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91-672: The Cibyrrhaeots ( ‹See Tfd› Greek : Κιβυρραιῶται , translit.   Kibyrrhaiōtai , lit.  "men of Cibyrrha") derive their name from the city of Cibyrrha (it is unclear whether this is Cibyrrha the Great in Caria or Cibyrrha the Lesser in Pamphylia ). The command first appears in the expedition against Carthage in 698, when a " droungarios of the Cibyrrhaeots"

182-675: A krites and later by a doux . Most of its territory was lost to the Seljuk Turks after the 1071 Battle of Manzikert , but recovered under Alexios I Komnenos ( r.  1081–1118 ). The rump theme was finally abolished by Manuel I Komnenos ( r.  1143–1180 ), and the territory in Caria subordinated to the theme Mylasa and Melanoudion . Greek language Greek ( Modern Greek : Ελληνικά , romanized :  Elliniká , [eliniˈka] ; Ancient Greek : Ἑλληνική , romanized :  Hellēnikḗ )

273-577: A basis for coinages: anthropology , photography , telephony , isomer , biomechanics , cinematography , etc. Together with Latin words , they form the foundation of international scientific and technical vocabulary ; for example, all words ending in -logy ('discourse'). There are many English words of Greek origin . Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European language family. The ancient language most closely related to it may be ancient Macedonian , which, by most accounts,

364-662: A close aristocrat to the Basileus . The Katepanakia inside the Theme were ruled by a deputy of the Doux called a "Praktor" or "Energon", they were appointed either by the monarch or the Doux himself, with the primary task of the collection of taxes and a second role in the maintenance of basic order, administration and justice in his district. Alexios fiscal reforms allowed an institution or individual to catalog and group their land domains and, through it, their fiscal obligations, in

455-447: A document referred as praktikon . The new reform essentially broke from the integrity of the "chora" or village tax, as its new purpose was the collection of the various taxes regardless of whether collection was by an institution, individual or the village itself, essentially offering it to the highest bidder. Although a simplification, it was not an improvement, as it pushed a great variety of villages and towns to eventually be added to

546-558: A fairly stable set of consonantal contrasts . The main phonological changes occurred during the Hellenistic and Roman period (see Koine Greek phonology for details): In all its stages, the morphology of Greek shows an extensive set of productive derivational affixes , a limited but productive system of compounding and a rich inflectional system. Although its morphological categories have been fairly stable over time, morphological changes are present throughout, particularly in

637-560: A faster, more convenient cursive writing style with the use of ink and quill . The Greek alphabet consists of 24 letters, each with an uppercase ( majuscule ) and lowercase ( minuscule ) form. The letter sigma has an additional lowercase form (ς) used in the final position of a word: In addition to the letters, the Greek alphabet features a number of diacritical signs : three different accent marks ( acute , grave , and circumflex ), originally denoting different shapes of pitch accent on

728-540: A foreign language. It is also often stated that the historical changes have been relatively slight compared with some other languages. According to one estimation, " Homeric Greek is probably closer to Demotic than 12-century Middle English is to modern spoken English ". Greek is spoken today by at least 13 million people, principally in Greece and Cyprus along with a sizable Greek-speaking minority in Albania near

819-425: A great internal weakness and the cause of various coups and rebellions in which viceroys with provincial armies and, sometimes, entire themes , would often challenge imperial power with claims of their own. In this way emperors such as Nikephoros II Phokas ( r.  963–969 ) and Heraclius ( r.  610–641 ) achieved royal power for themselves. There were no codified laws on the imperial succession, and

910-417: A greater centralization of power. The various Themes had been divided into smaller districts called "Katepanakia" which in turn were made up of the various towns and villages (chora) , the monastic estates (episkpesis) , the estates of the dynatoi (proasteion) , and the various pronoia grants. The Themes were ruled by a "Doux" , who was positioned by the emperor directly, commonly a relative of his or

1001-400: A high official would be both magistros (an "awarded" title) and logothetēs tou dromou (a "proclaimed" office). The "by award" titles for the "Bearded Ones" (non-eunuchs ) were, in descending order of precedence: By descending order of precedence, the "by award" titles for the eunuchs were: Book of Offices ranks the order of command below the emperor: Byzantine administrative nature

