100-417: The Thessaloniki Metro ( Greek : Μετρό Θεσσαλονίκης , listen ) is an underground rapid-transit system in Thessaloniki , Greece 's second largest city. The system consists of a single line with 13 stations ; a second line and a further 5 stations under construction are expected to enter service in late 2025. It is fully automated and driverless , the first system of its kind in Greece, and
200-561: A Linear B clay tablet found in Messenia that dates to between 1450 and 1350 BC, making Greek the world's oldest recorded living language . Among the Indo-European languages, its date of earliest written attestation is matched only by the now-extinct Anatolian languages . The Greek language is conventionally divided into the following periods: In the modern era, the Greek language entered
300-473: A crèche . It is expected that the development of the depot will attract investment to the area, and there have been calls to make provisions for a passenger station at the depot. The depot complex is expected to be finished in May 2019. As part of the initial design, 3,700 park and ride parking spaces were created – 1,050 spaces at New Railway Station , 650 spaces Nea Elvetia , and a further 2,000 at Panepistimio ,
400-408: A 4.78 km (2.97 mi) route between 25 Martiou and Mikra and adds five stations to the network. Construction on the project began in 2013, with a budget of € 518 million ($ 585.18 million). By 31 July 2018, the extension was 60 percent completed. Although construction began seven years after Line 1, it is expected to fully enter service just six months after Line 1, in May 2025. This
500-570: A basis for coinages: anthropology , photography , telephony , isomer , biomechanics , cinematography , etc. Together with Latin words , they form the foundation of international scientific and technical vocabulary ; for example, all words ending in -logy ('discourse'). There are many English words of Greek origin . Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European language family. The ancient language most closely related to it may be ancient Macedonian , which, by most accounts,
600-483: A competition to fill the first 28 Thessaloniki Metro employee positions. Despite the progress, in September 2019 Greece's new conservative cabinet announced a further 28-month delay to the project, pushing the opening date from November 2020 to April 2023 and citing costly archaeological works at Venizelou as the reason. The new Minister of Infrastructure and Transport announced that the government had decided to scrap
700-508: A faster, more convenient cursive writing style with the use of ink and quill . The Greek alphabet consists of 24 letters, each with an uppercase ( majuscule ) and lowercase ( minuscule ) form. The letter sigma has an additional lowercase form (ς) used in the final position of a word: In addition to the letters, the Greek alphabet features a number of diacritical signs : three different accent marks ( acute , grave , and circumflex ), originally denoting different shapes of pitch accent on
800-573: A lesser extent, in the Western Mediterranean in and around colonies such as Massalia , Monoikos , and Mainake . It was also used as the official language of government and religion in the Christian Nubian kingdoms , for most of their history. Greek, in its modern form, is the official language of Greece, where it is spoken by almost the entire population. It is also the official language of Cyprus (nominally alongside Turkish ) and
900-400: A limited but productive system of compounding and a rich inflectional system. Although its morphological categories have been fairly stable over time, morphological changes are present throughout, particularly in the nominal and verbal systems. The major change in the nominal morphology since the classical stage was the disuse of the dative case (its functions being largely taken over by
1000-592: A metro was revived during the 1980s. In 1987, the University of Thessaloniki published a proposal for an extensive, multi-branch light metro system, envisioned to be underground only between the New Railway Station and Sintrivani , at a cost of ₯ 12.5 billion ( $ 92 million – $ 248 million in 2023) for the underground portion. In 1988, under Mayor Sotiris Kouvelas , the city published studies for its Thessaloniki Metro development plan and construction of
1100-453: A mixed syllable structure, permitting complex syllabic onsets but very restricted codas. It has only oral vowels and a fairly stable set of consonantal contrasts . The main phonological changes occurred during the Hellenistic and Roman period (see Koine Greek phonology for details): In all its stages, the morphology of Greek shows an extensive set of productive derivational affixes ,
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#17330845464941200-587: A monthly bus pass for the city's bus network . This makes Thessaloniki Metro one of the most affordable means of public transport in Europe and the world according to data compiled by Compare the Market Australia , and the cheapest among major cities in the Greek-speaking world. In preparation for the start of operations on 30 November 2024, Minister of Infrastructure and Transport Christos Staikouras revealed
1300-501: A number of jokes in Greece. News satire websites such as To Koulouri have satirised the metro on numerous occasions with stories such as "Thessaloniki Metro will operate on a 24-hour basis during the Christmas rush" and "Thessaloniki Metro enters its 763rd day of strike", and it has been cited in satirical lyrics by the Greek rapper Tus . Greek prime minister Alexis Tsipras joked about
