Simple Tags in the Analysis
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Simple Tags in the Analysis

Everything we say about each Greek word is condensed in an identification "tag." The abbreviations and symbols appearing in the tags are interpreted in the chart at the end of the introduction. A given letter does not by itself uniquely represent some given information. It is the combination of a given letter and a given place in the tag, taken together with the initial letter in the tag, that uniquely represents a particular piece of information. For example, an A in the third position of a tag beginning with N (noun) represents accusative case while an A in the third position of a tag beginning with V (verb) represents aorist tense.

Every tag is one or another of seven major grammatical categories: noun, verb, adjective, determiner (definite article), preposition, conjunction, and particle. Whereas given tags must be uniquely one or another of these grammatical categories, Greek words may be now this and now that. For example, ka° may be any of three types of conjunction, cc (coordinating) or ch (superordinating) or cs (subordinating), or it may be an adverb, ab. Similarly ú may be a verb, vspa--1s; a particle, qs; or a noun, n-nn-s. This latter example is, of course, a case of homonymy, while the former example is a case of a single word having multiple functions.

Within each of the seven categories, left-to-right order is significant. We surveyed a sampling of Greek professors to determine a standard or traditional parsing order, but we found no consensus whatever. The order we chose reflects (from left to right) descending significance for grammatical studies. The verb, for example, is more likely to be studied for its divisions of mood and tense than for its divisions into person and number.

The hyphen (-) is significant as a placeholder. Hyphens at the end of a tag are dropped off. Thus a simple adverb, fully tagged ab-----, appears simply as ab. A verb tag with potentially eight slots may, if it represents an infinitive, have only the first four (e.g. vnaa for vnaa----) or five (e.g. vnapg for vnapg---).