# How do I form an adjective in Greek?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-form-an-adjective-in-greek/559656>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [November 6, 2010, 2:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-form-an-adjective-in-greek/559656 "2010-11-06T02:24:43Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 7\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![smiling\_bandit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)\
**Post date:** [November 6, 2010, 2:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-form-an-adjective-in-greek/559656/1 "2010-11-06T02:24:43Z")

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Theoretically, this would be Greek around 500 bc. But I’m not that picky. How would you say somewone comes from a specific place in Greek? If I’m talking about a man from Samos or Athens, how do I denote that? What would a Greejk speaker say?

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**Author:** ![YourAdHere](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/65b543/32.png) [@YourAdHere](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YourAdHere)\
**Post date:** [November 7, 2010, 12:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-form-an-adjective-in-greek/559656/2 "2010-11-07T00:51:23Z")

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If I remember correctly, there is usually a corresponding adjective / noun (Athenian, Corinthian, Ionian, etc). The adjective would get a different ending depending on the case, number, and gender of the thing it describes. Otherwise I think you could just use a preposition and say from wherever. I’ll have to look it up once I get back to work to be 100% certain though.

Ἀθηναῖος - From Athens, Athenian  
Κορίνθιος - Corinthian

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**Author:** ![YourAdHere](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/65b543/32.png) [@YourAdHere](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YourAdHere)\
**Post date:** [November 7, 2010, 1:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-form-an-adjective-in-greek/559656/3 "2010-11-07T01:00:04Z")

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Also,

Ἀθῆναι - Athens  
Κόρινθος - Corinth

So, you might be able to surmise a pattern from that if it’s a place that they wouldn’t have had a word for.

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**Author:** ![Polerius](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/d78d45/32.png) [@Polerius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polerius)\
**Post date:** [November 7, 2010, 1:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-form-an-adjective-in-greek/559656/4 "2010-11-07T01:44:21Z")

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> [@smiling\_bandit](#):
>
> Theoretically, this would be Greek around 500 bc. But I’m not that picky. How would you say somewone comes from a specific place in Greek? If I’m talking about a man from Samos or Athens, how do I denote that? What would a Greejk speaker say?

There are a few ways to denote where someone comes from, depending on the place name.

From Athens: Athineos, pronounced Ah-thi-neh-os

From Samos: Samiotis

I think the most common way is to add -eos to the end of the word for men (like in the case of Athens above) and add -ea for women.

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**Author:** ![YourAdHere](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/65b543/32.png) [@YourAdHere](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YourAdHere)\
**Post date:** [November 7, 2010, 2:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-form-an-adjective-in-greek/559656/5 "2010-11-07T02:52:47Z")

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It wouldn’t be pronounced as

“(h)a-theh-NAI-os” ?

The main reasons I say that are that:  
The aspiration comes before the alpha. Also, ancient attic pronunciation of eta is like the ‘e’ of “bet” (but held longer) or like the ‘e’ of eta / obey (depending on whether it’s accented), and the ai forms a dipthong like “aisle”. Eta usually got transliterated into Latin as either a regular e (bet) or a long e (obey) depending on whether or not it were accented. This is the case with Σωκράτης ------\> SOcratEs (imagine the O and E have macrons over them, I don’t know how to do it on this website), which would be pronounced as “so-cra-tays”. I thought the main instances when eta became an ‘a’ were when words ending with eta in Ancient Greek became words of the first declension in Latin, which ends in ‘a’.  
I think yours is the biblical pronunciation.  
Cites:  
[http://biblicalgreek.org/links/pronunciation.php](http://biblicalgreek.org/links/pronunciation.php)

> **[Greek Language and Linguistics: Alphabet](https://www.greek-language.com/Alphabet.html)**
>
> Ancient Greek alphabet, greek letters, pronunciation, modern greek, hellenistic, koine, classical greek

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**Author:** ![YourAdHere](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/65b543/32.png) [@YourAdHere](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YourAdHere)\
**Post date:** [November 7, 2010, 3:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-form-an-adjective-in-greek/559656/6 "2010-11-07T03:10:08Z")

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Sorry, didn’t mean to nitpick / hijack… Feel free to correct me if I’m wrong. Yeah, I would agree that adding an iota to the stem, moving the accent forward, and adding various endings / articles (masculine plural for the people as a noun) would seem to work. I just wasn’t ready to say that as a hard and fast rule because I wasn’t sure about words like delphic, doric, creten, etc.

This is pretty handy if you don’t have a hard copy in front of you:

> **[Ancient Greek Dictionary Online Translation LEXILOGOS](https://www.lexilogos.com/english/greek_ancient_dictionary.htm)**
>
> Ancient Greek-English Dictionary Online Translation, Language, Grammar

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**Author:** ![Apollon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e47774/32.png) [@Apollon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Apollon)\
**Post date:** [November 7, 2010, 4:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-do-i-form-an-adjective-in-greek/559656/7 "2010-11-07T04:37:16Z")

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> [@Polerius](#):
>
> There are a few ways to denote where someone comes from, depending on the place name.
> 
> From Athens: Athineos, pronounced Ah-thi-neh-os
> 
> From Samos: Samiotis
> 
> I think the most common way is to add -eos to the end of the word for men (like in the case of Athens above) and add -ea for women.

This doesn’t seem right. Why should there be an “i” in “Athineos”, rather of an “e”? Like YourAdHere said, “Athenaios” is correct.  
“Samiotis” doesn’t look right, either. Masculine nouns and adjectives ending in iota sigma are extremely rare. “Samotes” would be better; however, “Samios” is correct.

So, we have until now:  
from Corinth (Korinthos): Korinthios  
from Samos: Samios  
from Athens (Athenai): Athenaios

The same pattern also goes for:  
from Rhodes (Rhodos): Rhodios  
from Thebes (Thebai): Thebaios  
from Olympia: Olympios  
from Argos: Argeios

All of the above are stressed on the syllable that precedes “-ios”.

But there are some freak exceptions:  
from Crete (Krete): Kres  
from Sparta (Sparte): Spartiates (likewise: Epirus (Epeiros) -\> Epeirotes)  
from Macedonia (Makedonia): Makedon (stressed on the last syllable)  
from Aegina (Aigina): Aiginetes (likewise: Stageira -\> Stageiretes)  
from Troy (Troia): Troas  
from Byzantium (Byzantion): Byzantinos  
from Eleusis: Eleusinios (interjecting an “n”, rather than going for the more straightforward “Eleusios”)  
from Aetolia (Aitolia): Aitolos (bypassing the “i”, and stressing the final syllable)