1400-579: A priority among all future extensions of the Thessaloniki Metro and will include the following stations: The tender for the northwestern extension is expected to be completed by 2027. Topographic works, geological and geotechnical studies are currently being tendered for the project. This extension will start from Mikra and will continue to the south, with an underground part from Mikra to ASP (Higher School of War), an overground part to Georgikis Scholi Avenue and another overground part from IKEA to
1500-402: A series of unsuccessful contract competitions and appeals of awarded contracts. Another obstacle was lack of interest by Greece's central government . Thessaloniki attempted to fund the project on its own, saying that European Union member states were prepared to cover 50 percent of the project costs and provide favourable loans for the remainder, but without the central-government's involvement
1600-456: A state of diglossia : the coexistence of vernacular and archaizing written forms of the language. What came to be known as the Greek language question was a polarization between two competing varieties of Modern Greek: Dimotiki , the vernacular form of Modern Greek proper, and Katharevousa , meaning 'purified', a compromise between Dimotiki and Ancient Greek developed in the early 19th century that
1700-612: A system not originally implemented on the Athens Metro. In October 2024 it was reported that there was concern the ticketing system might not be ready on time for the opening on 30 November, due to the Thessaloniki Transport Authority not initiating the procurement process on time. The company attempted to bypass procurement requirements claiming extraordinary circumstances but the Court of Audit ruled this illegal, saying that
1800-463: A year, and reduce travel time by up to 66 percent. What is known as the Base Project ( Greek : Βασικό Έργο ) began in 2003, when Attiko Metro and the Greek government agreed to cooperate on a public works project Government support was instrumental, since lack of government support for the 1988 proposal was the primary reason it had failed. The project issued a request for tender in 2004–2005, and
1900-461: Is almost identical to his plan and runs from his proposed new railway station to the suburb of Nea Elvetia. The project never materialised. A circular metro line was proposed in 1968, extending to the airport and crossing the Thermaic Gulf in a tunnel. The first Greek national budget to include a funding code for a Thessaloniki Metro was that of 1976 under Konstantinos Karamanlis . The idea of
2000-411: Is due to the lack of major archaeological works, enabling the project to proceed without delays. The latest Elliniko Metro financial statement puts the extension's cost at €568 million ($ 642 million). An April 2019 update raised the estimated cost to €640 million ($ 723.01 million). The line is made up of 16 stations, 11 of which are also stations served by Line 1. After confusion about
2100-659: Is native to Greece , Cyprus , Italy (in Calabria and Salento ), southern Albania , and other regions of the Balkans , Caucasus , the Black Sea coast, Asia Minor , and the Eastern Mediterranean . It has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning at least 3,400 years of written records. Its writing system is the Greek alphabet , which has been used for approximately 2,800 years; previously, Greek
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#17330845464942200-559: Is operated by Thessaloniki Metro Automatic (THEMA), a Franco-Italian consortium . Estimates for the cost of the megaproject are at € 3 billion ( $ 3.24 billion), including €600 million ($ 649 million) in future interest payments. The project is primarily funded with loans from the European Investment Bank (EIB) and the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) , as well as funds from
2300-472: Is proceeding on schedule. Construction of tunnels for both lines was finished in 2018, and track-laying began in August of that year. Line 1 and Line 2 were expected to be operational by December 2023. Both lines are designed to serve a minimum of 18,000 passengers per hour in each direction, with a 90-second headway . The completed metro will reduce Thessaloniki's greenhouse gas emissions by an estimated 5,000 tons
2400-791: Is sometimes called aljamiado , as when Romance languages are written in the Arabic alphabet. Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in Greek: Transcription of the example text into Latin alphabet : Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in English: Proto-Greek Mycenaean Ancient Koine Medieval Modern List of mayors of Thessaloniki The Mayor of Thessaloniki
2500-758: Is still used internationally for the writing of Ancient Greek . In Greek, the question mark is written as the English semicolon, while the functions of the colon and semicolon are performed by a raised point (•), known as the ano teleia ( άνω τελεία ). In Greek the comma also functions as a silent letter in a handful of Greek words, principally distinguishing ό,τι ( ó,ti , 'whatever') from ότι ( óti , 'that'). Ancient Greek texts often used scriptio continua ('continuous writing'), which means that ancient authors and scribes would write word after word with no spaces or punctuation between words to differentiate or mark boundaries. Boustrophedon , or bi-directional text,
2600-562: Is to modern spoken English ". Greek is spoken today by at least 13 million people, principally in Greece and Cyprus along with a sizable Greek-speaking minority in Albania near the Greek-Albanian border. A significant percentage of Albania's population has knowledge of the Greek language due in part to the Albanian wave of immigration to Greece in the 1980s and '90s and the Greek community in
