A Different Alexandrine Greek

In a scenario in which Alexander the Great manages to survive longer, leave a stable succession and more fully implement his policies of cultural syncretism, how would this affect the linguistic development of an ALT Koine Greek? By this I mean, let's assume for a moment that the Macedonian and Achaemenid ruling elites intermarry for several generations and form a more or less syncretic culture (albeit one with heavy Hellenistic influence). Considering that Aramaic was the language of the court and administration of the Achaemenid Empire, how much realistic influence would it have on Greek and its future development as the lingua franca of such an Empire?

As of late, I've been considering working on a full reboot of my old TL 'Blood and Gold'. I'm curious however, as to the alternate linguistic developments of Koine Greek that this may entail. I am, of course, aware that in OTL, the Koine of the Diadochi kingdoms did not undergo any significant alterations in this vein, but the exact details of my TL assume a heavier syncretic element between Persian and Hellenistic culture.

I imagine there would be at least some minor phonetic changes and an influx of loanwords in the language used by the court?
 
I think that Aramaic will not contribute much more than some lone words. The language of the Persian nobility will be some version of middle persian. I can see much if not all of the upper nobility as bilingual for several generations. Look what that did to English. I think that there will be lots of loan words, many about government and royality. With a lot about warfare.
The bigest difference will be the greater possibility of the vocabulary sound changes in some central asian Greek languages. Currently there is only one greek language. Having a more stable empire that takes several generations to before breaking up will increase the likelyhood of several modern greek languages.
 
I think that Aramaic will not contribute much more than some lone words. The language of the Persian nobility will be some version of middle persian. I can see much if not all of the upper nobility as bilingual for several generations. Look what that did to English. I think that there will be lots of loan words, many about government and royality. With a lot about warfare.
The bigest difference will be the greater possibility of the vocabulary sound changes in some central asian Greek languages. Currently there is only one greek language. Having a more stable empire that takes several generations to before breaking up will increase the likelyhood of several modern greek languages.

How prevalent was the use of Old Persian among the Achaemenid ruling elite? My understanding was that Imperial Aramaic was, in addition to being the administrative language, also the court language.
 
My understanding was that Persian was the language spoken among Persians, but that Aramaic was the language spoken between groups. It was also the most widely spoke language in the Empire and was used by the imperial bureaucrats.
Interestingly Greek was the court language 600-700 years later.
I'm not sure when the cutoff date between old and middle persian is
 
I did a little searching, and found something that might be useful.

Lindsay Allen said:
A surviving group of letters, written in Aramaic, in ink on leather, was discovered in an unknown location in Egypt. ... With the address line and subject summary written on the exterior ("From Arsam to Nehtihur, the officer, comptroller, and his colleagues the accountants, who are in Egypt"), each letter includes a polite greeting and launches into a recap of its subject. Many close with an annotation giving the names of the official and scribe involved in dispatching the letter. Arsam, who was satrap of Egypt in the later fifth century, may have sent most of the surviving administrative letters to Egypt from Babylonia, where he had significant rural estates.

The letters show a close association of what appears to be both official and personal business. Arsam's title in the letters is "son of the house", which may indicate his blood relationship to the royal family, but seems likely to have also been an official identity. The satrap takes care of personal appeals from other Persians for the enforcement of estate-inheritance and revenue, he authorizes the supplies for the journey of his deputy to Mesopotamia and back and finally, from a distance, makes arrangements for a sculptor from whom he has commissioned several works to be taken to Egypt. The use of letters to the Persian authorities for specific personal appeals and orders extended to civil and judicial situations in the evidence from Elephantine, far up the Nile. There, an Egyptian community at Aswan played host to a Persian commander, while a Judaean military garrison lived on Elephantine island with the local [governor]. Administration was conducted in two languages, Demotic and Aramaic.