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1092-486: A large number of honorific titles existed, which the emperor awarded to prominent subjects or to friendly foreign rulers. Over the more than a thousand years of the empire's existence, the Imperial administrative system evolved in its adoption of historic titles. At first, the various titles of the empire were the same as those of the late Roman Empire . However, by the era of Heraclius ( r.  610–641 ), many of

1183-670: A regular theme , with its governing strategos first attested in 731/732. Until the 9th century, when the themes of the Aegean Sea and Samos were elevated from droungarios -level commands, the Cibyrrhaeot Theme was the only dedicated naval theme of the Empire. The theme encompassed the southern coast of Asia Minor (modern Turkey ), from south of Miletus (which belonged to the Thracesian Theme ) to

1274-444: A rise in importance of the aristocracy, and an increased number of new families entering it. The catastrophic losses in the latter 11th century again prompted a reorganization of the imperial administrative system, at the hands of the new Komnenos dynasty : the older offices and titles fell gradually into disuse, while an array of new honorifics emerged, which signified primarily the closeness of their recipient's familial relationship to

1365-804: Is also found in Bulgaria near the Greek-Bulgarian border. Greek is also spoken worldwide by the sizable Greek diaspora which has notable communities in the United States , Australia , Canada , South Africa , Chile , Brazil , Argentina , Russia , Ukraine , the United Kingdom , and throughout the European Union , especially in Germany . Historically, significant Greek-speaking communities and regions were found throughout

1456-773: Is an Indo-European language, constituting an independent Hellenic branch within the Indo-European language family. It is native to Greece , Cyprus , Italy (in Calabria and Salento ), southern Albania , and other regions of the Balkans , Caucasus , the Black Sea coast, Asia Minor , and the Eastern Mediterranean . It has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning at least 3,400 years of written records. Its writing system

1547-479: Is an Indo-European language, but also includes a number of borrowings from the languages of the populations that inhabited Greece before the arrival of Proto-Greeks, some documented in Mycenaean texts ; they include a large number of Greek toponyms . The form and meaning of many words have changed. Loanwords (words of foreign origin) have entered the language, mainly from Latin, Venetian , and Turkish . During

1638-531: Is attested as commanding the men from Korykos : Apsimar, who at the head of a fleet revolt became emperor as Tiberios III ( r.  698–705 ). At the time, the Cibyrrhaeots were subordinate to the great naval corps of the Karabisianoi . After the Karabisianoi were disbanded (the exact date is disputed between c.  719/720 and c.  727 ), the Cibyrrhaeots were constituted as

1729-519: Is protected and promoted officially as a regional and minority language in Armenia, Hungary , Romania, and Ukraine. It is recognized as a minority language and protected in Turkey by the 1923 Treaty of Lausanne . The phonology , morphology , syntax , and vocabulary of the language show both conservative and innovative tendencies across the entire attestation of the language from the ancient to

1820-822: Is sometimes called aljamiado , as when Romance languages are written in the Arabic alphabet. Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in Greek: Transcription of the example text into Latin alphabet : Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in English: Proto-Greek Mycenaean Ancient Koine Medieval Modern Krites Throughout

1911-526: Is spoken by at least 13.5 million people today in Greece, Cyprus, Italy, Albania, Turkey , and the many other countries of the Greek diaspora . Greek roots have been widely used for centuries and continue to be widely used to coin new words in other languages; Greek and Latin are the predominant sources of international scientific vocabulary . Greek has been spoken in the Balkan peninsula since around

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2002-763: Is still used internationally for the writing of Ancient Greek . In Greek, the question mark is written as the English semicolon, while the functions of the colon and semicolon are performed by a raised point (•), known as the ano teleia ( άνω τελεία ). In Greek the comma also functions as a silent letter in a handful of Greek words, principally distinguishing ό,τι ( ó,ti , 'whatever') from ότι ( óti , 'that'). Ancient Greek texts often used scriptio continua ('continuous writing'), which means that ancient authors and scribes would write word after word with no spaces or punctuation between words to differentiate or mark boundaries. Boustrophedon , or bi-directional text,

