nprbooks:

If you’ve been following the Greek financial crisis, you’ve
certainly seen that old cliché “it’s all Greek to me” in the headlines. Wall Street Journal language columnist Ben
Zimmer says Shakespeare probably popularized the phrase, but he didn’t actually
come up with it. Its true origin is a bit of a mystery, though Zimmer says there’s
a pretty good guess:

Back in the days before the printing press, medieval monks
would copy old Latin manuscripts to preserve them, but the Greek alphabet threw
them for a loop.

“And so if
they were copying a Latin manuscript, and they came across a Greek quotation in
a manuscript, they might have trouble actually trying to copy that part,”
Zimmer says. “And so as a kind of a cop-out, they might just write in
Latin, Graecum est, non legitur, which
means, ‘This is Greek. It cannot be read.’ ”

Is
It All Greek To You? Thank Medieval Monks, And The Bard, For The Phrase

Image: Greek flags fly
beside those of the European Union in Athens. (Matt Cardy/Getty Images)