2700-494: Is under construction with the intention of serving both lines, with a total built-up area of 120,000 m (1,300,000 sq ft) and a total cost of €130.5 million ($ 147.43 million). Apart from being the system's automated remote control command centre, the complex will also house the offices of Elliniko Metro, the Thessaloniki Transport Authority (TheTA), and the Thessaloniki Metro operating company, as well as railway stock maintenance facilities, two restaurants, and
2800-861: The Ampelokipi station , this extension will include the following stations: The Thessaloniki Metro will be of GoA4 category, the first of its kind in Greece , as starting, stopping, and the operation of doors will be fully automated without any on train staff. All 18 stations currently under construction were designed with platform screen doors for maximum protection, while the trains will be driverless . Eighteen Hitachi Rail Italy Driverless Metro units will be in service on Line 1, and 15 on Line 2. The articulated , four-car trains will be 50 metres (160 ft) long. They will have seating for 96 passengers and standing room for 370 more. The trains will use 750 V DC third rail electrification, while tracks have been laid to
2900-544: The British Overseas Territory of Akrotiri and Dhekelia (alongside English ). Because of the membership of Greece and Cyprus in the European Union, Greek is one of the organization's 24 official languages . Greek is recognized as a minority language in Albania, and used co-officially in some of its municipalities, in the districts of Gjirokastër and Sarandë . It is also an official minority language in
3000-637: The European canon . Greek is also the language in which many of the foundational texts in science and philosophy were originally composed. The New Testament of the Christian Bible was also originally written in Greek. Together with the Latin texts and traditions of the Roman world , the Greek texts and Greek societies of antiquity constitute the objects of study of the discipline of Classics . During antiquity , Greek
3100-504: The Greek financial crisis , the first line opened on 30 November 2024. The system is commonly known as the Thessaloniki Metro ( Greek : Μετρό Θεσσαλονίκης , Metró Thessaloníkis , [meˈtro θesaloˈnicis] ), but is sometimes also referred to by the more formal name of Thessaloniki Metropolitan Railway ( Greek : Μητροπολιτικός Σιδηρόδρομος Θεσσαλονίκης , romanized : Mitropolitikós Sidiródromos Thessaloníkis ). Ernest Hébrard and Thomas Hayton Mawson were
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3200-610: The Greek government . Construction by a Greco-Italian consortium is overseen by Elliniko Metro , the Greek state-owned company which oversaw construction of the Athens Metro and Athens Tram . Proposed during the 1910s and first seriously planned in the 1980s, construction of the main line began in 2006 and on the Kalamaria extension in 2013. The system under construction has 18 stations and 14.4 km (8.9 mi) of tunnels. After years of delays, due to archaeological discoveries and
3300-510: The Indo-Iranian languages (see Graeco-Aryan ), but little definitive evidence has been found. In addition, Albanian has also been considered somewhat related to Greek and Armenian, and it has been proposed that they all form a higher-order subgroup along with other extinct languages of the ancient Balkans; this higher-order subgroup is usually termed Palaeo-Balkan , and Greek has a central position in it. Linear B , attested as early as
3400-517: The Thessaloniki International Fair that a new archaeological museum would be built specifically to house archaeological artefacts unearthed during the construction of the metro. The new head of Attiko Metro (now Elliniko Metro ) accused archaeologists of "looking to the past; we need to look forward". There were two more delays, one from April 2023 to December 2023, and one from December 2023 to March 2024. The decision to disassemble
3500-633: The United Kingdom , and throughout the European Union , especially in Germany . Historically, significant Greek-speaking communities and regions were found throughout the Eastern Mediterranean , in what are today Southern Italy , Turkey , Cyprus , Syria , Lebanon , Israel , Palestine , Egypt , and Libya ; in the area of the Black Sea , in what are today Turkey, Bulgaria , Romania , Ukraine , Russia , Georgia , Armenia , and Azerbaijan ; and, to
3600-468: The genitive ). The verbal system has lost the infinitive , the synthetically -formed future, and perfect tenses and the optative mood . Many have been replaced by periphrastic ( analytical ) forms. Pronouns show distinctions in person (1st, 2nd, and 3rd), number (singular, dual , and plural in the ancient language; singular and plural alone in later stages), and gender (masculine, feminine, and neuter), and decline for case (from six cases in
3700-661: The new railway station and Sintrivani/Ekthesi, the metro runs below Egnatia Street (one of Thessaloniki's main arteries). Egnatia follows the Roman Via Egnatia , which connected Rome and Constantinople as one of the two most important roads in the Roman and Byzantine empires. The portion of the Via Egnatia which passed through Thessaloniki was the city's Decumanus Maximus (main road), and runs below present-day Egnatia Street at 5.4 metres (18 ft) below ground level. Although
