Grekelin
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| Grekelin | |
|---|---|
| A gnújza Grekelénikin | |
| Created by | Aggelos Tselios |
| Date | 2023 |
| Native to | Slovakia, Hungary, Serbia |
| Ethnicity | Greeks |
| Native speakers | approx. 100 thousand (2023) |
Early forms | |
Standard form | Standard Grekelin
|
Dialects |
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| Official status | |
Official language in | Csongrád-Csanád |
| Regulated by | Grekelin Language Administration |
Grekelin (Autoglossonym: A gnújza Grekelénikin, pronounced: /a ˈɡnʊd͡ʒɑ grːɛkɛˈlɛnikin/, lit. "The Grekelin language") is a Hellenic language with strong Hungarian influence. Grekelin split from Medieval Greek around the 12th century with the mass settlement of Hungary by Greek refugees, and has since then split for more than 9 centuries from Greek.
As a related language to Greek, Grekelin shares with Greek multiple features although it remains more conservative than Standard Greek. However the language has become an SOV one (As opposed to most Indo-European languages which are SVO) due to extensive Hungarian influence. It's vocabulary has almost mostly remained Greek however Hungarian words can be found often in the language. Grekelin is the most isolated Hellenic language currently in the entire world, with about 1200 kilometers of language seperation.
Etymology
Grekelin comes from the Old Hungarian word Görög, which means Greek. The suffix -lin comes from Proto-Grekelin "Hellin" which is the ethnonym for the Greeks. Another legend says that Grekelin was a very old Slavic word to describe the Greeks of the Black Sea, during the Kievan Rus times. It appears that the surname Grekelin exists in Ukrainian and Belarusian (Грекелін).
Alphabet and Orthography
The Grekelin alphabet consists of 28 letters, five of which are vowels and 23 are consonants.
| Letters of the Grekelin alphabet | ||||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Aa (/ɑ/) | Bb (/b/) | Cc (/t͡s/) | Dd (/d/) | Ee (/ɛ/) | Ff (/ɸ/) | Gg (/ɟ/) | Hh (/χ/) | Yy (/j/ or palatalization) | Ii (/i/) | Kk (/k/) | Ll (/ɫ/) | Mm (/m/) | Nn (/n/) | Οο (/o/) | Pp (/p/) | Rr (/rː/) | Ss (/s/) | Jj (/d͡ʒ/) | Tt (/t/) | Uu (/u/) | Ww (/v/) | Zz (/z/) |
The letters correspond always to their pronunciation. The Grekelin orthography is considered a phonetic, as opposed to deep orthographies like French's.
(Grekelin recently switched from the Greek to the Latin alphabet. For now consider that it's written with both but the Latin is preferred)
In addition, the following digraphs are used within the language:
| Digraphs in Grekelin orthography | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Ei (When behind a consonant or ο, it makes the /ji/ sound) | Gz (Makes the /ɟkʰ/ sound) | Zs (Makes the /ʐ/ sound) | Sz (Makes the /ʃ/ sound) |
The Grekelin orthography was reformed recently, as part of a larger reform within the conlang. As a result, some texts that preexisted on the internet may not comply with the modern form of the language.
Grammar
The grammar of Grekelin is generally very simple and consistent. It is very conservative compared to Greek (Or dialects of it).
- Grekelin has two articles, a and egy. a becomes e (Remnant of Greek genders) if the subject or object ends with -i.
- Grekelin has also lost it's grammatical genders, although traces of it still remain in the language. The loss of genders was seen during the shift to Proto-Grekelin, which did not distinguish inflections as much as Greek, leading to gender endings merging together.
- Fusional verb inflection for person, number and tense.
