The phrase the Greeks had a word for it, and its variants, are used:
– either literally,
– or of something that should not or cannot be named or mentioned—cf., for example, quotations 5, 6, 7, 8 and 9 below.
This phrase alludes to The Greeks Had a Word for It (1930), the title of a stage play by the U.S. playwright, screenwriter, novelist and poet Zoe Akins (1886-1958).
Zoe Akins was perhaps inspired by such formulations as the following two:
1-: From Accept the Help of Philosophy to Make the Most of Yourself, by C. S. Maddocks, published in The Columbus Sunday Dispatch (Columbus, Ohio) of Sunday 12th January 1913:
The Greeks had a word for the spark produced by rubbing a cat’s back or a piece of wax with silk, the very word electricity comes from.
2-: From an article by John W. Kelly about the gubernatorial candidates in Oregon, published in the Morning Oregonian (Portland, Oregon) of Wednesday 7th May 1930:
Ancient Greeks had a name for the type of politician now rampant in Oregon. It was “demagogue.”
—Cf. also quotation 4 below.
The earliest mention that I have found of Zoe Akins’s play The Greeks Had a Word for It is from the column A New Yorker at Large, by Mark Barron, Associated Press staff writer, published in The Spartanburg Herald (Spartanburg, South Carolina) of Monday 26th May 1930:
Zoe Akins has written a new play called “The Greeks Had a Word for It.” Reports are that it is about a woman who had the most beautiful neck in the world and in the last act she cuts her throat. My goodness!
According to the following from Ohio Producers Ready For Fall Season, by Leo Miller, published in The Columbus Sunday Dispatch (Columbus, Ohio) of Sunday 17th August 1930, the play’s original title was The Greeks Had a Name for It—Muriel Kirkland (1903-1971) was a U.S. actress:
The Broadway calendar this season calls for Miss Kirkland’s appearance under the auspices of William Harris, jr., in Zoe Akins’ “The Greeks Had a Word for It,” hitherto entitled “The Greeks Had a Name for It.” The project will go into final rehearsal in the immediate future, according to Mr. Harris.
However, Zoe Akins’s play The Greeks Had a Word for It has often been referred to as The Greeks Had a Name for It. The following, for example, is from The Erie Daily Times (Erie, Pennsylvania) of Tuesday 8th July 1930:
William Harris, Jr., will bring out a new play by Zoe Akins next September with the rather puzzling title: “The Greeks Had a Name For It.”
Zoe Akins’s play The Greeks Had a Word for It was first staged at the Broad Street Theatre, in Newark, New Jersey. The earliest advertisement that I have found is from The Jewish Chronicle (Newark, New Jersey) of Friday 5th September 1930:
WEEK BEGINNING MONDAY NIGHT SEPT. 15th
WILLIAM HARRIS, Jr., Presents prior to Broadway
“THE GREEKS HAD A WORD FOR IT”
A New Comedy by ZOE AKINS With This Brilliant Cast
MURIEL KIRKLAND DOROTHY HALL VERREE TEASDALE
ERNEST GLENDINNING FREDERICK WORLOCK
AND OTHERS
The following review of Zoe Akins’s play The Greeks Had a Word for It is from The Jersey Journal (Jersey City, New Jersey) of Tuesday 16th September 1930:
In this new comedy three girls—“Three Musketeers” of the female sex—are starred. These girls are Muriel Kirkland, Dorothy Hall and Verree Teasdale.
Don’t let the title fool you. It is nothing classic. If the Greeks did have a word for it the Americans might title it “Slip-On.”
The play deals quite modernly with ladies of leisure in New York. The three “ladies” like their drinkies, they quarrel over their masculine friends, drift apart for a time, but manage to make up in the end and thus stick together to continue their adventures. These three damsels are sort of the “gold digging” type. One is the peacemaker of the trio, another deals the “blows,” while the third is the receiver of these thrusts.
Naturally there are three men uppermost in their minds. One is a gentleman, the other a tightwad and the third an egotistical pianist. All find that the girls are too much for them. Of course sables and pretty clothes come to the three girls for it’s always thee man who pays the bills.
