The Greek Myth and English Vocabulary 英语论文

TheGreek Myth and English Vocabulary

Abstract:ModernEnglish is in constant fusion of each nation's language and

cultureand experienced a long historical development process after graduallyevolved. So there are many loan words in English vocabulary, and mostof the loan words, which come from Greek language origin from Greekmyth. The Greek myth has a great impact on English vocabulary, on theone hand, the produce of some English words directly transform fromGreek myth. On the other hand, the myth associates with the basicwords closely. And it also has an important position in Englishidioms.

KeyWords:Greek myth; English vocabulary; types

I.Introduction

Amyth is a folk story expressing and symbolizing certain fundamentalaspects of human existence. [1] Greek myths were created in ancienttimes, but they still survive now, and were passed generation bygeneration because of the permanent fascination. They are of greatsignificance in English vocabulary.

InRenaissance, European humanism scholars research and translateancient Greek and Roman classical literature, so that a large numberof Greek myth vocabulary directly into English. [2] With the nation’sconflict and communication, the English vocabulary take in more andmore Greek myth’s words by many ways and types, such as, the root,the affix, and the idiom.

II.Types of way to be absorbed in Greek myth

2.1Parts of words directly into English vocabulary
InRenaissance,European humanism scholars research and translate ancientGreekand Roman classical literature, so that a large number of Greek mythvocabularydirectly into English.

2.1.1Influenceon basic English vocabulary
TheGreek myth has some characters, who either have a certain typicalcharacteristics, either they had special experience, so their namedirectly trans- formed into English common nouns. Converted intocommon noun, retained the original spelling, its meaning is thesymbol of the mythical figure meaning and implied meaning, this kindof transfer or extended and myth character or experience in closerelations. At the same time, meaning of the connotation anddenotation of all have very big grow, and in the form is not changed,its meaning by a single conversion for diversity, abstract intospecific common.

Forexample, ''Siren'' is a sea monster, whose body is a half of man anda half

ofbird, she usually sings beautiful song to tempt voyager. Now, inmodern English, this word means charming beauty, good singer,whistle, alarm. ''Fortune'' is a goddess who represent happiness andsuccess. The word ''fortune'' means destiny, good luck and wealth intoday's vocabulary. Another example is ''Genie'', he also is a godand his duty is control the good soul of people and protect them inGreek myth. Now people always use this word express a mean of genius,talent and nature.

2.1.2Influenceon flowers and plants in English vocabulary
Inmodern English a lot of plants and flowers' name with the ancientGreek myth is closely related to the relationship.

Thereis a Greek myth about daffodil’s name. According to legend,Narcissus is a handsome boy, who is Achelous’ son. He is so prettythat many girls fall in love with him at the first sight, but healways ignore them, The Goddess of nature also loved him and can notpull out, eventually gaunt and die. Nemesis, the Goddess of revenge,wants to retaliate for him, so she let him to be infatuated with hisown shadow in the water, finally drop into the river, and die. TheGoddess of love loved him so she made him as a daffodil, so that hecould watch himself everyday. That is the reason why do people alsocalled the daffodil as narcissus.

Adonis,centaur and teasel, both of those flowers’ name are have they ownGreek myth.

2.2The influence on English root and affix
Greekmythology to English root and affix has been deeply implanted intoEnglish vocabulary.

2.2.1Names have an influence on English roots
Firstly,the Flora, was a goddess of flower. Her husband was the god of westwind Zephyr gave her a garden with a present. During Spring, theywalked hand to hand in the garden, where they go, where the flowersbloom. So Flora as root, equivalent to plant plants. Cognate wordshave floral (flowers, plants), florist (florist), and flourish(prosperity, bloom) and so on.

Secondly,Pan is one of the Greek myth of the mountain god, his has sheep footand human head. Because he looks weird, his mother abandoned him assoon as he born. He likes to wander in the mountain, with his strangevoice and grimace scared passers-by, people are fear. Fear from thePan, so fear is panic.

Thirdly,Pluto, the god of the underworld. Because have "Acheron thetreasure" and makes Pluto as a root said wealth. Cognate wordsinclude plutocracy plutocrat rule; Plutolatry money worship.

2.2.2Names and places have an influence on English affixes.

Thiskind of conversion usually said abstract and general, most forprefix. Meaning is the mythical figure ideal job function andsymbolic meaning.