3800-480: The standard gauge of 1,435 mm (4 ft 8 + 1 ⁄ 2 in). A carriage was on display at the September 2018 Thessaloniki International Fair before trial runs in 2019. As of August 2019 two complete train sets have been delivered to the depot, with an additional train set expected every 2 to 3 months. The system's level of automation has prompted Attiko Metro to call it "the most modern metro in Europe". A 50,000 m (540,000 sq ft) depot
3900-417: The syntax of Greek have remained constant: verbs agree with their subject only, the use of the surviving cases is largely intact (nominative for subjects and predicates, accusative for objects of most verbs and many prepositions, genitive for possessors), articles precede nouns, adpositions are largely prepositional, relative clauses follow the noun they modify and relative pronouns are clause-initial. However,
4000-566: The 20th century on), especially from French and English, are typically not inflected; other modern borrowings are derived from Albanian , South Slavic ( Macedonian / Bulgarian ) and Eastern Romance languages ( Aromanian and Megleno-Romanian ). Greek words have been widely borrowed into other languages, including English. Example words include: mathematics , physics , astronomy , democracy , philosophy , athletics , theatre, rhetoric , baptism , evangelist , etc. Moreover, Greek words and word elements continue to be productive as
4100-538: The Greek alphabet since approximately the 9th century BC. It was created by modifying the Phoenician alphabet , with the innovation of adopting certain letters to represent the vowels. The variant of the alphabet in use today is essentially the late Ionic variant, introduced for writing classical Attic in 403 BC. In classical Greek, as in classical Latin, only upper-case letters existed. The lower-case Greek letters were developed much later by medieval scribes to permit
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4200-406: The Greek government and 75 percent funded by loans from the European Investment Bank and the European Regional Development Fund . The latest available Attiko Metro financial data put the official estimated cost at € 1.28 billion ($ 1.45 billion). An April 2019 update raised the estimated cost to €1.62 billion ($ 1.83 billion). Line 1 runs within the municipality of Thessaloniki ,
4300-540: The Greek language was the Cypriot syllabary (also a descendant of Linear A via the intermediate Cypro-Minoan syllabary ), which is closely related to Linear B but uses somewhat different syllabic conventions to represent phoneme sequences. The Cypriot syllabary is attested in Cyprus from the 11th century BC until its gradual abandonment in the late Classical period, in favor of the standard Greek alphabet. Greek has been written in
4400-403: The New Railway Station, creating archaeological problems similar to those encountered during construction of the current system . Although construction was scheduled to end in 1995, the project stalled and the unfinished (but excavated) initial cut-and-cover section became known as "the hole of Kouvelas " ( Greek : η τρύπα του Κούβελα , i trypa tou Kouvela ). The project ultimately failed due to
4500-404: The acute during the late 20th century, and it has only been retained in typography . After the writing reform of 1982, most diacritics are no longer used. Since then, Greek has been written mostly in the simplified monotonic orthography (or monotonic system), which employs only the acute accent and the diaeresis. The traditional system, now called the polytonic orthography (or polytonic system),
4600-425: The airport. The overground parts of the line will probably stand at a height of 5 meters and on a bridge in order to avoid further delays due to possible archaeological finds . Tendering for the main project will take place in late 2024. The stations of the extension will be: Line 1 will be extended further to Thermi from Patriarchiko, with only one station currently planned. On May 20, 2024, projected Line 3
4700-475: The antiquities and re-assemble them elsewhere, and the city's archaeological services wanted the company to alter the depth of the line and the station entrances. The city council sided with the archaeological services in 2015, three years after the metro was originally planned to begin service. Mayor Yiannis Boutaris took the case to the Council of State , Greece's highest administrative court. Attiko Metro redesigned
4800-441: The archaeological finds, dubbed a " Byzantine Pompeii ", was strongly criticised, and a citizens' group has taken the government to court over the issue for a second time, supported by former mayor Yiannis Boutaris among others. Part of the objection has to do with the fact that the government has not carried out any studies as to how it will return and re-assemble the artefacts once the station has been built; this course of action
4900-474: The arrival of Proto-Greeks, some documented in Mycenaean texts ; they include a large number of Greek toponyms . The form and meaning of many words have changed. Loanwords (words of foreign origin) have entered the language, mainly from Latin, Venetian , and Turkish . During the older periods of Greek, loanwords into Greek acquired Greek inflections, thus leaving only a foreign root word. Modern borrowings (from
5000-416: The city council, and archaeologists reached Greece's Council of State , the country's highest administrative court, in 2015. The original schedule had Line 1 operational by 2012. Attiko Metro redesigned several stations in a solution which became known as "antiquities and metro" ( Greek : και αρχαία και μετρό ). Some finds discovered on the line will be put on display at permanent in-station exhibitions, while
