From Textus Receptus

Complete Greek, Track 02 – Language Transfer
Teacher: The first word we will learn in Greek is, μένω – I stay or, I’m staying. Μένω
[méno].
Student: Μένω.
T: Μένω. So this is I stay or I’m staying. It covers both in Greek. You may have
noticed that two words are becoming one here. We don’t need to say the word
for “I” in Greek; that’s included in μένω. Actually, it’s that [o] (ω) on the end that’s
showing us that it’s “I” – I stay, I’m staying. So μένω is, I stay or I am staying.
You will notice that most Greek words are built of parts, and a lot of these parts
we already know them from English, although we may not realise that we know
them. For example, in English we have the word perimeter, we have the word
period, periphery – this “peri” that we have in perimeter, period, periphery,
means around or near, in Greek.
If we stick that to the beginning of μένω – so we said that μένω means I stay or
I’m staying – if we stick this “peri” to the beginning of that, firstly how would it
sound, if we stick peri (περι) to μένω [méno]?
S: Περιμένω [periméno].
T: Περιμένω, good. So περιμένω, “around stay”, means, I wait or, I’m waiting.
S: Περιμένω.
T: Περιμένω. So tell me again, what is, I stay or I’m staying?
S: Μένω.
T: Μένω, good. And, I wait or I’m waiting, or I’m around staying?
S: Περιμένω.
T: Περιμένω, good. The word for don’t or not in Greek is, δεν [dhen].
S: Δεν.
T: This is spelt with δέλτα [dhélta], the Greek letter that looks like a d (δ), or in
capitals it looks like a triangle (Δ). Δεν/δεν.
S: Δεν.
T: So this is like the TH sound in the English word “then”, like, I came then I saw him;
it’s the same sound. So in Greek, we’re writing this sound with the letter δέλτα
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(δ), which looks like a D/d, but we shouldn’t let that confuse us. We can just look
back to the English word, “then”, and import the sound right over into Greek. It’s
the same sound. So if you want to say, I don’t stay or, I’m not staying, you can just
put that first, that δεν [dhen] before the verb. So how would that be?
S: Δεν μένω [dhen méno].
T: Δεν μένω, good. And I’m not waiting or, I don’t wait?
S: Δεν περιμένω [dhen periméno].
T: Very good, δεν περιμένω.
This [o] sound with verbs, words like μένω, περιμένω, that shows us that it’s “I”, is
written with a letter that looks like a “w” when it’s small (ω), or something like a
rounded tophat in capitals (Ω). This is the letter ωμέγα [omégha]. You don’t have
to worry about remembering the letter names or even how the letters look. I’m
just mentioning them in case you are exposing yourself to written Greek.
In fact, vowels were not previously written in the script that became the Greek
and the Latin script, and [o] was adapted from “w” in English. So we see that
connection there with this letter in Greek that looks like a W and produces an [o]
sound – the letter, ωμέγα [omégha]. Ωμέγα. In other scripts, such as Arabic for
example, we also see this connection, where W and O is actually the same letter.
Arabic, Greek, Latin – the English script – they all come from the same root, they
all come from the same parent script. So this [o] sound like in μένω [méno] or
περιμένω [periméno], looks like a “w” in Greek. So give me again, I stay or, I‘m
staying.
S: Μένω.
T: Μένω, good. And I wait or, I’m waiting.
S: Περιμένω.
T: Περιμένω. So we see that this [o] or this w-letter shows us that it’s “I”. If we want
to make, He stays or, He is staying, She stays/she is staying, It stays/it is staying,
we change this [o] sound to an [i] sound, then we get the version of the verb
which works for he, she or it. How would that sound?
S: Μένει [méni].
T: Μένει, brilliant, μένει. So μένει gives us, he stays, he’s staying, she stays, she’s
staying or, it stays, it’s staying – all of that with μένει. He waits or, She waits?
S: Περιμένει [periméni].
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T: Περιμένει. She isn’t waiting?
S: Δεν περιμένει [dhen periméni].
T: Δεν περιμένει. Very good.
Now, if you want to make it a question – Is she waiting? Is he waiting? – we do
something that in English will form the question, we invert the “is” and the “he”:
She is waiting – Is she waiting? He is waiting – Is he waiting? But you don’t have to
worry about that in Greek. In Greek, all you need to do to make a question is
make it sound like a question. So, if you want to say, Is he waiting? Is she waiting?
how would that be?
S: Περιμένει; [periméni?].
T: That’s it. Περιμένει; Isn’t she waiting?
S: Δεν περιμένει; [dhen periméni?].
T: Δεν περιμένει; Good. The word for “me” in Greek is the same as in English; you
just pronounce it more like how it’s written, με [me]. Με.
S: Με.
T: So that’s “me”. If you want to say, He’s waiting for me, firstly we don’t need the
for, we will say something like, He’s awaiting me, She’s awaiting me, and that me,
that με [me], is going to come before the verb, it’s going to come first. So how
would you say that, He is waiting for me, She is waiting for me.
S: Με περιμένει [me periméni].
T: Very good, με περιμένει. She’s not waiting for me. So this με [me] wants to come
just before the verb. What will come first is the not. So, Not she is waiting for me/
he is waiting for me.
S: Δεν με περιμένει [dhen me periméni].
T: Very good, δεν με περιμένει. Isn’t she waiting for me? Isn’t he waiting for me?
S: Δεν με περιμένει; [dhen me periméni?].
T: Δεν με περιμένει; Well done.