2093-650: Is the Greek alphabet , which has been used for approximately 2,800 years; previously, Greek was recorded in writing systems such as Linear B and the Cypriot syllabary . The alphabet arose from the Phoenician script and was in turn the basis of the Latin , Cyrillic , Coptic , Gothic , and many other writing systems. The Greek language holds a very important place in the history of the Western world. Beginning with

2184-464: The katepano who commanded the theme's Mardaites . These were the descendants of several thousand people transplanted from the area of Lebanon and settled there by Emperor Justinian II ( r.  685–695, 705–711 ) in the 680s to provide crews and marines for the fleet. In the early 9th century, the thematic fleet of the Cibyrrhaeots comprised 70 ships; and in the Cretan expedition of 911,

2275-573: The Taktikon Uspensky of 842/843, dropping to fifty-fifth in the Escorial Taktikon of 971–975. Like its other counterparts, the Cibyrrhaeot Theme was divided into droungoi and tourmai , and possessed the full array of typical thematic administrative positions. Among the most important subordinates of the strategos were the imperial ek prosopou at Syllaion , the droungarioi of Attaleia and Kos and

2366-495: The Eastern Mediterranean , in what are today Southern Italy , Turkey , Cyprus , Syria , Lebanon , Israel , Palestine , Egypt , and Libya ; in the area of the Black Sea , in what are today Turkey, Bulgaria , Romania , Ukraine , Russia , Georgia , Armenia , and Azerbaijan ; and, to a lesser extent, in the Western Mediterranean in and around colonies such as Massalia , Monoikos , and Mainake . It

2457-516: The Indo-Iranian languages (see Graeco-Aryan ), but little definitive evidence has been found. In addition, Albanian has also been considered somewhat related to Greek and Armenian, and it has been proposed that they all form a higher-order subgroup along with other extinct languages of the ancient Balkans; this higher-order subgroup is usually termed Palaeo-Balkan , and Greek has a central position in it. Linear B , attested as early as

2548-844: The Roman Republic was never formally abolished. Theoretically, each emperor was formally elected, by both the senate (Synkletos) and the army . In practice, however, the Senate had lost all of its former powers and was mostly reduced to a ceremonial role, filled with relatives or close aristocrats to the Emperor; while the Army practically had a monopoly regarding elections. Emperors usually managed to secure succession for their children through indirect means, such as appointing them as co-emperors, and thus introduced various dynasties . The absence of codified succession laws and procedures, as well as

2639-423: The allelengyon . Becoming one of several towns within the estates of the different institutions and individuals of the time was an unbearable phenomenon for many communes due to the various fiscal tolerances that the basileus offered the different monastic institutions and their estates, further accelerating the disappearance of the fiscal individuality of the villages and towns. The 10th and 11th centuries saw

2730-426: The fall of Constantinople ) was the joint tax liability system of the different communities inside a théma , duties which were carried out by provincial officials such as the epoptes , exisotes , and praktores of the different bureaus. A Theme was made up of several individuals and institutions, such as the various lands that the many monasteries owned (episkepsis) , the soldiers' farming lands (stratiotai),

2821-492: The nominal and verbal systems. The major change in the nominal morphology since the classical stage was the disuse of the dative case (its functions being largely taken over by the genitive ). The verbal system has lost the infinitive , the synthetically -formed future, and perfect tenses and the optative mood . Many have been replaced by periphrastic ( analytical ) forms. Pronouns show distinctions in person (1st, 2nd, and 3rd), number (singular, dual , and plural in

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2912-643: The senate . At the peaceful height of Middle Byzantium, court life "passed in a sort of ballet", with precise ceremonies prescribed for every occasion, to show that "Imperial power could be exercised in harmony and order", and "the Empire could thus reflect the motion of the Universe as it was made by the Creator", according to the Emperor Constantine Porphyrogenitus , who wrote a Book of Ceremonies describing in enormous detail

3003-413: The thematic military system whose functions had been simplified and specialized in the rapid creation of provincial armies. Influenced by Orthodox kingship and Hellenistic theocratic philosophies , power was relegated to military leaders, with the various Strategoi , Katepan , Douk, Kephalai or Exarch each acting as viceroys in their respective " thémata " or governorships, all being appointed by