5100-476: The core of the Thessaloniki urban area , calling at 13 stations. It has two parallel single-track tunnels on a 9.5 km (5.9 mi) route between New Railway Station (for the city's main railway station ) and Nea Elvetia , with Pylaia depot further southeast. Although construction began in 2006, major archaeological finds in the city centre delayed the project considerably. Disputes between Attiko Metro,
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#17330845464945200-406: The corner of Egnatia and Venizelou Streets), and Efkleidis is shown as Archaeological Museum . The network would be within the city limits, excluding Kalamaria and a large portion of Thessaloniki's metropolitan area . Of the 7.77 km (4.83 mi) of track proposed, 6.26 km (3.89 mi) would be underground and 1.51 km (0.94 mi) above ground. In 1989, construction began on
5300-765: The country. Prior to the Greco-Turkish War and the resulting population exchange in 1923 a very large population of Greek-speakers also existed in Turkey , though very few remain today. A small Greek-speaking community is also found in Bulgaria near the Greek-Bulgarian border. Greek is also spoken worldwide by the sizable Greek diaspora which has notable communities in the United States , Australia , Canada , South Africa , Chile , Brazil , Argentina , Russia , Ukraine ,
5400-441: The dative led to a rise of prepositional indirect objects (and the use of the genitive to directly mark these as well). Ancient Greek tended to be verb-final, but neutral word order in the modern language is VSO or SVO. Modern Greek inherits most of its vocabulary from Ancient Greek, which in turn is an Indo-European language, but also includes a number of borrowings from the languages of the populations that inhabited Greece before
5500-435: The delays at the 2018 Thessaloniki International Fair: "What's happening with the metro, guys? Will it get built here?" Greek language Greek ( Modern Greek : Ελληνικά , romanized : Elliniká , [eliniˈka] ; Ancient Greek : Ἑλληνική , romanized : Hellēnikḗ ) is an Indo-European language, constituting an independent Hellenic branch within the Indo-European language family. It
5600-469: The document was not originally created by MnMS, the company that Elliniko Metro directly appointed to design the logo, but rather by Palladian, one of the companies which has submitted bids in the competition. The two companies were previously based in the same building in Athens, raising further questions. Elliniko Metro amended the metadata five hours after the official unveiling of the logo, changing among others
5700-528: The earliest forms attested to four in the modern language). Nouns, articles, and adjectives show all the distinctions except for a person. Both attributive and predicative adjectives agree with the noun. The inflectional categories of the Greek verb have likewise remained largely the same over the course of the language's history but with significant changes in the number of distinctions within each category and their morphological expression. Greek verbs have synthetic inflectional forms for: Many aspects of
5800-453: The extension's place in the system, Elliniko Metro clarified in August 2018 that it would be a separate line running between New Railway Station and Mikra without the need to change trains at 25 Martiou . The extension of Line 2 to Makedonia Airport went to tender in March 2019 with an initial budget of €254,150 ($ 287,000) for topographical works in order to enable more detailed planning of
5900-412: The extent that one can speak of a new language emerging. Greek speakers today still tend to regard literary works of ancient Greek as part of their own rather than a foreign language. It is also often stated that the historical changes have been relatively slight compared with some other languages. According to one estimation, " Homeric Greek is probably closer to Demotic than 12-century Middle English
6000-444: The first 650 metres (2,130 ft) of tunnel along Egnatia street between the Thessaloniki International Fair grounds and Aristotle University of Thessaloniki (the present Panepistimio station). Construction was carried out with the cut-and-cover method instead of a tunnel boring machine . The proposed metro was only 4.5 metres (15 ft) beneath ground level at 25 Martiou but dropped to about 10 metres (33 ft) towards
6100-723: The first to propose the creation of a metro system in Thessaloniki in 1918 as part of a commission appointed by the government of Eleftherios Venizelos to redesign the city after the Great Fire of 1917 , which had devastated the city centre. They proposed an underground railway to connect the New Railway Station and Nea Elvetia, terminus for a proposed railway connecting Mikra and the Strymonic Gulf . Although Thessaloniki has grown considerably since Hébrard's original design, Line 1
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#17330845464946200-442: The hospitals at the northwestern entrance of the city, and will end at a second depot of Line 1 situated at the ring road of Thessaloniki. The relevant decisions were announced by Hellenic Metro S.A. on May 20, 2024. The funding process will begin in 2024. The contractor's audit procedures will follow, along with the approval by the Court of Audit and the signing of the contract with the contractor. The northwestern extension will be
