Ancient Greek vocabulary for school: 50 words to learn first

We did not find a list of 50 words shared by every school course. What programmes do share is the idea of a basic vocabulary. The Griego II guide of Castilla y León lists techniques for building «un vocabulario básico griego de frecuencia». The Dutch SLO goals for lower vwo expect pupils to use their Griekse basiswoorden to understand a simple text. The Graecum courses at Tübingen use an Altgriechisch-Grundwortschatz, and their exam texts come from Plato and Xenophon. So the 50 words below are our own selection.

It starts from frequency. Wilfred Major estimated that about 1,100 lemmas generate 80% of a typical Greek text, and the Greek Core Vocabulary by Christopher Francese (Dickinson College Commentaries) ranks some 500 lemmas by frequency. That ranking alone would make a poor first list: among its first 50 places only six are verbs (εἰμί, λέγω, γίγνομαι, ἔχω, φημί, ποιέω) and only two are nouns (λόγος, θεός). Much of the rest is grammar: ὁ, καί, δέ, γάρ. We therefore chose from the whole list, between ranks 3 and 395, favouring verbs and nouns, and looked up each modern form in the Triantafyllidis dictionary of Modern Greek.

The dictionary derives these directly from Ancient Greek. The spelling marks and the sound differ: έχω is [éxo], θεός is [θeós]. The arrow runs from ancient to modern, with today's meaning in brackets. Meaning can move: καλός first meant beautiful or fine, and its first sense in the dictionary today is good, kind.

• Verbs: ἔχω → έχω (have), γράφω → γράφω (write), ἀκούω → ακούω (hear), μένω → μένω (stay), ἔρχομαι → έρχομαι (come), ζάω → ζω (live)
• Nouns: ἄνθρωπος → άνθρωπος (human being), θεός → θεός (god), λόγος → λόγος (speech, reason), πόλεμος → πόλεμος (war), νόμος → νόμος (law), ψυχή → ψυχή (soul), σῶμα → σώμα (body), ἡμέρα → ημέρα (day)
• Others: καλός → καλός (good), κακός → κακός (bad), πολύς → πολύς (much), ἄλλος → άλλος (other), καί → και (and), ἀλλά → αλλά (but)

One warning from outside the list. παιδεύω is a drill verb in beginners' handouts such as those of UC Santa Cruz. It is still a Greek verb, but its first modern sense is to put someone through hardship: «μη με παιδεύεις άλλο», stop tormenting me.

These are the same words, reshaped. Three habits explain many of them. Some presents were rebuilt on the aorist stem: μαθαίνω on ἔμαθον, πεθαίνω on ἀπέθανον, δίνω on δωσ-, λύνω on λυσ-. Some nouns grew out of the accusative: ἄνδρα gave άντρας, γυναῖκα gave γυναίκα, πατέρα gave πατέρας. Some are diminutives: παιδί from παιδίον, χέρι from χέριον. Xenophon's Anabasis opens with παῖδες δύο; in today's Greek that is δύο παιδιά. The small words changed most: δεν comes from the neuter οὐδέν, σε from εἰς, and για from διά.

• Verbs: λέγω → λέω (say), εἰμί → είμαι (be), φέρω → φέρνω (bring), δίδωμι → δίνω (give), μανθάνω → μαθαίνω (learn), εὑρίσκω → βρίσκω (find), πίπτω → πέφτω (fall), λύω → λύνω (untie, solve), ἀποθνῄσκω → πεθαίνω (die)
• Nouns and adjectives: ἀνήρ → άντρας (man), γυνή → γυναίκα (woman), πατήρ → πατέρας (father), παῖς → παιδί (child), χείρ → χέρι (hand), βασιλεύς → βασιλιάς (king), πόλις → πόλη (city), μέγας → μεγάλος (big)
• Small words: οὐδέν → δεν (not), εἰς → σε (in, to), διά → για (for)

Here the everyday modern word is a different word, one that took the old word's place and does not descend from it. Learn each pair together. The opening of Plato's Apology (17a) has οὐκ οἶδα; a Greek today says δεν ξέρω, and ξέρω is not the descendant of οἶδα.

• ὁράω: today βλέπω, also an ancient verb. But the past είδα continues εἶδον, and όραση continues ὅρασις.
• ποιέω: today κάνω, from κάμνω, “make, work”. ποίημα (poem) remains.
• οἶδα: today ξέρω, from ἐξεῦρον, aorist of ἐξευρίσκω, “find out”.
• λαμβάνω: today παίρνω, from ἐπαίρω, “lift”. λαμβάνω remains in formal Greek.
• βούλομαι: today θέλω, a variant of ἐθέλω. βούληση (will) remains.
• ὕδωρ: today νερό, from νηρὸν ὕδωρ, “fresh water”.
• ναῦς: today πλοίο, from another ancient word, πλοῖον. ναύτης (sailor) remains.
• οἶκος: today σπίτι, from Hellenistic ὁσπίτιον (from Latin hospitium). οίκος remains in formal Greek.
• ἵππος: today άλογο, from Hellenistic ἄλογον, “the unreasoning one”.
• ἀγαθός: the everyday word for good is now καλός. αγαθός suggests someone mild and harmless.