- Grekelin has 4 cases: Nominative, genitive, accusative and vocative. In the Slavic dialect, another case persists (Although different from the one in Proto-Grekelin), the dative case:
| Case | Singular | Plural |
|---|---|---|
| Nominative | (A) gnújza | (A) gegnújzek |
| Genitive | Ta gnújzas | Tak gegnújzes |
| Accusative | Ecs gnújza | Ecs gegnújzek |
| Dative | Gnujzadúk | Gegnujzadúkek |
| Vocative | Oh gnújzae | Oh gegnújzaek |
Nouns ending in -i are slightly different but overall not very hard:
| Case | Singular | Plural |
|---|---|---|
| Nominative | (E) kuklí | (E) kekuklímek |
| Genitive | Te kuklín | Tek kekuklínimek |
| Accusative | Ecs kuklí | Ecs kuklí |
| Dative | Kuklidúk | Kekuklikedúk |
| Vocative | Oh kuklí | Oh keklukímeka |
Geographic Distribution and Demographics
Grekelin today has about 50 thousand speakers, spread out all across Central Europe. Out of them, 28.000 lived in Hungary, another 16.500 live in Serbia or Greece, and 15.500 live in Slovakia or Ukraine (Carpathia). It forms the majority language in villages of North Banat and some spread out parts of Slovakia and Ukraine. It forms a significant language in Hungary and is also spoken in Greece, primarily from learners. The populations of Serbia and Slovakia speak the Slavic dialect whereas the Hungarian populations speak the Standard dialect.
Stress
Grekelin does not have any rules on the stress placement. The stress may go on any position unless the final vowel is doubled*, where the stress is automatically passed there. The standard Grekelin dialect makes stressed syllables have longer length, a remnant of the Classical Greek vowel length feature. Slavic Grekelin instead makes all the phonemes have the same length.
*Doubled vowels are largely extinct in Modern Grekelin, as oo for example would become ojzo.
Evolution
Vowels
Grekelin preserved all Medieval Greek vowels, except for /y/. Vowel length was already lost although some Slavic subdialects do preserve the Proto-Grekelin rule, where a stressed vowel becomes slightly longer and pronounced more clearly.
Consonants
Many consonants underwent a very regular but much more extensive evolution found in most Greek dialects, called Tsitakismos, where /k/ and /c/ are palatalized. Modern Grekelin further merged many consonants and clusters in words into /d͡ʒ/, such as /ks/, /z/, /n/, /k/ and /ɣ/. /l/ became entirely /ɫ/, something only common in Macedonia then. Finally, in Proto-Grekelin, if the preceding letter was a consonant, /v/ became /w/. Metathesis is very common in the language too, as consonant clusters are often split apart eg. Greek Αλεύρι vs Grekelin Aléwir.
Grammar
Grekelin melted down much of Greek grammar, including the deletion of genders and moods. In addition, Grekelin is slowly turning from a fusional language to an agglutinative one:
- Greek: Είδα τους ανθρώπους
- Grekelin: E leleóttek íwlima
Grekelin uses seperate particles for the plural, person, tense and recepient.
Words
Conversation
| English (Egzlezikin) | Grekelin (Grekelenikin) | Pronunciation (IPA) |
|---|---|---|
| Yes | Ne | /nɛ/ |
| No | u | /u/ |
| Hello! | Jzóworzso! (Formal) / Gya! (Informal) | /'d͡ʒoβorʐo/ /ɟʲɑː/ |
| Good morning! | Jo regzétti! | /d͡ʒo rɛ'ɟkʰɛːti/ |
| Good night! | Jo niktrá! | /d͡ʒo njk'tr̩ɑ/ |
| Have a nice day! | Eis jódila sei! | /jis 'd͡ʒodilɑ si/ |
| Goodbye! | Wísontlataszra | /'visontɭatɑːʃr̩a/ |
| Thank you! | Jzómmo! | /ˈd͡ʒomo/ |
| Who? | Pkios? | /pkjoːs/ |
| What? | Ti? | /ti/ |
| When? | Pónte? | /ˈpo.ntɛ/ |
| Where? | Pe? | /pɛ/ |
| How? | Posz? | /ˈpoʃ/ |
| Why | Jzátti? | /'d͡ʒati/ |
| Again | Uyrá | /ujˈrɑ/ |
| What is your name? | Ti entá a nóma sei? | /ti ɛnˈta ɑ ˈno.mɑ si/ |
| My name is... | A nóma mei entá ...' | /ɑ ˈno.ma mi enˈtα/ |
| Do you speak English? | Relalíte a egzlézikin? | /rɛ.ɫɑˈɫ̩ita ɑ ɛɟkʱˈɫɛ.zikiŋ/ |
| I do not understand Grekelin. | U nyõ a gnújza Grekelénikin. | /u ɲoː ɑ ˈɡnud͡ʒɑ ɡrɛˈkɛ.ɫɛnikiŋ/ |
| Help me! | Woíttya! | /ˈvoˈitʲɑ/ |
| How much is it? | Pószo entá? | /ˈpoʃo ɛnˈtɑ/ |
| The study of Grekelin sharpens the mind. | Máttkiszi ta Grekelénikis peiá a nu kowtoérta. | /'matkisi grːɛkɛˈlɛ.nikibiː pjɑ α nu kovtoˈɛr.ta/ |
| Where are you from? | Pe énte ecs szy? | /pɛ ˈɛnte ɛt͡s ʃi/ |
Dialects
Grekelin has three dialects, depending on where each is or was spoken.
