Unlike in the digital world, where an update comes from out of nowhere, or perhaps from the clouds above – overnight and undercover, or intruding unannounced in the light of day, there remain great collections of human thought and knowledge, remnants from times passed, that demand meticulous review; and under the auspices of the human brain that understands memory as more than a machine, that pays little regard to bits and bytes, and timeouts, rather dedicates its own finely wired synapses to the higher arts of scholarship – perseverance, selection, reflection, accuracy.
Such may be said of the just published Cambridge Greek Lexicon (Cambridge University Press). [On the website is a trove of information, including the history and methodology of the project, an extended video introduction and reference material and links.] Over twenty years in compilation; what was originally conceived as a revision of HG Liddell and Robert Scott’s legendary 1889 Intermediate Greek-English Lexicon, after due consideration and because of its antiquated form, had morphed into a completely new project.
This Guardian piece informs of what is in and what is not, and delights in giving us the down and dirty – or “earthy” as they call it. Some may say, well … and with a blush! To rejoin: Shame on those who go digging in ancient ground and shun at getting hands dirty! And though blushing, I quote:
…The verb χέζω (chezo), translated by Liddell and Scott as “ease oneself, do one’s need”, is defined in the new dictionary as “to defecate” and translated as “to shit”; βινέω (bineo) is no longer “inire, coire, of illicit intercourse”, but “fuck”; λαικάζω (laikazo), in the 19th-century dictionary translated as “to wench”, is now defined as “perform fellatio” and translated as “suck cocks”.
The Guardian, 27th May 2021
Whatever would the Messrs. Liddell and Scott think! Whether these new volumes will endure as long as their predecessor only time will tell but it is interesting to contemplate how language and custom may develop in the next hundred years or so (hopefully, it will still be determined by the living, breathing not an artificial intelligence!) – and in which direction! As the Guardian editorial ends:
…Easy as it is to gently mock the sensibilities of a former age, perhaps future generations will decry early-21st-century comfort with sexually aggressive terms; when, perhaps, it will be time for another dictionary of a “dead” language.
The Guardian, 28th May 2021