Katharevousa

Katharevousa is an archaizing formal variety of Modern Greek that drew on Ancient Greek forms. It was widely used in administration and writing before demotic Greek replaced it as Greece’s official language in 1976.

Adamantios Korais: An Enlightenment scholar who promoted a cultivated modern Greek purified of what he considered foreign influences. His proposals helped shape the language-reform ideas from which Katharevousa emerged.
Modern Greek: The Greek language spoken and written from roughly the late medieval period to the present. Katharevousa was a formal variety within the development of Modern Greek.
Greek education: The system of schooling and instruction in Greece and Greek-speaking communities. Katharevousa dominated formal instruction for long periods, shaping literacy and classroom language.
Greek language reform of 1976: The Greek government’s adoption of demotic Greek as the language of education and public administration in 1976. This reform ended Katharevousa’s official status and established demotic as the state standard.
Greek language question: The long dispute over whether Modern Greek should use a popular vernacular or an archaizing formal variety. Katharevousa became the principal formal side of this national dispute.
Atticism: The deliberate imitation of classical Attic Greek in later Greek writing. Katharevousa shared Atticism’s use of classical forms as a model for elevated language.
Greek administration: The public institutions and procedures through which the Greek state governs and provides services. Katharevousa served as a language of state records, laws, and official communication.
Monotonic orthography: A Greek writing system using one accent mark instead of the multiple accents and breathings of polytonic orthography. Its adoption in education in 1982 further simplified written conventions associated with older formal Greek.
Greek War of Independence: The 1821–1829 revolt that established an independent Greek state after centuries of Ottoman rule. The new state needed a language for administration and national institutions.
Diglossia: A social arrangement in which distinct language varieties serve different functions or levels of formality. Greek institutions often assigned Katharevousa formal roles and demotic everyday ones.

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