Thread: How do you say "The Greeks had a word for it"?

Originally Posted by it-ogo

TOM: Моя девушка любит, чтобы собака спала в постели с нами.
BILL: Хммм... Как бишь это называется на латыни?
TOM: Заткнись, я не это имел в виду!

Aha, so you blame the Romans, not the Greeks!

But either way, the idea is "The ancient pagans... [pause] ...were ancient, and were pagans."

(They lived a long time ago, and their religion was different from ours, so we should not expect them to think like us on matters of morality.)

Could one say Древние язычники -- древними язычниками with the same kind of meaning as "Boys will be boys"?

Originally Posted by Throbert McGee

Could one say Древние язычники -- древними язычниками with the same kind of meaning as "Boys will be boys"?

Древние язычники есть древние язычники (Язычники есть язычники is shorter and thus is better in my opinion ).
It's a standard way to express the idea "X is X. What else can you expect from X?"