6300-449: The language show both conservative and innovative tendencies across the entire attestation of the language from the ancient to the modern period. The division into conventional periods is, as with all such periodizations, relatively arbitrary, especially because, in all periods, Ancient Greek has enjoyed high prestige, and the literate borrowed heavily from it. Across its history, the syllabic structure of Greek has varied little: Greek shows
6400-463: The late 15th century BC, was the first script used to write Greek. It is basically a syllabary , which was finally deciphered by Michael Ventris and John Chadwick in the 1950s (its precursor, Linear A , has not been deciphered and most likely encodes a non-Greek language). The language of the Linear B texts, Mycenaean Greek , is the earliest known form of Greek. Another similar system used to write
6500-418: The latter particularly on social media due to its simplicity. Elliniko Metro initiated two design competitions, with an initial prize of €8,000 ($ 8,650), but both were cancelled and the contract was instead awarded directly to a company for €30,000 ($ 32,438). The company retorted that the second competition was cancelled due to not being satisfied with the bids received (8 in total), eventually deciding to award
6600-608: The line, sinking the tunnels to depths from 14 to 31 metres (46 to 102 ft) and providing for mini-museums in the stations similar to the Syntagma metro station in Athens (which houses the Syntagma Metro Station Archaeological Collection ). The Venizelou station will contain an open archaeological site , the world's first metro station to do so. The archaeological excavations are currently budgeted at €132 million ($ 149 million), compared with
6700-437: The line. The extension to the northwestern districts initially included a circular line and was in a preliminary phase until the fall of 2023 when the management of Elliniko Metro S.A. decided not to proceed with the project, considering it both structurally unfeasible and wrong in design. The project now includes a northwest extension of Line 1 that will start from Dimokratias , will cross Stavroupoli and Evosmos , will reach
6800-468: The local community" as part of a "long list of direct appointments". The spokesman of the Government of Greece described concerns around the brand's aesthetics as "legitimate", but otherwise defended both the design and the companies involved. In an examination of the metadata on the official branding presentation document published by Elliniko Metro, carried out by +Design Magazine , it was revealed that
6900-429: The location of the Via Egnatia in Thessaloniki was known when the metro line was planned, it was uncertain what else was buried nearby. The metro was planned to run at 8 metres (26 ft) below ground, leaving only 2.6 metres (8.5 ft) between it and the ancient road. The discovery of a Byzantine road at Venizelou station was a major archaeological find: 75 metres (246 ft) of the marble-paved and column-lined road
7000-441: The major discoveries at Venizelou will make up the world's first publicly-accessible open-air archaeological site contained in situ within a metro station. Construction of the tunnels was completed on 31 July 2018, 12 years and one month after breaking ground. That day, the architectural work on Line 1 was reported as 80 percent finished. In August 2018 installation of the tracks and electronic signalling equipment began. It
7100-448: The many other countries of the Greek diaspora . Greek roots have been widely used for centuries and continue to be widely used to coin new words in other languages; Greek and Latin are the predominant sources of international scientific vocabulary . Greek has been spoken in the Balkan peninsula since around the 3rd millennium BC, or possibly earlier. The earliest written evidence is
7200-477: The metro system are more complex than similar issues surrounding the construction of the New Acropolis Museum . Other important discoveries included a headless statue of Aphrodite , fourth-century-AD mosaics , a golden wreath , a bath complex , urban villas , and 50,000 coins. Artifacts from the 1917 fire were also found. The discovery sparked controversy in Thessaloniki; Attiko Metro wanted to remove
7300-465: The morphological changes also have their counterparts in the syntax, and there are also significant differences between the syntax of the ancient and that of the modern form of the language . Ancient Greek made great use of participial constructions and of constructions involving the infinitive, and the modern variety lacks the infinitive entirely (employing a raft of new periphrastic constructions instead) and uses participles more restrictively. The loss of
7400-432: The name of the author, but had already disseminated the unaltered presentation to media outlets such as Naftemporiki . A large number of important archaeological finds, primarily Roman and early Christian and Byzantine , have been discovered during the metro's construction. The project triggered the largest archaeological dig in northern Greek history, covering a 20-square-kilometre (7.7 sq mi) area. Between
7500-417: The opening date of the metro was not an extraordinary circumstance, and that the size of the order (2.7 million paper tickets and 100,000 plastic cards) necessitated a public invitation to tender . In November 2024 it was announced that a typical ticket will cost €0.90, but the cost will be reduced to €0.60 for the first six months of the system's operations. A monthly ticket will cost €16, compared to €27 for
7600-507: The original archaeological budget of €15 million ($ 17 million), and employ 300 archaeologists. Over 300,000 artefacts have been unearthed to date. The archaeological work is being carried out by the Ministry of Culture and Sports ' Ephorate of Prehistoric and Classical Antiquities and the Ephorate of Byzantine Antiquities. Construction delays have made the Thessaloniki Metro the subject of
