Hello, good friends of EB!

I am doing some very minor modding of the game "Hegemony Gold: Wars of Ancient Greece" the expansion of "Hegemony: Philip of Macedon", by changing the names of factions and cities to their realistic equivalents; more or less inspired by EB.

I have almost no knowledge of the Ancient Greek language, but I've been wracking my brain and using translators, greeklish converters, google, wikipedia and such to try and get the names right. The cities aren't giving me too much trouble, but the faction names are really stumping me. Therefore I'd like to ask any kind soul here who'd be willing to give me a few moments of their time, if these are at all correct.

I have completely left out diacritics, because as far as I can tell the game only supports some of them, while other characters are left blank.

Bold is the original game name, italic my attempts at naming:

Acarnanian League - Koinon Akarnanion
Achaean League - Koinon Akhaion
Aetolian League - Koinon Aitolion
Arcadian League - Koinon Arkadion
Argolis(Argolid Federation) - Argolis
Athenian Empire - Koinon Delion
Balkan Mountain Tribes -
Boeotian League - Koinon Boiotion
Central Odrysian Kingdom -
Chalcidian League - Koinon Khalkidikon
Corinthia(Corinthian Alliance) - Korinthia
Crete - Krete
Danube Valley Tribes -
Eastern Odrysian Kingdom -
Elean League - Koinon Elion
Illyrians - Illyrioi
Kingdom of Epirus - Epeiros
Kingdom of Macedonia - Makedonia)
Lacedaemonians - Lakedaimon
Paeonia - Paionia
Persian Empire - Haxamanishiya
Phocian League(Phocians) - Koinon Phokion
Thessalian League - Koinon Thessalikoinon
Tyrants of Pherae - maybe Tyrannaios ton Pheron?
Western Odrysian Kingdom -

What I have for the Seas:
Adriatic Sea -
Aegean Sea - Aigaion Pelagos
Black Sea - Euxeinos Pontos
Cretan Sea - Kretaion Pelagos
Ionian Sea - Ionon Pelagos
Thracian Sea - Thraikion Pelagos

May I also ask what the Greeks might have called the Adriatic Sea?

Thanks for any help you might be able to give. I really do appreciate it.

Edit: Updated the list to include all factions and seas. I apologize that some are still unnamed.

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Link the mod when you are done with it. I'm quite tired of some of the really silly aspects of it.

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I will definitely try and post what I do get.

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I think Koinon is the proper term, also on paper I believe the athenian "empire" was called Delian League and the Spartans' Peloponnesian League...

Symmachia meant only a military alliance iirc...

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So the Athenian Empire might be 'Koinon ton Athenaion' or 'Koinon ton Delion'?

I was never really sure what the actual word was that 'league' stands in for, so I went with a lead (symmachia) that a Modern Greek translation gave me.

Thank you for the reply.

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Nitpicker The game is awesome.

Koinon Delion. Like Koinon Hellenon? It's the same methinks. It's not League of the... It's League Something-ian Koinon Something-on. Same with Boiotian, Koinon Boiotion.

If Makedonia is a female noun, then I imagine it is Basileia tes Makedonia, or Basileia? I'm not that good on that aspect.

Koinon Pelloponesson? For Sparta? Koinon Thessalikoinon? Same stuff here.

Tyrannaios ton Pheron? I seriously don't know here.

~Jirisys ()

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Thank you very much Jirisys. I saw 'koinon ton-' written on a site or two and thought that's how it was. For whatever reason I just never realized it should be like Koinon Hellenon. Bah, I embarrass myself sometimes.

Thank you again for your help.

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+1 Awesome game but some aspects were just soooo silly.

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I was wondering if I might rename the military units in the game as well, (Phalangites -> Pezhetairoi).

Although to do that, I would first have to ask the EB team for permission to use some of the names of their units. Does anyone know whom exactly I might contact about that?

Sorry to keep bothering everyone. Thanks for reading.

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Well basically not even the EB Team owns the rights on Ancient Greek so I think you can just do so. Apart from that I'd just send ... hhmm... foot a Pm.

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Has anyone here read Thucydides in Greek? I skimmed through it the other day and the word το κοινον does not come up that often. At least not to describe the actions of the various states and leagues.

Don't get me wrong, το κοινον does mean "state" or "league" in Greek. But it seems to me that Thucydides preferred using "the Athenians" or "the Lakedaimonians" when describing the actions of the "leagues". I don't see το κοινον used that much in his work or Herodotus', and I don't think I've ever seen Koinon Delion in Greek. Herodotus also prefers writing "the Athenians did this" or "the Lakedaimonians did that" over "Athens", "the Athenian league/state" or "Lakedaimon".

If I were in your shoes, I'd just name them Athenaioi, Arkades, Khalkides, Lakedaimonioi, etc. Just like you did for Illyrioi.

Anyway, the Adriatic is called Adrias. Kretikon Pelagos instead of Kretaion Pelagos. Ionios Kolpos instead of Ionon Pelagos (ancient writers seem to use the word gulf instead of sea to describe the area). Hope that helps.