3094-484: The "classic" or middle period of the Byzantine state (8th-late 11th centuries), a new, court-centered system emerged. In this, dignities of a certain level were awarded with new titles derived from older, now obsolete, public offices. A senatorial class remained in place, which incorporated a large part of the upper officialdom; every official from the rank of protospatharios (literally "first sword-bearer"; originally

3185-470: The 3rd millennium BC, or possibly earlier. The earliest written evidence is a Linear B clay tablet found in Messenia that dates to between 1450 and 1350 BC, making Greek the world's oldest recorded living language . Among the Indo-European languages, its date of earliest written attestation is matched only by the now-extinct Anatolian languages . The Greek language is conventionally divided into

3276-533: The Byzantine navy, fulfilling a tax supporting role largely in contrast from the more active and military themas of Strategos and Katepanos focussed in Asia Minor. The duties of said governors were largely limited to the collection of the various maritime taxes of their governorships; the management of the various large urban centers such as Athens, Corinth or Thebes; and a basic level of protection for its provinces against pirates and any other parties. During

3367-521: The Cibyrrhaeot theme sent 31 warships – 15 large dromons and 16 middle-sized pamphyloi – with 6,000 oarsmen and 760 marines. Around the mid-11th century, as the Muslim naval threat subsided, the Byzantine provincial fleets began a precipitate decline: the fleet of the Cibyrrhaeots is last mentioned in the repulsion of a Rus' raid in 1043, and the theme became a purely civil province, headed by

3458-538: The Emperor desired. In the 8th–11th centuries, according to information provided by the Taktikon Uspensky , the Klētorologion of Philotheos (899) and the writings of Constantine Porphyrogennetos , below the imperial titles, the Byzantines distinguished two distinct categories of dignities ( ἀξίαι ): the "dignities by award" ( διὰ βραβείων ἀξίαι ), which were purely honorific court titles and were conferred by

3549-411: The Emperor. The Komnenian-led Empire, and later their Palaiologan successors, were based primarily on the landed aristocracy , keeping the governance of the state tightly controlled by a limited number of intermarrying aristocratic families; for instance in the 11th and 12th century, only 80 civil and 64 military noble families have been identified, a very small number for so large a state. Finally, in

3640-486: The Greek alphabet since approximately the 9th century BC. It was created by modifying the Phoenician alphabet , with the innovation of adopting certain letters to represent the vowels. The variant of the alphabet in use today is essentially the late Ionic variant, introduced for writing classical Attic in 403 BC. In classical Greek, as in classical Latin, only upper-case letters existed. The lower-case Greek letters were developed much later by medieval scribes to permit

3731-425: The Greek language are often emphasized. Although Greek has undergone morphological and phonological changes comparable to those seen in other languages, never since classical antiquity has its cultural, literary, and orthographic tradition been interrupted to the extent that one can speak of a new language emerging. Greek speakers today still tend to regard literary works of ancient Greek as part of their own rather than

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3822-495: The Greek language was the Cypriot syllabary (also a descendant of Linear A via the intermediate Cypro-Minoan syllabary ), which is closely related to Linear B but uses somewhat different syllabic conventions to represent phoneme sequences. The Cypriot syllabary is attested in Cyprus from the 11th century BC until its gradual abandonment in the late Classical period, in favor of the standard Greek alphabet. Greek has been written in

3913-629: The Greek verb have likewise remained largely the same over the course of the language's history but with significant changes in the number of distinctions within each category and their morphological expression. Greek verbs have synthetic inflectional forms for: Many aspects of the syntax of Greek have remained constant: verbs agree with their subject only, the use of the surviving cases is largely intact (nominative for subjects and predicates, accusative for objects of most verbs and many prepositions, genitive for possessors), articles precede nouns, adpositions are largely prepositional, relative clauses follow

4004-685: The Greek-Albanian border. A significant percentage of Albania's population has knowledge of the Greek language due in part to the Albanian wave of immigration to Greece in the 1980s and '90s and the Greek community in the country. Prior to the Greco-Turkish War and the resulting population exchange in 1923 a very large population of Greek-speakers also existed in Turkey , though very few remain today. A small Greek-speaking community

4095-459: The Palaiologan system as reported by pseudo-Kodinos , one can discern the accumulated nomenclature of centuries, with formerly high ranks having been devalued and others taking their place, and the old distinction between office and dignity having vanished. These were the highest titles, usually limited to members of the imperial family or to a few very select foreign rulers whose friendship