7700-733: The plan did not go forward. One reason for the lack of central-government support was Greece's political polarisation during the 1980s; Kouvelas represented the centre-right New Democracy party when the country was governed by the Panhellenic Socialist Movement . Plans for a Thessaloniki metro were abandoned until the 2000s. In 2018, Elliniko Metro S.A. was overseeing the construction of a two-line, twin-tunnel system composed of Line 1 (the base project) and Line 2 (the Kalamaria Extension). Although Line 1 has been delayed by extensive archaeological works, Line 2's construction
7800-460: The previous plan to keep the archaeological discoveries in situ within the station at Venizelou, choosing instead to disassemble them and re-assemble them at a later stage, noting that excavation costs had exceeded €130 million ($ 146.86 million), more than the cost of the new Acropolis Museum . Thessaloniki's new conservative mayor, Konstantinos Zervas , as well as Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis , supported this move. Mitsotakis also announced at
7900-433: The project's first phase. The line was almost identical to the modern line, with 14 stations between the New Railway Station and Nea Elvetia . The plan had one additional station, Patrikiou, between 25 Martiou and Voulgari and had alternative names for three stations. Dimokratias is shown as Vardari, an alternative name for the public square served by the station; Venizelou is listed as Alkazar ( Hamza Bey Mosque , on
8000-622: The regions of Apulia and Calabria in Italy. In the framework of the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages , Greek is protected and promoted officially as a regional and minority language in Armenia, Hungary , Romania, and Ukraine. It is recognized as a minority language and protected in Turkey by the 1923 Treaty of Lausanne . The phonology , morphology , syntax , and vocabulary of
8100-416: The removal of the antiquities from their original location, saying that the discoveries constituted "a cultural and scientific jewel" and that "it would be a tragedy to jeopardise [Greece's reputation for monument preservation] by squandering the treasure of the Thessaloniki material and data through an unnecessarily hasty construction project", arguing that the previous decision to leave the discoveries in-situ
8200-461: The same price and 48.1 percent said they would pay more. Of the latter, 19.9 percent said that they would pay €0.60; 19.6 percent would pay €0.70, and 8.6 percent would be willing to pay €1.00 (double the cost of a bus ticket). The remaining 4.7 percent responded with another fare. A standard 2023 single-trip OASTH bus ticket is €0.90, or €0.45 with a discount. Thessaloniki Metro will utilise an electronic card ticketing system as well as fare gates ,
8300-437: The stressed vowel; the so-called breathing marks ( rough and smooth breathing ), originally used to signal presence or absence of word-initial /h/; and the diaeresis , used to mark the full syllabic value of a vowel that would otherwise be read as part of a diphthong. These marks were introduced during the course of the Hellenistic period. Actual usage of the grave in handwriting saw a rapid decline in favor of uniform usage of
8400-511: The successful Greco- Italian consortium (which included AnsaldoBreda ) began construction in late June 2006. An alternate consortium, Macedonian Metro ( Greek : Μακεδονικό Μετρό ), was barred by the European Court of Justice from participating in the tender because it changed its composition after the tender proceedings began (violating EU law ). The project was budgeted at € 1.05 billion ($ 1.19 billion), with 25 percent funding from
8500-480: The system's brand identity. The central design element is lowercase Greek letter M (μ), in the Greek miniscule style used to write Medieval Greek manuscripts, in reference to the city's Byzantine history . Dark blue was chosen as the main brand colour, to symbolise stability . The SIL Open Font Commissioner was chosen for the word 'metro' in the logo, and for promotional materials and signage. The logo attracted criticism both for its cost and its aesthetics,
8600-435: The system's halfway point serving Greece's largest university . Additional parking will be created at Mikra , the terminus of Line 2. Elliniko Metro conducted a 2005 survey to determine Thessaloniki residents' preferred fare for the metro compared to the standard price of a Thessaloniki Urban Transport Organization (OASTH) bus ticket (€0.50 at the time). Of the 400 respondents, 47.6 percent said that they were willing to pay
8700-545: The €30,000 prize money to a company directly in order for the visual identity to be ready on time, while the Architects' Association of Thessaloniki accused the company of deliberately orchestrating the situation in order to give the contract to an "obscure start-up which did not even have a website at the time of its appointment", a situation it described as "a sham process - at the expense of fellow architects and other related professionals (graphic designers, artists) and ultimately
8800-568: Was a distinct dialect of Greek itself. Aside from the Macedonian question, current consensus regards Phrygian as the closest relative of Greek, since they share a number of phonological, morphological and lexical isoglosses , with some being exclusive between them. Scholars have proposed a Graeco-Phrygian subgroup out of which Greek and Phrygian originated. Among living languages, some Indo-Europeanists suggest that Greek may be most closely related to Armenian (see Graeco-Armenian ) or
