Ancient Greeks had three words for father: patér (father), táta (daddy) and páppa (daddy). Why do modern Greeks use the Turkish word "Baba" for father, instead of the aforementioned Greek words?
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1 Expert Answer
The most common name for father used in Greece today is indeed the word baba, a Turkish word, pronounced mbamba with the accent on the second syllable. It is used most often to address the father. The word patera with the accent on the second syllable, is more formal and connotes respect to the father figure.
The Greek language has borrowed many words from Turkish, such as baklava, kataifi (the popular Greek desserts), shiskebab (souvlaki), dolmades (stuffed grape leaves), etc. Besides Turkish, Greeks have borrowed words from other languages as well, such as French.
Constantine K.
What an awful answer and wrong. No. It's because the letter B in Greek in classical Greek switched to making the V sound. By the time of koine Greek to make up that bah sound the Greeks put The letters Mπ together to make the bah sound. A 3 yr of greek kid might say papa aka πaπa one minute and the next mπaπa. π is P. That's all. It has nothing to do with the turkish language.. I expected better than this
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10/11/22
Neslihan A.
Well, actually it has got a lot to do with Turkish language...There are honestly more words than these....
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12/24/22
Valerie A.
tutor
Well, Constantine K. unfortunately is wrong. He says above "the letter B in Greek in classical Greek switched to making a V sound". There was no 'switch'. How wrong he is! The second letter of the Greek alphabet has always been 'B' pronounced 'V', it has NEVER been a B sound. There is no letter in the Greek alphabet for B; the way to make the B sound is to combine the two letters mb such as in mbamba. We have several 2 letter combinations to make sounds, such as nt for the D sound, since again we don't have a letter D in the Greek alphabet. And indeed 'mbamba' is Turkish, as Neslihan A. above confirms.
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02/13/23
Esra R.
Dolma is often mistaken for sarma. Dolma in Turkish is a cognate object of the verb "doldurmak" that means to fill with/up or to stuff with (to fill something with/up something else). Dolma in traditional Turkish cuisine means vegetables (such as green peppers, tomatoes, aubergines, courgettes ...etc.) stuffed with seasoned rice (rice with spices, onions, greens like parsley, pine nuts and currants). On the other hand, sarma in Turkish is a cognate object of the verb "sarmak" that means to wrap up/in. Therefore, in Turkish cuisine, sarma means not only grapes leaves, but also chard, collard greens or cabbage leaves wrapped up with seasoned rice - like in the form of a thin roll. Both dolma and sarma are traditionally cooked either as a vegetarian dish or as a meaty dish through blending minced meat in addition to the seasoned rice..
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04/08/23
Valerie A.
tutor
Everybody is an expert!
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04/08/23
Valerie A.
tutor
Stuffed, wrapped, dolmades, what difference does it make?
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04/08/23
Zach R.
It is extremely normal when u have 400 years another language to use by force eventually even to forget yours .. the Hellenic language could be only a dead ancient language.. but it didn’t.. transformer to survive and we r able now to learn again for ever . To use words from the conquerors around us I think is smart and revolutionary
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04/27/23
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Constantine K.
No. Just no lol awful answer. . It's because in Greek, the letter B went from Ba to V. To make the original Bah sound, the Greeks put the letters MPie together to make the Bah sound. That's what it is. A 3 yr old greek kid is going say papa and then might say mamba the next time.10/11/22