for all who followed my previous Greek Crisis I've decided "Eugenides" is properly pronounced without the hard "g"

Not that it ever mattered…

I feel a bit of imposter syndrome about being a classics nerd because it's only peripherally my area of academic study

but it's fine, the classical references in the canon I play from currently are all made up, so it's fine

in Attic Greek, "ΕΥΓΕΝΙΔΗΣ" (lowercase is a later invention) would be pronounced with a hard G— the same sound in like, Antigone, or Gaia

this isn't true in modern greek or even in most ancient dialects

but when you learn ancient greek they teach you attic pronunciations because athens bias

would it be a g like in gif

eu-jen? or am i overthinking

i’m trying to think really hard but was there even truly a soft g in ancient greek? what would it be in the case of the Aegean Sea

i always thought that was soft but did that sea actually go by.. that name... i’m not even sure at this point

okay when I get off mobile I will do some Greek pronunciation basics

one: the g in gif is fake

two: disclaimer that there are in fact many dialects of Ancient Greek and idk anything about like, Doric Greek, Laconian, &c

traditionally classical Greek is Attic, the language of Athens, which is also the basis of Koine Greek, the language of Hellenistic times and late antiquity. Biblical Greek is Koine Greek.

Homeric Greek also is its own thing since it significantly predates the classical period and has some of its own issues: see also the dual in the Iliad, a ongoing classics mystery

But in Attic Greek, aescapes there is no soft G.

i kind of thought that was the case! taps chin. and so the aegean sea? hard g, named after.... aigeas?

but today, pronounced with a soft g?

In modern Greek there is but the exact sound doesn't exist in English and the j is more like ja

in ancient times the Aegean was known mostly as αρχιπέλαγος

arkipelagos

Αἰγεύς = Aegeus (a hard g)

Eugenides = Ευγενιδης, in Attic this would be Eugenidehs with a hard g and η as a long "eh" kind of sound, like the e in "bed" but lengthened. In Modern Greek, written the same way, the γ/g is soft and the η is more like the English "ee" sound.

So probably exactly as you've been pronouncing it.

Incidentally the vowel at the end of Irene/Εἰρηνη is also eta. All of those vowels are long = "Eirehneh" or "Irini"

Attic Greek loves vowels and hard consonants and the letter H is a vowel so the h sound is always implicit / represented with hard or soft breathing

e.g. Helen/Ἑλένη, where the h sound is indicated by the ῾ in front of the initial E.

note that I never remembered accents or aspiration marks because I was a lazy greek student but they're important for poetic meter or smth

anyway there you go, the nerdiest tangent I've been on since that rant about the dual in the Iliad or the time I broke down the Latin in Iron Man 2

or, let's not forget, the time I discovered there was an ancient greek verb for sticking a piece of fruit up someone's asshole

... you know. it does not surprise me there is a greek verb for that

there's a verb for that™

also i feel the soft g/hard g debate. it took me forever to figure out how to pronounce "iphigenia"

lo, the particular torture of threading in ancient greek

baleinette I have to decide if he'd recognize the name Aphrodite

all gen's gods are fake

but it's implied once that the olympian gods are the religion of the invaders, so I might go with that

THAT SOUNDS LIKE ZEUS TBH

ffff we blew up at work but i love this discussion. caught up now that i’m home.

silena like THATS MY STUPID FAMILY

I think it's probably more fun if he recognizes some legends as from this vague outsider pantheon but immediately he's not going to associate aphrodite with the goddess, having the same name as a god doesn't make you a god & he would know

also important I looked up the plurk and it was specifically a verb for putting a radish up someone's ass

not just any fruit but a radish specifically

@lightfellows - (vocabulary) ραφανιδόω = "to thrust ...

lmao a radish...

as a punishment

A RADISH

why a radish

i mean

I DON'T KNOW

i guess it’s like the ancient greek version/size/shape of a... plug?? maybe they had to walk around with it for a while omg...

maybe it was a kinky punishment