8900-546: Was adopted for the construction of Agias Sofias metro station , where the archaeological discoveries were more significant than those at Venizelou, but the re-assembly of the artefacts on site is now impossible because Attiko Metro never constructed any space dedicated to the re-assembly of the artefacts it disassembled, despite having promised to do so. In April 2020, the International Association of Byzantine Studies (AIEB) wrote to Prime Minister Mitsotakis to protest
9000-546: Was also used in Ancient Greek. Greek has occasionally been written in the Latin script , especially in areas under Venetian rule or by Greek Catholics . The term Frankolevantinika / Φραγκολεβαντίνικα applies when the Latin script is used to write Greek in the cultural ambit of Catholicism (because Frankos / Φράγκος is an older Greek term for West-European dating to when most of (Roman Catholic Christian) West Europe
9100-541: Was by far the most widely spoken lingua franca in the Mediterranean world . It eventually became the official language of the Byzantine Empire and developed into Medieval Greek . In its modern form , Greek is the official language of Greece and Cyprus and one of the 24 official languages of the European Union . It is spoken by at least 13.5 million people today in Greece, Cyprus, Italy, Albania, Turkey , and
9200-466: Was expected that the line would enter service in its entirety, between New Railway Station and Nea Elvetia , in 2020 but will not stop at Agias Sofias and Venizelou , which will open at a later date. By February 2019 construction on the main line was 95 percent completed and platform screen doors were beginning to be installed, while the Supreme Council for Civil Personnel Selection was planning
9300-423: Was officially announced, as connection of the western with the northeastern districts of the city has been deemed necessary. Line 3 will run under Tsimiski avenue and parallel to Line 1, which will eventually meet at University station. However, from that station, it will head northeast. The stations of Line 3 will be: Line 2 is further projected to include extensions to KTEL Macedonia and Kordelio. Breaking from
9400-525: Was preferable. A final opening date for Line 1 was set for noon on 30 November 2024, although the cultural and commercial celebrations organised by the Thessaloniki Chamber of Commerce were postponed to 4 December due to bad weather. In preparation for this, a brand identity was unveiled on 13 November 2024, while the final project cost of €3 billion ($ 3.24 billion), including €600 million ($ 649 million) in future interest payments,
9500-480: Was recorded in writing systems such as Linear B and the Cypriot syllabary . The alphabet arose from the Phoenician script and was in turn the basis of the Latin , Cyrillic , Coptic , Gothic , and many other writing systems. The Greek language holds a very important place in the history of the Western world. Beginning with the epics of Homer , ancient Greek literature includes many works of lasting importance in
9600-474: Was revealed on 20 November 2024. The line was finally opened on 30 November in a ceremony officiated by Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis , with no fares to be collected until 4 December. The Kalamaria Extension ( Greek : Επέκταση Καλαμαριάς ) extends the metro system to Kalamaria , the second-largest municipality in the Thessaloniki urban area and the 18th-most-populous in Greece . Similar in construction to Line 1, it has two parallel single-track tunnels on
9700-566: Was under the control of the Frankish Empire ). Frankochiotika / Φραγκοχιώτικα (meaning 'Catholic Chiot') alludes to the significant presence of Catholic missionaries based on the island of Chios . Additionally, the term Greeklish is often used when the Greek language is written in a Latin script in online communications. The Latin script is nowadays used by the Greek-speaking communities of Southern Italy . The Yevanic dialect
9800-586: Was unearthed, with shops, other buildings, and plumbing which one scholar called "the Byzantine Pompeii ". A crossroads, marked with a tetrapylon , was found at Venizelou where the Decumanus Maximus crossed a cardo (a north–south road). An additional 22 metres (72 ft) of the same road was discovered at the Agias Sofias station. Issues concerning archaeological finds and the display of artefacts in
9900-637: Was used for literary and official purposes in the newly formed Greek state. In 1976, Dimotiki was declared the official language of Greece, after having incorporated features of Katharevousa and thus giving birth to Standard Modern Greek , used today for all official purposes and in education . The historical unity and continuing identity between the various stages of the Greek language are often emphasized. Although Greek has undergone morphological and phonological changes comparable to those seen in other languages, never since classical antiquity has its cultural, literary, and orthographic tradition been interrupted to
10000-653: Was written by Romaniote and Constantinopolitan Karaite Jews using the Hebrew Alphabet . In a tradition, that in modern time, has come to be known as Greek Aljamiado , some Greek Muslims from Crete wrote their Cretan Greek in the Arabic alphabet . The same happened among Epirote Muslims in Ioannina . This also happened among Arabic-speaking Byzantine rite Christians in the Levant ( Lebanon , Palestine, and Syria ). This usage
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