56-721: The Acharnes Railway Center ( Greek : Σιδηροδρομικό Κέντρο Αχαρνών ) or SKA is a two-level railway station in the northern parts of the Athens agglomeration , in the suburb of Acharnes , where several important railway lines converge. It is an important passenger interchange station linking The main Piraeus–Platy railway line from Athens Central to Thessaloniki and the Athens Airport–Patras railway . The station opened in April 2011. The station opened on 5 April 2011. Plans for
112-454: A interchange had been part of future expansion plans to Corinth. Before construction started in 2005, the station was initially to be named Menidi Railway Center (SKM). By 2010, the electrification works of the lines 3 and 4 with 25 kV AC, 50 Hz neared completion, and was opened on the Oinoi–Chalcis line in 2013, in the sections SKA-Oinoi and Treis Gefyres – SKA in 2015, and finally in
168-565: A white elephant . Greek language Greek ( Modern Greek : Ελληνικά , romanized : Elliniká , [eliniˈka] ; Ancient Greek : Ἑλληνική , romanized : Hellēnikḗ ) 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
224-577: 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,
280-558: 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
336-560: 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
392-540: 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
448-410: A new air-conditioned indoor passenger shelter and Dot-matrix display departure and arrival screens or timetable poster boards on both platforms. There is a large car park on-site, adjacent to the southbound line. The station has two side platforms , as well as one low-level platform in the median of Attiki Odos toll highway . Currently, only this and two other platforms are used. Since 15 May 2022,
504-483: A symbol and usually its main or alternate logo since 1902, originally in sarcastic defiance of John McGraw 's 1902 characterization of the new team as a "white elephant". The Al Maktoum International Airport on the outskirts of Dubai has also been named a white elephant. The Roman-styled Boothtown Aqueduct in Sydney , which was opened in 1888, has been referred to as a "white elephant" for its failure to operate as
560-455: Is a possession that its owner cannot dispose of without extreme difficulty, and whose cost, particularly that of maintenance, is out of proportion to its usefulness. In modern usage, it is a metaphor used to describe an object, construction project, scheme, business venture, facility, etc. considered expensive but without equivalent utility or value relative to its capital (acquisition) and/or operational (maintenance) costs. The term derives from
616-804: 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
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#1732773143817672-479: 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
728-466: Is matched only by the now-extinct Anatolian languages . The Greek language is conventionally divided into 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 ,
784-519: 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
840-821: 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 White elephant A white elephant
896-763: 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,
952-512: Is under the control of OSE . On 1 February 2018, the electrification of the Piraeus-Athens Central station section of the network was completed. The Athens Suburban Railway was extended to Aigio in 2020. In October 2021 it was announced Network improvements between SKA and Oinoi to improve current services and upgrade existing infrastructure would be carried out. In July 2022, the station began being served by Hellenic Train ,
1008-674: 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 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
1064-624: 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 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
1120-627: 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 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
1176-495: 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
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#17327731438171232-516: 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
1288-657: 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 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
1344-492: 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
1400-525: The Athens to Thessaloniki Line and the Suburban Rail low-level platform, the station has six unused platforms. Those platforms exist in order to accommodate future services, especially after the completion of the P.A.Th.E./P. Delays in both opening and connection to Corinth Low usage of the station and its unnecessarily large size and the number of platforms have led to the project being criticised as
1456-486: 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
1512-495: 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
1568-629: 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
1624-685: 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
1680-469: The West, the term "white elephant", relating to an expensive burden that fails to meet expectations, was first used in the 17th century and became widespread in the 19th century. According to one source it was popularized following P. T. Barnum 's experience with an elephant named Toung Taloung that he billed as the "Sacred White Elephant of Burma". After much effort and great expense, Barnum finally acquired
