6533b81ffe1ef96bd1277737

RESEARCH PRODUCT

Gettare, con l’acqua sporca (vari segni diacritici, διακριτικά), anche il bambino (lo spirito aspro, δασεία)

subject

description

The author agrees with the spelling reform for Modern Greek introduced in 1984 in all respects, except as regards spiritus asper (δασεία). The fact is that the latter sign, in addition to rendering comprehensible aspiration phenomena still present in modern words (per es. πενθ-ήμερο, ὑφ-ηγητής, ἀφ-ήλιο), would be an effective guide to foreign words of Greek origin (e.g. English hypocrisy, homonymy, hygiene, German Hypokrisie, Homonymie, Hygiene, French hypocrisie, homonymie, hygiène, Spanish hipocresia, homonimia, higiene). One thus gets the impression that, so to speak, “the baby has been thrown out with the bathwater”. As a final consideration, in Italian practice relating to ancient Greek the author proposes eliminating the spiritus lenis (ψιλή) – a sign that has never corresponded to anything real in pronunciation – so as to give greater emphasis to words with spiritus asper.