4186-565: The Strategos in his military duties. Due to the lack of action or large-scale battles in the thematas of mainland Greece , by the 12th century most of these came to be governed directly by the Megas doux , under him the Krites or Archons of the various coastal cities. The themes , now made up of several Archontates , was accommodated and repurposed solely for the income and maintenance of

4277-404: The acute during the late 20th century, and it has only been retained in typography . After the writing reform of 1982, most diacritics are no longer used. Since then, Greek has been written mostly in the simplified monotonic orthography (or monotonic system), which employs only the acute accent and the diaeresis. The traditional system, now called the polytonic orthography (or polytonic system),

4368-402: The ancient language; singular and plural alone in later stages), and gender (masculine, feminine, and neuter), and decline for case (from six cases in the earliest forms attested to four in the modern language). Nouns, articles, and adjectives show all the distinctions except for a person. Both attributive and predicative adjectives agree with the noun. The inflectional categories of

4459-470: The annual round of the Court. Special forms of dress for many classes of people on particular occasions are set down; at the name-day dinner for the Emperor or Empress various groups of high officials performed ceremonial "dances", one group wearing "a blue and white garment, with short sleeves, and gold bands, and rings on their ankles. In their hands they hold what are called phengia ". The second group do just

4550-485: The award of a symbol of rank, and the "dignities by proclamation" ( διὰ λόγου ἀξίαι ), which were offices of the state and were conferred by imperial pronouncement. The former were further divided into three subcategories, depending on who was eligible for them: different sets of titles existed for the "Bearded Ones" ( βαρβάτοι from Latin barbati , i.e. not eunuchs), the eunuchs ( ἐκτομίαι ) and women. State officials usually combined titles from both main categories, so that

4641-480: The borders, or for the management of new successful territorial acquisitions after long-term campaigns, thereby taking key roles as protagonists of any armed offensive headed by the emperor. A Strategos , or any military governor, was assisted by several deputies, chief among them the tourmarchēs or merarchēs (to a lesser degree also referred as topotērētēs ). The main provincial governors and their deputies held equal military and administrative duties within

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4732-644: The confines of the Arab borderlands in Cilicia , including the old Roman provinces of Caria , Lycia , Pamphylia and parts of Isauria , as well as the modern Dodecanese . Its geographical position made it the "front-line" theme facing the attacks of the Muslim fleets of the Levant and Egypt , and consequently the Cibyrrhaeots played a major role in the naval aspect of the Byzantine–Arab Wars . The land, which

4823-487: The constant Christianized worldview of late antiquity . By the 6th century, such ideas had already influenced the definitive power of the monarch as the representative of God on earth and of his kingdom as an imitation of God's holy realm . The Byzantine Empire was a multi-ethnic monarchic theocracy adopting, following, and applying the Orthodox - Hellenistic political systems and philosophies . The monarch

4914-519: The different episkpesis of either the adjoining monasteries or of the various well-resourced dynatoi landowners, who would become responsible for both their fiscal obligations as monastic institutions, or as individuals, and for the fiscal obligations of the various towns and villages in their domain. This trend culminated in the eventual disappearance of the fiscal individuality that each commune or town had enjoyed, something which emperors like Basil II had fought and delayed with special taxes such as

5005-400: The different communities ("Chora", "Komai"), from the different land owners estates ("proasteion"), and from monasteries (" episkepsis ") . Additionally, and more commonly, as the right hand of the emperor in the management of internal and external affairs, they had to provide an efficient management of fast and flexible provincial armies, dispatching them to appease different threats within

5096-404: The early 19th century that was used for literary and official purposes in the newly formed Greek state. In 1976, Dimotiki was declared the official language of Greece, after having incorporated features of Katharevousa and thus giving birth to Standard Modern Greek , used today for all official purposes and in education . The historical unity and continuing identity between the various stages of

5187-444: The emperor when he took part in religious ceremonies or removed his crown. Eunuchs in the early Byzantine Empire were usually foreigners, and they were often seen as having a low status. This changed in the 10th century, when the social status of eunuchs increased and members of the educated Byzantine upper class began to become eunuchs. However, even by the time of Anna Comnena , with the Emperor away on military campaigns for much of