1736-608: The White Elephant ' and the third monarch of the Konbaung dynasty ). Because the animals were considered sacred and laws protected them from labor, receiving a gift of a white elephant from a monarch was simultaneously a blessing and a curse. It was a blessing because the animal was sacred and a sign of the monarch's favour, and a curse because the recipient now had an animal that was expensive to maintain, could not be given away, and could not be put to much practical use. In
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1792-404: 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),
1848-402: 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
1904-546: The animal from the King of Siam only to discover that his "white elephant" was actually dirty grey in color with a few pink spots. The expressions "white elephant" and "gift of a white elephant" came into common use in the middle of the nineteenth century. The phrase was attached to "white elephant swaps" and "white elephant sales" in the early twentieth century. Many church bazaars held " white elephant sales " where donors could unload unwanted bric-à-brac , generating profit from
1960-411: The following weekday services call at this station: Line A4 trains running between Piraeus and Kiato do not call at this station. The station is also served by local and regional buses: KTEL Attikis regional buses operates Lines 740 (Olympic Village - SKA - Acharnai - Agia Anna), 755 (Acharnai - St. Kato Patisia) Usage of the seven remaining platforms Apart from the two platforms on
2016-416: The government-run entity attempted to reduce overheads. Services from Athens Airport & Athens were cut back, with some ticket offices closing, reducing the reliability of services and passenger numbers. In 2017 OSE 's passenger transport sector was privatised as TrainOSE , currently, a wholly owned subsidiary of Ferrovie dello Stato Italiane station infrastructure remained under Gaiose, while railway lines
2072-439: 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
2128-467: 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
2184-576: 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
2240-441: 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
2296-399: 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
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2352-706: 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
2408-524: The phenomenon that "one man's trash is another man's treasure" and the term has continued to be used in this context. In modern usage, the term now often refers in addition to an extremely expensive building project that fails to deliver on its function or becomes very costly to maintain. Examples include prestigious but uneconomic infrastructure projects such as airports, dams, bridges, shopping malls and football stadiums. Rail transport projects are also sometimes deemed white elephants. In Japan, it
2464-541: The predominant sources of international scientific vocabulary . Greek has been spoken in the Balkan peninsula since around 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
2520-440: The rebranded TranOSE. The station building is adjacent to the southbound platforms, with access to the platform level via stairs or lifts. currently the station has two working side platforms but has been future-proofed for expansion a further eight platforms. Access to the station is via steps or ramp. The Station buildings are also equipped with toilets and a staffed booking office. At platform level, there are sheltered seating in
2576-641: The sacred white elephants kept by Southeast Asian monarchs in Burma , Thailand (Siam), Laos and Cambodia . To possess a white elephant was regarded—and is still regarded in Thailand and Burma—as a sign that the monarch reigned with justice and power, and that the kingdom was blessed with peace and prosperity. The opulence expected of anyone who owned a beast of such stature was great. Monarchs often exemplified their possession of white elephants in their formal titles (e.g., Hsinbyushin , lit. ' Lord of
2632-547: The section Three Bridges – Piraeus in 2018. In fact, the advent of electrification in SS. Athenson 30 July 2017, led to the modification of the lines of the Suburban Railway to have the central station of the capital as a starting point. The station opened during the Greek debt crisis . With the crisis unfolding, OSE 's Management was forced to reduce services across the network. Timetables were cut back, and routes closed as
2688-437: 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
2744-447: The various stages of 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
2800-529: The vernacular form of Modern Greek proper, and Katharevousa , meaning 'purified', a compromise between Dimotiki and Ancient Greek developed in 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
2856-574: 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
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#17327731438172912-568: 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
2968-557: 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
3024-528: Was feared that the Yurikamome at Odaiba would end up as a multibillion-yen white elephant, . In Singapore, paper cutouts of white elephants were placed next to the completed but unopened Buangkok MRT station on the North East Line in 2005 to protest its non-opening. (The station eventually opened the following year.) The American Oakland Athletics baseball team has used a white elephant as
3080-580: 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
3136-673: 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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