The Cretan epigrams of the Imperial period feature a vocabulag, characterized by a mixture of elements, a) A large number of loan words taken from the language of Homer and the poets; b) Some hápax created by the authors of the epigrams in an attempt to renew this genre, so fidl of traditional themes and formulisms; c) Certain terms iypical of late Greek, either because of the words themselves, or because of the sense in which they are used.