GoddessSelene (syler nie) conversion evolved as "selen - month",such as: "selenodesist lunar experts", "selenologymonth surface science, on physical". Similarly, "Hebe -"can be used for conversion, table "youth", its from Hebe(Hebe, they specialize in world youth and serve Olympia mountain thespirit, be skillful in

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play?, such as hebephrenial namely medicine refers to the "adolescentstay chi disorder"
Pluto(prue with) system hel of god, the god of the grave; Because have"acheron the treasure" and similar "Pluto" as theroot said "wealth"; Ares (Ares) is the myth of the god ofwar, Mars Roman name (marr,). The ancient greeks observed strangereddish-brown Mars, imaginary is his trouble there, so in his Romanname Mars to Mars named. Ares and this name is turned into aconversion "areo - Mars", such as "areocentric(astronomy) to Mars as the center", "Aerographic on thesurface of Mars"; "Areography Mars learning".

2.2.3Myth story have an influence on the English geographical term
Themyth of the names in a specific root, plus a suffix said specificgeographic term, become the world universal geographic terms. Thesegeographic term by the ancient Greeks had lived geographic range,with the Mediterranean as the center.

Accordingto the Greek myths, Athens king Theseus go to the Crete (what is nowCrete) to battle with a devil, it is very dangerous, so hang blacksail to show mourning, when they leave. With others' help, Theseuskilled devil but he was so excited that forgot to change the whitesails which means victory, when they come back, his father namedAegean (Aegean) saw the black sail considered that his son, Theseus,already were unfortunate, under the immense grief of losing a son,the old king jump into the sea. So later generations took the areacalled the Aegean sea.

''Europe''named by Zeus. Legend, Europa is a beautiful amorous Phoenicianprincess, Zeus deceived her, and made her come into a sheep to carryhim to a new continent for "marriage". In return, thecontinent named Europe by Zeus, because the myth story is charming,so this word ''Europe'' still be received.

2.3The influence on English idioms
Idiomsare fixed phrase, with the unity of semantic and rigidity. Thestructure, idioms have the integrity of itself, of which each part isfixed, not any apart and replace. There are a lot of English idiomsare from Greek myth story, its literal meaning still has the richconnotation meaning.

''Appleof discord''[3], this idiom means the cause of an argument, aconflict or a contention. There are a greek myth for the idiom. Erisis an unpopular goddess, she is the origin of argument and conflict.One day, the wedding of Zeus's son was not invited Eris, that madeher very unpleasent, so she throw a gold apple at the wedding andwrite something what is ''For the most beautiful goddess''. All ofthe Goddesses think that themselves is the apple's owner so Themother earth Hera, intelligence goddess Athena and so on, have adispute. Zeus don't want to offend anyone who refused to award, andthen they find the most beautiful man Paris on Earth to award thedispute. Aphrodite promised Paris she would give the Spartan king'swife Hellen for him, so Paris consist that Aphrodite is the mostbeautiful goddess. For the foolish decision, Paris and his countrypaid a heavy price; Trojan which is his country battle with Greek forten years. The gold apple led to a long Trojan war, so ''Apple ofdiscord'' means the cause of argument or conflict.

''Thestone of Sisyphus'' means hard and invalid work,''Charon's boat''means

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passaway, ''the heel of Achilles'' means somebody's fatal weakness, allof these idioms are from Greek myth. And these only a tip of icebregof english idioms which comes from Greek myth.

III.Conclusion

Itis obvious that Greek myths make great contributions to the richnessand resourcefulness of the English vocabulary.Greek mythology to theinfluence of the English vocabulary reflects the vocabulary ofseveral aspects, from the common noun to the root and affix, learnfrom plant nouns to astronomy and geography. With the societydevelopment myth has lost continue to create the possibility of down,but the Greek mythology is still a high not and the form of "showeverlasting charm" (Marx: "" the critique of politicaleconomy introduction", "selected works of Marx and Engelssecond volume of 114 pages).

References

[1]Huang Chengming,Myths in modern English poetry,厦门大学学报（哲社版），1988年，第

二期

[2]汪榕培、王之江.英语词汇学：英语词汇的来源.上海外语教育出版社,2012.

[3]RogerD. Woodard，（2008）.TheCambridge Companion to Greek Mythology. Cambridge

UniversityPress。

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