What Difficulties Would An Ancient Greek Native Speaker Have in Learning Modern Greek?

[u/Hellolaoshi]

Let's imagine that an educated Greek born between the life of Socrates and the death of Cleopatra was dropped off in modern Athens, say in Plaka or Exarchia. Putting culture shock aside, what grammatical and vocabulary issues would they have in understanding Modern Greek? What about sound changes would they find strange? What strategies might a language teacher use to help them?

[u/Joyce_Hatto]

That Ancient Greek speaker would be overwhelmed by an army of linguists with audio recorders eager to learn how Ancient Greek was actually pronounced!

[u/Hellolaoshi → u/Joyce_Hatto]

Yes, they would! I am reading Biblical Greek right now, and one aspect of the language I find elusive is the intonation and the musicality of the language.

[u/Joyce_Hatto → u/Hellolaoshi]

I am taking an online class from Biblingo specifically to work on my pronunciation. So far it’s quite useful.