Page:Christian Greece and Living Greek.djvu/58

 36 CHRISTIAN GREECE AND LIVING GREEK. establishment, then ro-oypaipia had been formed, and from the latter a great many combinations were made which could not possibly have been formed from araiir.spia. In the same manner was a/Jouzriro^, then the genuine Greek durjydpo?, or first TTOffva, the raxudpufiBiov, etc. Thesc and thousands of foreign words are now entirely out of use, and may be known only to the oldest people ; the majority of the Greeks have no recollection of them. This process continues wherever a for- eign word has been introduced. In my child's dX I find the word /xai/xoo (monkey). In vain should I look for it in a Greek dictionary. It is not a regular word adopted by the literary language. From nai/io6 we can form the diminu- tive fiaifiouddxc, but that is all; while from the genuine and regular word ttWtjxo? 1 can form Tzidrjxt^w, TuOriXL<Tfx6<s^ 7:c0rjXt(TTij<Sj etC. This shoWS hoW the metaphoric use of words like fxai/io6 is very limited, that of -tOrjxo?, however, very extended. This facility of combinations which is so fre- quent is a great advantage in regard to genuine and regular Greek words. Greek, the new literary language, has steadily become richer and more homogeneous ever since 1 821; it undergoes changes all the time. Con- struction and forms are constantly remodelled