The three adventurists—all pretty to the eyes and all accomplished actresses—are Muriel Kirkland, who scored a hit in “Strictly Dishonorable”; Dorothy Hall, who appeared in the musical comedy, “Flying High,” and Verree Teasdale, who played a prominent role with Ethel Barrymore in “The Constant Wife.”
Miss Kirkland is wise and sophisticated. She it is who gets the “bum deal” at the hands of her friend, Verree Teasdale, who cops the gentlemen friends and who delights in discarding her dress for a slip-on. Dorothy Hall acts as the peacemaker and talks in a monotone. This trio makes this play one of unusual interest.
Among others in the cast who do good work are Ernest Glendinning and Frederick Worlock.
Again let me say you will have an enjoyable afternoon or evening by sitting in on “The Greeks Had a Word for It,” which word interpreted in the English language might be “Slip-On.”
—A. D. M.
Zoe Akins’s play does not make clear what it is that the Greeks had a word for. The following explanation is from the review of The Greeks Had a Word for It, by Gilbert W. Gabriel, published in The Denver Post (Denver, Colorado) of Sunday 5th October 1930—the noun hetaera, also hetaira, designates a female prostitute, especially an educated courtesan, in ancient Greece:
Among the fortnight’s novelties we’ve seen Zoe Akins’ new comedy, “The Greeks Had a Word for It.” It turned out to be the word for ladies of professional ease, the hetira [sic].
The earliest occurrences of the phrase the Greeks had a word for it and variants that I have found are as follows, in chronological order:
1-: From a reader’s contribution to the column The Fun Shop, edited by Maxson Foxhall Judell, published in The Jersey Journal (Jersey City, New Jersey) of Friday 10th October 1930:
The Greeks Had a Word For It!
John: “I got a reduction to that girl.”
Frank: “A reduction—you mean introduction—you were introduced to her.”
John: “Introduction nuthin.’ I was reduced to her. I guess I know when I get a knock down to a girl!”
—Lee Zenna
2-: From the column Around the Razz Berry Bush, by Ted Yudain, published in the Stamford Advocate (Stamford, Connecticut) of Wednesday 29th October 1930:
Did You Know; that Greek Paper money is printed right here in the United States . . and that the “Greeks had a word for it?”
3-: From the account of the monthly boxing show of the Sts. Peter and Paul A. C., in Fleetwood—account by Gus Martin, Daily Argus sports writer, published in The Daily Argus (Mount Vernon, New York) of Thursday 18th December 1930:
The evening’s festivities were opened by heavyweight exponents of the muscle benders’ art, known as wrestling, though the Greeks have a word for it, “rasling.”
4-: From an article about the British conductor Leopold Stokowski (1882-1977), by W. J. Henderson, published in The Evening Bulletin (Providence, Rhode Island) of Saturday 27th December 1930—this use of the phrase may be unrelated to Zoe Akins’s play:
When Mr. Stokowski conducts, he feels a strange electrical force flowing through all his veins. He does not know what it is. He feels it. Is it a spiritual control? Is he, without having suspected it, mediumistic and under the other world direction of old Habeneck, Wagner, Buelow and Arthur Nikisch? Or is the mysterious force purely that of his own emotional organization? He feels it; he does not know what it is. The Greeks had a word for it. We moderns translate the word by “virtue.” According to Plato the virtue of the human soul is its “fitness for its proper work.” Mr. Stokowski has a ton of that.
5-: From the column On Broadway, by Walter Winchell (1897-1972), published in the Detroit Evening Times (Detroit, Michigan) of Tuesday 30th December 1930:
If you want to know the character of a girl, first ask her the month in which she was born. […]
[…]
If she is a December baby, she will be fully developed young, extravagant, fond of novelty and risque [sic] shows. She is easily bored, but always has the change of a $100 bill. The Greeks had a word for her.
6-: From the review of Meet My Sister, a musical comedy presented at the Shubert Theatre, New York City, on Tuesday 30th December 1930—review by Dixie Tighe, published in The Standard Union (Brooklyn, New York) of Wednesday 31st December 1930:
It’s a young man named Walter Slezak, cast as the librarian, who takes “Meet My Sister” well in hand and leads it squarely to personal success. He has that something, that maybe the Greeks have a word for, but in English is difficult to describe. It’s the same magnetic Chevalier personality—and the comparison is cited only to graphically suggest his charm.
