MACEDONIAN LANGUAGE. The native language of the ancient Macedonians. It is only imperfectly known through glosses preserved by Suidas and other lexicographers and through proper names. More than a hundred Mace donian words with their Greek equivalents were collected by Sturz. About the same number of proper names may lie found explained in Fick's dissertation. As to the character of the language, K. O. Miller. and F. Blass have refused to recognize it as a Greek dialect, urging a closer kinship to the Illyrian or the Thracian; while Sturz, Abel, Basmatzides. Fick, Demitsa. Ed. Meyer, Hatzidakis, Kretsehmer, and apparently Brugmunn have maintained that Macedonian is only a Hellenistic dialect. The strongest argu ment against the latter view is that /3, y, and 8 have a tendency to take the place of Greek (/), and e, as in Slavonic. Celtic. Lithuanian, and Illyrian. It is possible, however, that /3 and 5 were pronounced by the Macedonians' as bit, r. and (Hi (th in this). and that the change of ph to bh and th to elh has nothing in common with the process by which the Illyrian h and d have been derived from MI and dh. Of the Macedonian x there are many instances. The fact that the digam ma has disappeared without compensation only seems to show the operation of the same laws as govern Greek speech. While many Macedonian words and nouns are not yet satisfactorily ex plained, a great number have been. Alexander,
his generals and his nobles spoke Attie Greek as well as their native dialect. But Attie Greek cannot have been long in vogue in Macedonia. When. therefore. the nobles are called iraZpot, as in the Homeric poems, and many proper names occur that are found in Homer but not in the later times, the only probable conclusion seems to be that the Macedonians were a Greek people re maining behind when the rest moved into the peninsula, and that their language was a dialect retaining some peculiarities lost in the other ]vets and developing by contact with neighboring Illyrian and Thracian languages some peculia•i ties of its own. Consult: Sturz, De Dialeclo Macedonica ct Alcrand•ina (Leipzig, 180S) ; 0. Miller, Ueber die die A bstammung end iiltere Gcschichte des macedonischen rothes (Berlin, 1825) ; Abel, Makcdonicn ror Ruing I'llilipp I Leipzig. 842 ) Basmatzides. 'H MassZiovia sal al MaKeobves (Monaco. 1867 ) Fick, "Make donisehe Glossen," in Zeitsehrift fur verglei chende Sprochforschung, vol. xxii., p. 193 sqq.: Hatzidakis, llept Tor) 'EXXextrgoi, cipxahov:81ase66 vwv (Athens, 1896) ; Ed. Meyer, Geschiehte des Alto-turns, vol. ii. (Stuttgart. 1893) Kretseh mer. Einleitung in die Gesehichte der gricehischen ( Gottingen, • 1896 )