Slavic
The Slavic ("Dialékti Sláwin", "/djɑˈɫɛ.kti sɫɑvin/" or "/diaˈɫʲekta sɫɑvʲin/") dialect can be distinguished by some certain features that aren't present in Standard Grekelin:
- Skipping of the verb "to be" (énta) in the present tense (Dáwto énta egy wlemíni -> Dáwto egy wlemíni), if the subject can be assumed.
- The letter "u" represents the /ɨ/ sound instead of the /u/ one, when unstressed.
- Borrow of Slavic words instead of using Grekelin ones (A kárka -> A sztúlla).
- Preserving the dative case (Eis a míra -> A mirajdú) (NOTE: The dative case fixes the stress on the last syllable, which must be an u).
The Slavic dialect is spoken fluently in the Vojvodina region of Serbia, where it is flourishing as a local language. It is also spoken by a tiny community living in Slovakia.
Urlogrockae
The Urlogrockae ("Urlegrekelin" dialect is the one used as the standard language. It's closer to Hungarian when it comes to phonetics but closer to Greek when it comes to orthography. Key features of this dialect, compared to the Slavic one and mainly to (Medieval) Greek are:
- Skipping the final vowel in pronounciation, if it's a short one (y or i).
- "E" does not use the Proto-Grekelin "/eː/" sound but the Urlogrok "/ε/".
- /k/ has replaced /s/ in many grammatical rules: Greek "Οι λέοντες" vs Grekelin "E keléontek".
- Higher effect of soft and hard Tsitakismos (/j/, /i/ become /d͡ʒ/, /k/ becomes /t͡s/, etc), similar to multiple Greek dialects.
- Rarely, voiced consonants become voiceless when unstressed
Western (Extinct)
A more archaic and richer dialect is Western Grekelin. While not as diversified as the Slavic dialect, it remains a very interesting dialect. Some features include:
- /o/ becomes /u/ when unstressed
- Softening of /s/ and /k/ into /ʃ/ and /x/ respectively
- Preservation of the final /s/ (Which was lost in the other dialects) as a softer /ʃ/, except for the plural: Standard /oˈr̩ɑˑnɑ/ (αυράνα) and Western /oˈr̩ɑˑɳoʃ/ (αυράνοs)
- Preservation of the dative case (Different from the one in Slavic Grekelin). The dative case of this dialect remains from Attic Greek whereas Slavic Grekelin invented it due to excessive Slavic influence.
This dialect went extinct in the 18th century, being replaced by Standard Grekelin.
Example texts
Basic sentence
English
I would like a coffee and biscuits, thank you.
Grekelin
(Go) tílko egy káve kia kebiszkótek, jzommo.
UN Human Rights Declaration, Article 1
English:
All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.
Grekelin:
Pádi leleóttek lelészterek kiá memísek wewórtamek eís méltosagi kiá yógatek. Dedórizandek mí észeli kiá siníndiszi, kiá prépi ná ecszinálnamek á égy eís állila eís égy sélemi tá adérfiktas.
Lord's prayer
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