CRISTIANOS, CRISTIANOU
Carl W. Conrad
cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu
Fri Oct 25 06:38:23 EDT 2002
At 9:07 AM +0000 10/25/02, jwest at highland.net wrote:
>> > it is an insult because it is a diminutive form of
>> > christos = *little
>> > christ*.
>>
>> This is incorrect. The -IAN comes from a fairly common
>> Roman suffix, as in Caesarian, referring to those who
>> follow, belong, or were loyal to a person/leader.
>
>is it proper to confuse latin endings and usages with greek? several
>people on
>list have done this as though the two languages were identical. this is a
>fallacy of interpretation. to say that greek endings and common usage were
>enforced by latin speakers and/or writers is tenuous at best and
>eisegetical at
>worst. certainly there are instances where the two overlap. but this is not
>one of them. nor is it likely that the common herd wandering the marketplace
>in rome or the common herd in the agora of athens used word endings with such
>precision as we are being led to believe.
>
>hence, there are two errors being committed here. first, the generalization
>stating that latin and greek endings are identical and second the false or at
>least unsubstantiated belief that the average person of the first century (in
>rome or athens) was as grammatically adept as carl or waldo appear to be.
>
>see the article i referenced yesterday.
This is not a matter of confusion, Jim. I don't believe that anybody on
this list imagines that Greek and Latin are identical--anymore than anyone
supposes that Greek and Hebrew are identical.. You might like to look at
the discussion of Latinisms in the GNT at BDF#5 with special reference to
(2): "Certain Latin suffixes also became current in Greek and were added to
Greek words"--and note 3 on -ANOI and -IANOI. Nor is this a matter of the
person in the street being an adept: alien terminology and usage makes
inroads into native speech of the person on the street without cognizance
by the person on the street of the source of the terminology and usage.
What was objected to was the claim made by you and at least one other than
-IANOS is a diminutive ending in Greek, one that implied contempt for those
to whom the name was implied. If you think that Lipsius' article from the
late nineteenth century indicates otherwise, then maybe you'd better check
your memory and also look at some more recent references.
--
Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University (Emeritus)
1989 Grindstaff Road/Burnsville, NC 28714/(828) 675-4243
cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu OR cwconrad at ioa.com
WWW: http://www.artsci.wustl.edu/~cwconrad/
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