The most popular hypothesis on the origin of Griko is the one by Gerhard Rohlfs[8] and Georgios Hatzidakis, that Griko's roots go as far back in history as the time of the ancient Greek colonies in Southern Italy and Sicily in the eighth century BC. The Southern Italian dialect is thus considered to be the last living trace of the Greek elements that once formed Magna Graecia.
There are, however, competing hypotheses according to which Griko may have preserved some Doric elements, but its structure is otherwise mostly based on Koine Greek, like almost all other Modern Greek dialects.[9] Thus, Griko should rather be described as a Doric-influenced descendant of Medieval Greek spoken by those who fled the Byzantine Empire to Italy to escape the Turks. The idea of Southern Italy's Greek dialects being historically derived from Medieval Greek was proposed for the first time in the 19th century by Giuseppe Morosi.[10]
Nasal+stop clusters [ᵐb, ⁿd, ᵑɡ] along with voiceless equivalents [ᵐp, ⁿt, ᵑk] also are heard.
The cacuminal /ɖ/ may also be realized as an affricate [ɖːʐ], and consonant sequences /tr/ and /tːr/ may be pronounced as [ʈʂ] and [ʈːʂ] among speakers.
[z] is heard as a realization of /s/ when before a voiced consonant.
A few cases of a palatal lateral [ʎ] can be heard, possibly as a result of the influence of Standard Italian.
Vowels /i, u/ are heard as homorganic glides [j, w] when following consonants and preceding other vowels.[17]
Grammar
In many aspects, its grammar is similar to that of Modern Greek. The language has three genders, masculine, feminine, and neuter. All nouns and adjectives are declined according to number and case. There are four cases, just like in Modern Greek: nominative, genitive, accusative, and vocative. Verbs are conjugated according to person, number, tense, mood, and aspect. The table below shows the personal pronouns of the Griko language:
^G. Rohlfs, Griechen und Romanen in Unteritalien, 1924.
^G. Horrocks, Greek: A history of the language and its speakers, London: Longman. 1997. Ch. 4.4.3 and 14.2.3.
^G. Morosi, Studi sui dialetti greci della terra d'Otranto, Lecce, 1870.
^Law no. 482 of 1999Archived 2015-05-12 at the Wayback Machine: "La Repubblica tutela la lingua e la cultura delle popolazioni albanesi, catalane, germaniche, greche, slovene e croate e di quelle parlanti il francese, il franco-provenzale, il friulano, il ladino, l'occitano e il sardo."
^ abOften, in actual performances of the song, synizesis takes place on the two final syllables of καρδία (/kar.'di.a/ > /kar.dja/) corresponding to Standard Modern Greek καρδιά/kar.'ðʝa/ (< καρδία/kar.'ði.a/).
^ ab The verbs "σέρνομαι" and "στέκομαι" are in passive forms but the active forms "σέρνω" (transl. el – transl. serno) and [especially] "στέκω" (transl. el – transl. steko) of the respective verbs can be used with "passive meaning" in modern Greek.
^Romano, Antonio (2011). Acoustic data about the Griko vowel system. University of Turin, Italy.