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Yes that's true, but it has a lot to do with the greek mentality...
Both Athens and Sparta were Hegemon, all the other members participated in an epimachia (on paper was simply a defensive policy), so their actions were pivotal...
But they didn't held any power from a "constitutional" level, Athens almost by accident ended up having poleis looking out for her and Sparta was held in high esteem for its military fame...
They were acknowledged as Hegemon of the League and that's the power they had over the members, but it wasn't like the other poleis were Athenians themselves or participated in their "state"...

Similarly you don't hear of the League of Corinth marching east to take over Asia and punish the Persians, but again on paper that's what it was...

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I guess my point is that to contemporary Greeks decisions were seen as being made by the hegemon polis and not the league, even though the fighting is done by the hegemon polis and her allies.

In any case, the construction koinon "city" seems like an anachronism to the period since it was hardly used by contemporary commentators.

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That's what you get with ancient Greeks, in the period they most likely listed all members...
What I was saying is that going only by the Hegemon is misleading, to abbreviate contemporary historians went with "... and his allies", but for temple dedications and such I'm pretty sure it was done with the formula of all members in the league...

When Athens moved the treasury to its acropolis and all other "imperial" actions made all the other poleis angry and such, dealing with the politics of ancient Hellas is very difficult and all it's open to discussion though :)

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You have been a GREAT help, thank you. Could I ask what the rule is for certain names where 'k' is included in the ending, like "Kretikon" or "Thessalikoi", where the 'k' wasn't there before?

I fully understand your point about the naming, and it does seem much more natural and realistic. Ultimately all I'm trying to go for is a "Europa Barbarorum" feel, in naming the factions as they would have been called. So, I guess, the decision isn't really mine, but more what you guys think it should be.

Thank you again for your help.

I will PM him and see what he thinks. Thank you very much.

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Κκ (kappa) is usually romanized with "k", while Χχ (chi) with "ch"...

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On the other hand it's not like anyone would always use the correct name for a state but instead just mentions it's most prominent inhabitants. Just like nobody who does not have to fear to be sued often uses terms like "Federal republic of germany" in everyday conversation. Especially not when the subject is not the state itself. And I don't think Thucydides had a lector and a lawyer in his neck. When an army of the Delian League marches towards your city you'd probably not say "help the delian league" but "help the Athenians!".

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Are you asking about when to use the -ik- suffix instead of the -i- suffix for adjectives? There is no hard fast rule I think. Ancient authors seems to alternate between them. Anyway, here's a list of people names in the same order you put them up top.

From Acarnians to Cretans it's: Akarnanes, Akhaioi, Aitōloi, Arkades, Argeioi, Athēnaioi, Boiōtoi, Khalkidees, Korinthioi and Krētes.

The Elean name for Eleans is Wāleioi.

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Thank you. I generally knew that was the case, but a few of the more helpful sites I went to all had 'Kh' used instead, so I just went with it.

Thank you very much for this, I appreciate it greatly.

The Elean name is interesting; I read somewhere(probably wikipedia) that the Greeks dropped the 'w' sound. Did the Eleans never lose it, or did the Greeks have it and just never used it?

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I thought the Elean name was interesting too, so I double-checked early Elean inscriptions and sure enough that ethnonym is there.

North-western Greek dialects, as well as many varieties of Doric, Arcado-Cypriot and Aeolic preserve initial 'w', and in some of these dialects word-internal 'w's as well.

The Eleans actually do lose it by around the second century BCE it seems from the inscriptions I looked at, but for the time period you're working with Elis was called Walis by its inhabitants.

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I've always loved learning about the Hellenes. Even the little things never bore me.

Thank you again for all the information you've shared.

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Sorry for the slight necro but I've been wanting to clear a few things up. It's me asking questions

People have proposed Koinon for leagues like the attic league but as far as I know, contemporaries called it hoi Athenaioi kai hoi sýmmachoi, "the Athenians and their allies/confederates", right?
The way I understand it, Koinon was rather used for federal states, like the Boiotians or Achaians?

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Yeah, the main use for to koinon was to describe "the state", and in the plural, ta koina, it meant "the authorities". But it is also used to mean league or federation of allies.

But yes, contemporaries primarily used ethnonyms like Athenaioi or Lakedaimonioi with an implied or overtly stated kai hoi summakhoi.

Koinos is really just an adjective that means "common" and to koinon is a substantivized adjective that roughly means "the common good/cause/interest". So you can see why there's some liberty in its use. Someone who reads inscriptions more extensively than me could comment further, but I doubt you'd find to koinon in inscriptions as an official name of Athens or any other polis. At least for the Elean dedications I've read, I've only ever seen Waleioi and not to koinon ton Waleion.

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For the tribes, even though I don't know in their own language, but they were all getting bilingual, you could use ethnai :)

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What about using just plain 'Athenaioi' or 'Spartiatai' instead of those artificial 'koinon' names?

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