5278-521: The emperor's direct handling over its domains, foreshadowing similar future administrative reforms initiated and endorsed by contemporary divine Orthodox monarchical philosophy in the Greek-speaking eastern Mediterranean. Following the transformation of the Byzantine state during the 7th century due to massive territorial loss to the Muslim conquests , this early structuring came to be replaced by

5369-618: The epics of Homer , ancient Greek literature includes many works of lasting importance in the European canon . Greek is also the language in which many of the foundational texts in science and philosophy were originally composed. The New Testament of the Christian Bible was also originally written in Greek. Together with the Latin texts and traditions of the Roman world , the Greek texts and Greek societies of antiquity constitute

5460-470: The estates (proasteion) of the land owners ( dynatoi ) and the peasants (geōrgikē) , with most of a village or town (chora or komai) being made up of the later. These were the main source of a constant and rapid revenue that ultimately derived from the earlier Hellenistic fiscal and administrative principle of "epibole". Epibole had served as an accessible tool for the Hellenistic kingdoms for

5551-437: The face of state supreme ownership. Beneath the emperor, a multitude of officials and court functionaries—all directly chosen by the emperor or by one of his representatives—operated the empire's administrative bureaucracy. State officials acted not as magistrates or elected public legates , but as representatives, deputies, and viceroys of the monarch in his different domains throughout the empire. In addition to those officials,

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5642-408: The fifth century, Hellenistic political systems , philosophies , and theocratic Christian-Eastern concepts had gained power in the eastern Greek-speaking Mediterranean due to the intervention of important religious figures there such as Eusebius of Caesarea ( c.  260  – c.  339 ) and Origen of Alexandria ( c.  185  – c.  253 ) who had been key to developing

5733-452: The following periods: In the modern era, the Greek language entered a state of diglossia : the coexistence of vernacular and archaizing written forms of the language. What came to be known as the Greek language question was a polarization between two competing varieties of Modern Greek: Dimotiki , the vernacular form of Modern Greek proper, and Katharevousa , meaning 'purified', a compromise between Dimotiki and Ancient Greek developed in

5824-515: The head of the Emperor's bodyguards) was considered a member of it. During this period, many families remained important for several centuries, and several Emperors rose from the aristocracy. Two groups can be distinguished: a metropolitan civil nobility and a provincial military one, the latter remaining regionally based and having large land-holdings, but apparently no military forces of their own, in contrast to contemporary Western Europe . The backbone of Byzantine administration and economy (until

5915-439: The infinitive entirely (employing a raft of new periphrastic constructions instead) and uses participles more restrictively. The loss of the dative led to a rise of prepositional indirect objects (and the use of the genitive to directly mark these as well). Ancient Greek tended to be verb-final, but neutral word order in the modern language is VSO or SVO. Modern Greek inherits most of its vocabulary from Ancient Greek, which in turn

6006-467: The late 15th century BC, was the first script used to write Greek. It is basically a syllabary , which was finally deciphered by Michael Ventris and John Chadwick in the 1950s (its precursor, Linear A , has not been deciphered and most likely encodes a non-Greek language). The language of the Linear B texts, Mycenaean Greek , is the earliest known form of Greek. Another similar system used to write

6097-470: The main sub-division inside a thema, a tourma . These deputies, or any deputy or representative of the Strategos, or of any other military governor, were generally called Ek prosopou , second to them the Krites or Praitor were responsible for the judicial matters inside a Theme. Although the range of tasks of the Krites or Praitor were neither fixed nor dogmatic, as they are shown assisting in various military campaigns or, on occasions, replacing

6188-640: The membership of Greece and Cyprus in the European Union, Greek is one of the organization's 24 official languages . Greek is recognized as a minority language in Albania, and used co-officially in some of its municipalities, in the districts of Gjirokastër and Sarandë . It is also an official minority language in the regions of Apulia and Calabria in Italy. In the framework of the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages , Greek

6279-429: The militarized state of the Empire, led to numerous coups and revolts, leading to several disastrous results, such as the 1071 defeat at Manzikert . Applying Orthodox-Hellenistic political schemes, the monarch's household was the sacred kingdom Oikonomia , and he was its Christ-loving owner and manager Oikonomos , which meant that no individual or institution through the history of the empire truly owned any land in

