages in the countryside, where they could still communicate as they now amounted up to 100.000. The first villages were built along the Danube, in Hungarian and Serb majority areas back then.

From the mid-14th to the 17th century Ottoman expansion in the Balkans reached Grekelin-speaking areas, reducing the spoken language's population significantly. Regardless, the language managed to remain alive within the Austrian Empire (Where the most conservative dialects are found as well), which had conquered the northernmost parts of what is now Slovakia and Czechia. Ottoman rule imported some words that are cognates with Greek ones (Eg. **Χαράτσι, Haradza** (Unjustified high tax), **Μπαχάρι, Baharrya** (Spice)). The language however, being spoken for over 300 years at this point, had changed significantly, and, due to constant wars and rebellions in the region, now had three different dialects.

Already by the 16th century however, Grekelin was largely different, both in phonetics and grammar. In addition, Grekelin was by now written exclusively with the Latin alphabet, as few Greek scholars were left to teach the Greek one. Further attempts in the 17th century to convert the Grekelin-speaking population to Catholicism resulted in the introduction of many foreign (Latin and Hungarian) words, and by the 19th century Grekelin would be completely different, grammatically and lexically.

Dialects

Old Grekelin was spoken from Belgrade to Budapest, so it didn't take long to split into different dialects. Those dialects are usually categorized in 4 groups. Modern Grekelin derives directly from the Danube dialect (Although the Slavic dialect is basically the result of the homonymous Old Grekelin dialect), and the last two have gone extinct. The following are the 4 groups of Old Grekelin and their status today.

- Danubian Dialects (Once spoken between Budapest and Northern Vojvodina, now the basis of Modern Grekelin, with about 3/4's of all Grekelin speakers)

- Slavic Dialects (The only surviving variant of this language, currently spoken in spread out places of Eastern Hungary, Slovakia and Southern Vojvodina)

- Northern Dialect (Dialects that developed when Grekelin speakers yet again fled the Ottoman threat in the Alps. No longer spoken)

- Savvian Dialect (The least significant in socio-linguistic terms, due to its low population (Just above 2.000) and their late divergence from Greek).

The Savvian dialects were far more divergent than the other three, possibly due to their late settlement (13th century, during the Slavic raids into Greece) and their nearly complete isolation from Hungarian influence. Some could call them an entirely separate language, as they remained very conservative and close to Greek up until the 19th century (When the last speaker was identified). The following parts compare the sentence "I would like to see it with my eyes" (Modern Grekelin: "Ennacsinallo davto na ivlo mi ek opiek mei, /ˌɛt͡ɕiˈnɑɫo ˈdɑv.to nɑ iv.ˈlo mi ɛk ˈopjɛk mʲi/"

Danubian dialects

The Danubian dialects are the root of Modern Grekelin.

Slavic Dialects

Key evolutions of the Slavic dialects are the introduction of the dative (Initially as slang but eventually as a regular practice) and the /y/ > /ɨ/ evolution. It also contains considerably fewer words of Hungarian origin, and the use of palatalization in regular speech.

Northern Dialect

The only dialect to introduce a glottal stop (ʔ) and glottalization. Apart from that, it was mostly just a subdialect of the Danubian dialects, just divergent enough to have its own group.

Savvian Dialect

The Savvian dialect is not directly a dialect of Old Grekelin as it split off from Medieval Greek two centuries afterwards. However, it is conventially treated as one.

Despite Grekelin now being one language with two variants, some consider the Slavic dialect a seperate language, since it derives from another Old Grekelin dialect (Compare the Slavic and Northern dialects from above) and was not in contact with the rest of the Old Grekelin dialects for over 500 years.

Example Texts

Digenes Acritas (Translated)

This is a small part of the Digenes Acritas song, translated into Proto-Grekelin. It was one of the few surviving Byzantine songs in the era, and it's one of the few texts to be written using the Greek script. Notable parts include the use of the digamma to denote the now lost /w/ sound, the use of [ζ̌] to indicate the /ʒ/ sound and the introduction of the [σζ] digraph to show the /ʃ/ sound.

For comparison, the original verse is put by the side. Do note that the tildes do not mean much in pronunciation of the text. The version of the text displayed here is from the 17th century, about 5 centuries after the original was written down:

Verse from Digenes Acritas in Old Grekelin and Medieval Greek

Old Grekelin	Medieval Greek
Κί σάμα είϝλαϊν ἀδέρφια τἦ ά κόρα μαρεμέναν, μαζιή αῑ πένδε ρεστένατσζαν, δάϝτο λόγο ειρελάλησσαϊ: 'Ρἐστάσζε, ά λεγένυα, εῑδεσζην αδερφήν μἦ εχὧμεθα σἧ άς δήζ̌ήϝετην κὶ ά Θιὸς φέλατσζε σἧ έτσζ σέπυως κάλλεως σἧ. Πόλεμους οὐ φοβὧμεθα έτσζ ἀγάπη σἧ.'	Καὶ ὡς εἴδασιν τὰ ἀδέλφια της τὴν κόρην μαραμένην, ἀντάμα οἱ πέντε ἐστέναξαν, τοιοῦτον λόγον εἶπαν: 'Ἐγείρου, ἠ βεργόλικος, γλυκύν μας τὸ ἀδέλφιν˙ ἐμεῖς γὰρ ἐκρατοῦμαν σε ὡς γιὰ ἀποθαμένην καὶ ἐσὲν ὁ Θεὸς ἐφύλαξεν διὰ τὰ ὡραῖα σου κάλλη. Πολέμους οὐ φοβούμεθα διὰ τὴν σὴν ἀγάπην.'