I couldn't find much on the prevalence of Persian within the court. Obviously it must have had some prevalence, since after all arguably the most famous loan-word from the Achaemenid Empire to the Greeks, "satrapy", is derived from the Old Persian title "protector of the kingdom" (xsacapavan). Aramaic was clearly the preferred tongue for the bureaucracy and administration. However, the fact that these letters, written in Aramaic, were used for personal business for Arsam in dealing with other high-ranking Persian officials and courtiers, suggests to me that Aramaic must have played a significant role at court as well. After all, these were personal letters, not decrees, sent to fellow members of the Persian nobility, so why not use Old Persian if that was the dominant language at court? I would bet that many or all in the Persian court would have been bilingual in both Persian and Aramaic and able to use both interchangeably. Adding to that the more widespread use of Aramaic among ancient Near Eastern commoners, I would think that Aramaic would have a more significant impact on Koine Greek than Old Persian. Hope this helps.


Also I'm glad to hear that you're considering rebooting "Blood and Gold". It's one of my favorite timelines on this site. :)
 
I imagine there would be at least some minor phonetic changes and an influx of loanwords in the language used by the court?

There's a rough OTL example of a similar phenomenon when Arabs conquered Persia. They appear to have intermarried heavily with the Persian elite and have integrate quite a lot of Persian high culture and art.
The Persians, on the other hand, absorbed an incredible amount of Arabic influence: religion, script, metrics, a vast number of loanwords, you name it. After a certain point, you simply talk an "Islamicate" culture where you cannot really tell an "Arabic" or "Persian" feature apart.
In linguistic terms, however, the dominant language, namely Arabic, was only marginally affected. Persian loanwords were introduced and minor phonetic changes adopted in Arabic when pronounced by Persian speakers but those changes were never ever acccepted into the standard grammar of literary Arabic.
My assessment, then, is that Greek will affect the local Asian languages in depth, while staying basically unchanged (in its standard, written variety likely to be used at court) except for loanwords and maybe some change in pronounciation. Of course, as it happened historically, local varieties of spoken Greek will emerge showing a far larger degree of Asian substrate influence, but that any of these would ever emerge to linguistic standardization as such is to be seen.
All in all, I do not expect major differences with OTLs koiné.
 
I did a little searching, and found something that might be useful.



I couldn't find much on the prevalence of Persian within the court. Obviously it must have had some prevalence, since after all arguably the most famous loan-word from the Achaemenid Empire to the Greeks, "satrapy", is derived from the Old Persian title "protector of the kingdom" (xsacapavan). Aramaic was clearly the preferred tongue for the bureaucracy and administration. However, the fact that these letters, written in Aramaic, were used for personal business for Arsam in dealing with other high-ranking Persian officials and courtiers, suggests to me that Aramaic must have played a significant role at court as well. After all, these were personal letters, not decrees, sent to fellow members of the Persian nobility, so why not use Old Persian if that was the dominant language at court? I would bet that many or all in the Persian court would have been bilingual in both Persian and Aramaic and able to use both interchangeably. Adding to that the more widespread use of Aramaic among ancient Near Eastern commoners, I would think that Aramaic would have a more significant impact on Koine Greek than Old Persian. Hope this helps.


Also I'm glad to hear that you're considering rebooting "Blood and Gold". It's one of my favorite timelines on this site. :)

I think that the language spoken at court was usually Persian, at least when court was held in Iran. This may not have been the case in Babylon.
Surely, a Persian/Aramaic form of bilingualism must have been in place, as proven by the use of reading Aramaic writing in Persian, that must have been the basis for the Middle Persian "logographic" script.
 
I think that the language spoken at court was usually Persian, at least when court was held in Iran. This may not have been the case in Babylon.
Surely, a Persian/Aramaic form of bilingualism must have been in place, as proven by the use of reading Aramaic writing in Persian, that must have been the basis for the Middle Persian "logographic" script.

That makes sense. So perhaps the language spoken depended on where the court was rather than the court itself? (Persepolis compared to Babylon)

Also the Arabs are a good example to look to for comparison; didn't think of that.
 
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