Greek to me

Origins

It may have been a direct translation of a similar phrase in ("it is Greek, [therefore] it cannot be read"). The phrase is widely believed to have its origins among medieval scribes. While most scribes were familiar with Latin, few people in medieval Western Europe, even among the intellectual classes, were schooled in Greek. When copying classic manuscripts they would frequently encounter passages and quotations in Greek which they would have no way of translating, and as such would note the phrase in the margins.

Recorded usage of the metaphor in English traces back to the early modern period. It appears in 1599 in Shakespeare's play Julius Caesar, as spoken by Servilius Casca to Cassius after a festival in which Caesar was offered a crown:

CASSIUS: Did Cicero say any thing?

CASCA: Ay, he spoke Greek.

CASSIUS: To what effect?

CASCA: Nay, an I tell you that, I'll ne'er look you i' the face again: but those that understood him smiled at one another and shook their heads; but, for mine own part, it was Greek to me. I could tell you more news too: Marullus and Flavius, for pulling scarfs off Caesar's images, are put to silence. Fare you well. There was more foolery yet, if I could remember it.

Here, Casca's literal ignorance of Greek is the source of the phrase, using its common meaning to play on the uncertainty among the conspirators about Cicero's attitude to Caesar's increasingly regal behaviour.

Shakespeare was not the only author of this period to use the expression. It was also used in 1603 by Thomas Dekker in his play Patient Grissel:

FAR: Asking for a Greek poet, to him he fails. I'll be sworn he knows not so much as one character of the tongue.

RIC: Why, then it's Greek to him.

The expression is almost exclusively used with reference to the speaker (generally "Greek to me"); Dekker's "Greek to him" is rare.

Variations

Other languages have similar formulations, some referring to Greek but many referring to foreign languages such as Chinese or Spanish. Many refer to a language with a different alphabet or writing system.

This is an example of the usage of demonyms in relation to the ability of a people to be understood, comparable to the development of the words barbarian (one who babbles), Nemec (Slavic for "the mute one," indicating Germans).

In an article published by Arnold L. Rosenberg in the language journal Lingvisticæ Investigationes, he claimed that there was a popular "consensus" that Chinese was the "hardest" language, since various non-English languages most frequently used the Chinese language in their equivalent expression to the English idiom "it's all Greek to me". David Moser of the University of Michigan Center for Chinese Studies reached a similar conclusion.

References

References

1. (17 April 2011). "Etymology of Gringo".
2. Rosenberg, Arnold L.. (January 1979). "The Hardest Natural Languages". Lingvisticæ Investigationes.
3. Moser, D. Pīnyīn.Info. Why Chinese Is So Damn Hard. Retrieved Jun 4, 2011, http://www.pinyin.info/readings/texts/moser.html {{Webarchive. link. (2011-05-21)
4. In isolation, ''voor'' is pronounced {{IPA. nl. voːr. .
5. "Ergens geen jota van snappen".
6. "volapukaĵo -- Plena Ilustrita Vortaro de Esperanto".
7. Katja Grundmann, [https://www.geo.de/geolino/redewendungen/5199-rtkl-fuer-mich-sind-das-boehmische-doerfer "Böhmische Dörfer"], ''[[Geo (magazine). GEO (GEOlino)]]''.
8. "itku'ile in English - Lojban-English Dictionary {{!}} Glosbe".
9. Note also a related occurrence: Rachel Gardener's [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gv0QIbGc8i8&t=27s “lo nabmi” (“The problem”) song at 00:27]: “.i .ia nadme'a fa la .itku'ile .'enai” (“I think Ithkuil would be easier than this”).
10. (2024-07-24). "Откуда произошло выражение «китайская грамота»".
11. (2024-08-15). "Как появилось выражение «писать как курица лапой» (ему уже больше 2000 лет)".
12. "Biblismos".
13. "Biblismos".
14. "Güncel Türkçe Sözlük'te Söz Arama".
15. "Hürriyet Arama".
16. "Güncel Türkçe Sözlük'te Söz Arama".
17. (7 January 2021). ""Anladıysam Arap olayım" sözü rafa mı kalkıyor?".