6370-441: The modern period. The division into conventional periods is, as with all such periodizations, relatively arbitrary, especially because, in all periods, Ancient Greek has enjoyed high prestige, and the literate borrowed heavily from it. Across its history, the syllabic structure of Greek has varied little: Greek shows a mixed syllable structure, permitting complex syllabic onsets but very restricted codas. It has only oral vowels and

6461-403: The monarch's paroikoi (subjects). He was the sole administrator and lawgiver of the holy Basileia and Oikoumene (commonwealth), with sole power over the state, the land, and his subjects, which he had achieved through God's appointment of him as king. This opened a new stage of reverence in which Hellenistic and Eastern court ceremonies such as proskynesis highlighted the divinity of

6552-491: The more common ones, including non-nobles who also directly served the emperor. Logothetes originally had some influence on the emperor, but the posts eventually became honorary. In the later empire the Grand Logothete was replaced by the mesazōn ("mediator"). Other administrators included: The protasekretis , logothetes , prefect, praetor, quaestor, magister , and sakellarios , among others, were members of

6643-399: The noun they modify and relative pronouns are clause-initial. However, the morphological changes also have their counterparts in the syntax, and there are also significant differences between the syntax of the ancient and that of the modern form of the language . Ancient Greek made great use of participial constructions and of constructions involving the infinitive, and the modern variety lacks

6734-536: The objects of study of the discipline of Classics . During antiquity , Greek was by far the most widely spoken lingua franca in the Mediterranean world . It eventually became the official language of the Byzantine Empire and developed into Medieval Greek . In its modern form , Greek is the official language of Greece and Cyprus and one of the 24 official languages of the European Union . It

6825-706: The older periods of Greek, loanwords into Greek acquired Greek inflections, thus leaving only a foreign root word. Modern borrowings (from the 20th century on), especially from French and English, are typically not inflected; other modern borrowings are derived from Albanian , South Slavic ( Macedonian / Bulgarian ) and Eastern Romance languages ( Aromanian and Megleno-Romanian ). Greek words have been widely borrowed into other languages, including English. Example words include: mathematics , physics , astronomy , democracy , philosophy , athletics , theatre, rhetoric , baptism , evangelist , etc. Moreover, Greek words and word elements continue to be productive as

6916-539: The reforms of Alexios I , the system underwent various changes in which, due to the desperate state of the empire and the urgent need for income to finance its military campaigns and strengthen its borders, several simplifications and concessions were made. The theme system established under the Komnenoi would remain the administrative basis of the Byzantine state until its final fall in 1453 , differing in few key aspects from its administrative predecessors; it highlighted

7007-515: The ruler and became standardized and very often mandatory. In practice, imperial power was exercised as administration—simplified and centralized through viceroys such as the Exarchos , Douk , Katepánō , Kephalai and the Strategoi who enjoyed the same omnipotence and the emperor's God given divinity in their respective governorships . Such concentrations of power proved to be both

7098-670: The same, but wearing "a garment of green and red, split, with gold bands". These colours were the marks of the old chariot-racing factions, the four now merged to just the Blues and the Greens, and incorporated into the official hierarchy. As in the Versailles of Louis XIV , elaborate dress and court ritual probably were at least partly an attempt to smother and distract from political tensions. Eunuchs also participated in court life, typically serving as attendants to noble women or assisting

7189-427: The simple income and rapid collection of taxes by deputies towards various rural communities in the war-time Hellenistic period , after having been adopted and adapted from the late Roman and early Byzantine province of Egypt , which had kept its own former fixed fiscal system, proving this measure to be an indirect consequence of the multiple wars and invasions that Byzantium had to deal throughout its history. After

7280-419: The sovereign directly. These governors, being the direct representatives of the monarch himself all through the provinces, enjoyed an omnipotence of their own, accompanied by the divine attributes for being deputies of the emperor himself in their respective districts. Their primary tasks were jointly working with the various provincial subordinates of the capital bureaus for the effective collection of taxes from