7-: From the column Off the Backboard, by Vern Boxell, published in The Indianapolis Times (Indianapolis, Indiana) of Thursday 1st January 1931:
In keeping with the spirit of the day, Mr. A. L. Trester, who has the thankless job of watching over some 780 Indiana high schools and their athletic activities, comes out with a headache-aggravator about stalling and sportsmanship, all contained in bulletin number something or other. Of course, Mr. Trester and the I. H. S. A. A. do some high-powered deploring of this thing called stalling.
Coaches are to blame for the stall, according to Mr. Trester’s statement, for they instruct the boys in the graceful, even though disgusting to the fans, ways to hold the ball and do nothing.
Coaches, Principals and players could eliminate the stall by getting together before the game and agreeing to play throughout, win or lose. Can you imagine Burl Friddle and John Adams standing in the middle of the floor with their arms around each other, talking over such matters as stalling. The Greeks have a word for it, and it must be bologna.
8-: From the column Ahead of the Times, by Gail Borden, published in the Daily Times (Chicago, Illinois) of Wednesday 28th January 1931:
Mrs. Charles Coburn got a proposition from a swain in Indiana who said he would pay the management extra if she would sing “Two Loving Hearts” some time during a performance of “Lysistrata.” The Greeks had a word for guys like that, and it’s lucky for your sensibilities this isn’t a Greek rag.
9-: From the Reading Times (Reading, Pennsylvania) of Monday 9th February 1931:
THE GREEKS HAVE A WORD FOR IT
CHICAGO, Feb. 8 (AP)—Even politeness can be carried too far, Christ Manapolous, cafe entrepreneur, believes.
He was charmed at first when two of his patrons, mellowed by two of his dinners, out-strove each other in demanding the check. Such courtesy, a rarety [sic], of truth, these times of economizing.
But even “Allow me to pay” and “No, let me do it.” It’s my treat” become wearisome after 10 minutes without interruption.
So Manopolous [sic] called the police. Search by officers disclosed neither James Duggan, the Gaston, nor John Powell, the Alphonse, had a cent.
10-: From one of the unconnected paragraphs making up the column Tuning in on the Talkies, by ‘Walthill’, published in the Las Vegas Evening Review and Journal (Las Vegas, Nevada) of Saturday 14th February 1931—what the phrase refers to here is particularly obscure:
“The Greeks had a Word for It” and it was not Clarabow.
11-: From the review of the U.S. comedy film Girls Demand Excitement (1931)—review by W. Ward Marsh, published in the Cleveland Plain Dealer (Cleveland, Ohio) of Saturday 14th February 1931:
The girls, in an effort to win the boys to their side and continue co-education at Bradford, borrow a little of “Lysistrata’s” old trick. Vote for co-education or no more necking, is their war cry. The boys seem to suffer terribly. Borrowing the title of a stage play, the Greeks had a name for it.
12-: From the Arkansas Gazette (Little Rock, Arkansas) of Saturday 21st February 1931:
New College Fraternity Proposed.—Headline. No doubt the Greeks have a name for it.
13 & 14-: From accounts of a wrestling match between James Londos and James McMillen, which took place at Madison Square Garden, in New York City, on Monday 23rd February 1931:
13-: From the Detroit Evening Times (Detroit, Michigan) of Tuesday 24th February 1931:
Universal Service Wire
NEW YORK, Feb. 24.—The Greeks had a word for it—and so did Jim Londos, who retained his heavyweight wrestling title last night by defeating Jim McMillen at the Madison Square Garden. The word for it in this instance was a bear hug which threatened for a time to ooze the innards from the body of the former Illinois football star.
14-: From the Buffalo Evening News (Buffalo, New York) of Tuesday 24th February 1931:
NEW YORK, Feb. 24 (U.P.)—Culture, as dispensed at the University of Illinois, collided with the classic tradition of Plato and Socrates last night at Madison Square Garden where James Londos of Athens, Greece, and James McMillen of Urbana, Ill., wrestled for the championship of the world.
[…]
After the match rumors circulated that Mr. Londos’ triumph was accomplished by a hold known as “a leg breaker and airplane.” Others insisted it was a simple toe-hold. Mr Londos, unfortunately, did not reveal what hold he used, but doubtless the Greeks have a word for it.
word histories 