Notes

*A thaler is any of various silver coins that served as a unit of currency in some Germanic countries between the 15th and 19th centuries. The word "dollar" has its orgins in the German word "thaler".

Transliteration

To pedhee thelee khoro

To pedhee thelee khoro
Ta veeoleea dhen eene edho
Kee opeeos paee na ta feree,
Ena talaro sto cheree

"dh" like in "the", "this"
"th" like in "thick", "thin"
"kh" like Spanish "j" or German "ch" in Bach
"ch" like German ch in ich
"e" like in "red".

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Penelope Karagouni sent us the following info about this song with the note below:

This is the whole song as I know it. As I told you before this is a kind of song we sing when the child is restless. We have him/her on our lap and we move him/her according to the rhyme of the music.

το παιδί θέλει χορό     
τα βιολιά δεν είν ' εδώ  
κι όποιος πάει να  τα φέρει 
πέντε τάλιρα στο χέρι     
κι άλλα τόσα στο μαντήλι 


Transliteration:

to pedi theli xoro
ta violia den ein edo
ki opios pai na ta feri
pente talira sto xeri
ki ala tosa sto mantili

English Translation:

The child wants to dance
There are no fiddles here
And whoever goes to bring them
Shall have five thalers in his hand
and 5 more in the handkerchief.

Now if we have a baby boy we say this:

για του μπέμπη το
χατίρι 
gia tou mpempi to xatiri (transliteration)
For the favor of the baby boy.

If we have a baby girl we say this:

για της μπέμπας το χατίρι
gia tis pmempas to xatiri (transliteration)
For the favor of the baby girl.

Comments

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Above we tried to modernize the Greek text (change of spelling officially adopted in: 1982). Below is the original ancient text we were given.



We apologize for any errors in the modernized version and welcome corrections. Please email us with any modifications.

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Thanks and Acknowledgements

Many thanks to Thomy Verrou at the Institute for Balkan Studies in Greece for contributing and translating this song. Many thanks also to Monique Palomares for the transliteration and to Marietta Parianos for checking and helping with it. Thanks to Penelope Karagouni for the Greek text, the second translation and the pronuniciation.

Ευχαριστώ πολύ!