Alternate Names: Ellinika, Graecae, Grec, Greco, Neo-Hellenic, Romaic
Dialects: Dimotiki, Katharevousa, Saracatsan. Katharevousa is an archaic literary dialect, Dimotiki is the spoken literary and now official dialect. The Saracatsan are nomadic shepherds of northern Greece. The Greek of Italy and that of Corsica are probably distinct languages (1992 R. Zamponi). In Cyprus, the dialect is reportedly more similar to Classical Greek , in some vocabulary and grammar than that spoken in Greece, and to have Latin , and Turkish , loanwords. Lexical similarity: 84%–93% with Greek , in Cyprus.
Status Notes: De facto national language.
Genealogy:
Demographics: 10,700,000 in Greece (ELDIA 2012). Population total all countries: 13,432,940.
Language Use: 5,136,000 also use English [eng]. 856,000 also use French [fra]. 963,000 also use Standard German [deu].
Language Development: Fully developed. Bible: 1840–1994.
Typology: SVO.
Spoken In: Cyprus, Greece
Writing System: Braille, Cyrillic, Greek
Nation of Origin: Greece
Other Comments: Greeks in the Russian Federation and Ukraine speak either Greek or Turkish, Ethnonym: Urums. The Karamanli were Orthodox Christian Turks who came from central Turkey.