7371-437: The stressed vowel; the so-called breathing marks ( rough and smooth breathing ), originally used to signal presence or absence of word-initial /h/; and the diaeresis , used to mark the full syllabic value of a vowel that would otherwise be read as part of a diphthong. These marks were introduced during the course of the Hellenistic period. Actual usage of the grave in handwriting saw a rapid decline in favor of uniform usage of

7462-574: The titles had become obsolete. By the time of Alexios I ( r.  1082–1118 ), many of the positions were either new or drastically changed. However, from that time on, they remained essentially the same until the fall of the Byzantine Empire in 1453. In the early Byzantine period (4th to late 6th century), the administrative structure of the empire was a conglomeration of the late Roman Empire's diocese system , set up by Diocletian and Constantine , and of Justinian's innovations; in

7553-565: The years 535 and 536 Justinian's administrative reforms were formalized. This eliminated the administrative diocese system hierarchy established in previous centuries and with it the strict military and civic divisions within the empire, replacing it with various provincial circumscriptions directly governed by deputies of the emperor, variously called Stratalates , Strategoi and Harmost . These deputies held extraordinary military and administrative powers accompanied by prestigious new titleholders in an attempt to lessen corruption and simplify

7644-574: Was a distinct dialect of Greek itself. Aside from the Macedonian question, current consensus regards Phrygian as the closest relative of Greek, since they share a number of phonological, morphological and lexical isoglosses , with some being exclusive between them. Scholars have proposed a Graeco-Phrygian subgroup out of which Greek and Phrygian originated. Among living languages, some Indo-Europeanists suggest that Greek may be most closely related to Armenian (see Graeco-Armenian ) or

7735-568: Was also used as the official language of government and religion in the Christian Nubian kingdoms , for most of their history. Greek, in its modern form, is the official language of Greece, where it is spoken by almost the entire population. It is also the official language of Cyprus (nominally alongside Turkish ) and the British Overseas Territory of Akrotiri and Dhekelia (alongside English ). Because of

7826-557: Was also used in Ancient Greek. Greek has occasionally been written in the Latin script , especially in areas under Venetian rule or by Greek Catholics . The term Frankolevantinika / Φραγκολεβαντίνικα applies when the Latin script is used to write Greek in the cultural ambit of Catholicism (because Frankos / Φράγκος is an older Greek term for West-European dating to when most of (Roman Catholic Christian) West Europe

7917-496: Was characterized by its versatility and unfixed duties in constant role change depending on a specific situation. The vast Byzantine bureaucracy had many titles, more varied than aristocratic and military titles. In Constantinople there were normally hundreds, if not thousands, of bureaucrats at any time. Like members of the Church and the military, they wore elaborately differentiated dress , often including huge hats. These are some of

8008-415: Was known for its fertility, suffered from the frequent and devastating Arab raids, which largely depopulated the countryside except for the fortified cities and naval bases. The seat of the strategos was most probably Attaleia . He drew an annual salary of 10 pounds of gold, and his overall rank in the imperial hierarchy was relatively low, but still senior to any other naval commander: twenty-fifth in

8099-522: Was the incarnation of the law— nomos empsychos —and his power was immeasurable and divine in origin insofar as he channeled God's divine grace, maintaining what is good. He was the ultimate benefactor, caretaker, and saviour of the people: Evergétis , Philanthrōpía , and Sōtēr , anointed with all power, upholding the divine laws since he ought to emulate Christ first ( christomimetes ) in all of his divine, pious, loving orthodox attributes to all by being his earthly presence. The people in turn were

8190-580: Was under the control of the Frankish Empire ). Frankochiotika / Φραγκοχιώτικα (meaning 'Catholic Chiot') alludes to the significant presence of Catholic missionaries based on the island of Chios . Additionally, the term Greeklish is often used when the Greek language is written in a Latin script in online communications. The Latin script is nowadays used by the Greek-speaking communities of Southern Italy . The Yevanic dialect

8281-621: Was written by Romaniote and Constantinopolitan Karaite Jews using the Hebrew Alphabet . In a tradition, that in modern time, has come to be known as Greek Aljamiado , some Greek Muslims from Crete wrote their Cretan Greek in the Arabic alphabet . The same happened among Epirote Muslims in Ioannina . This also happened among Arabic-speaking Byzantine rite Christians in the Levant ( Lebanon , Palestine, and Syria ). This usage

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