This is the song currently used as the national anthem of Greece (Hellenic Republic): Ύμνος εις την Ελευθερίαν (Ýmnos eis tin Eleftherían), the Hymn to Liberty or Hymn to Freedom. The lyrics were written as a poem by Dionýsios Solomós in 1823 and they received a melody by Nikólaos Mántzaros in 1828. It was adopted as the anthem of the independent Greece (“Elláda”) in 1865, and as the anthem of the Greek part of the island of Cyprus in 1966. The original poem is much longer (158 stanzas in total), and only its first part is used as the anthem.
Solomós (1798-1857) was born in the island of Zante and was inspired by the fight for independence, finnaly obtained by Greece in 1821 from the Ottoman Empire. In 1824 the king George I decreed the poem as the national anthem, displayed in its short version with two stanzas. Mántzaros (1795-1873) was born in the island of Corfu, in the Ionian Sea, and studied music in Italy for many years. Only in 1865 the anthem was officialized, with the first 24 stanzas of the poem, although only the two first ones are played in official events.
I downloaded from this video the audio with singers. The video with the instrumental version is here. My video has three subtitles: in the modern Greek spelling, in one of the many ways of transliterating, and in English translation. Read below the lyrics in the modern Greek spelling (1) and in the “polytonic” spelling, official until 1982 (2):
1) Σε γνωρίζω από την κόψη του σπαθιού την τρομερή, σε γνωρίζω από την όψη που με βία μετράει τη γη. Απ’ τα κόκαλα βγαλμένη 2) Σὲ γνωρίζω ἀπὸ τὴν κόψι Ἀπ’ τὰ κόκκαλα βγαλμένη ____________________ Sharpness of the sword, I recognize you by your face That hastefully defines the land. [i.e. the land’s borders] From the sacred bones, |
