Introduction to the ancient Greek language. January 2004.

Introduction to the ancient Greek language

The Greeks were a people of sailors separated by the land and united by the sea.

ca. 6500 B.C., the first inhabitants of Greece starts cultivating land.
ca. 2000 B.C., an Indo-European people invads Greece.
They borrow a few words from the original inhabitants, like the words for the sea and for the olive tree.
The earliest Greek texts that have survived are written with a script called Linear B (the Minoan civilization of Crete used a similar syllabary which we now call Linear A).
ca. 1100 B.C., end of the Mycenaean civilization. Linear B is not used anymore.
The Phoenicians devise the Hebrew alphabet.
ca. 800 B.C., Hesiod writes his works, probably using the Greek alphabet, which is derived from the alphabet of the Phoenicians.
ca. 750 B.C., first written version of the poems, the Iliad and Odyssey, that Homer composed about 100 years earlier.
The 4 main dialects of the Greek language are: Arcado-Cyprian, Eolian, Ionic-Attic, and Doric.
Between ca. 600 B.C. and ca. 400 B.C., Athens is a prominent city and the Attic dialect is spread to other parts of Greece.
ca. 300 B.C., the Greek world--its main city is now Alexandria--speaks a common language derived from the Attic, called the Koine. The new testament is written in Koine.
ca. 400 A.D., the ancient Greek language is abandoned.
The modern Greek language uses the same alphabet as the ancient Greek, but with minuscules. The pronunciation is different, e.g. eta is pronounced as in English 'see', and can be transliterated by the letter 'i'.

Upper- case	Lower- case	Name	ISO transliteration	Latin transliteration	Ancient pronunciation
A	a	Alpha	a	A	May be long or short and is pronounced O as in "not".
B	b	Beta	b	B	Like English B.
G	g	Gamma	g	G	Like English hard G in "good." When Gamma occurs before Gamma, Kappa, Mu, Xi or Chi, it is pronounced like the NG in "hang".
D	d	Delta	d	D	Like English D.
E	e	Epsilon	e	E	The exact quality of epsilon is not clear, but it seems to be a short vowel like AY in "bay" but tending to E in "bet".
Z	z	Zeta	z	Z	Pronounced ZD, although sometimes also DZ or Z.
H	h	Eta	ê	E	A long EH sound like the E in "bet". This is not an "h". Greek has no separate letter for the "h" sound. The first letter of the famous gods, Hera and Hephaestos, is Eta, but an "h" is added in the transcription showing that eta was aspirated in these words.
Q	q	Theta	th	TH	Pronounced as an aspirated T something like the TH in "hothouse" when spoken rapidly.
I	i	Iota	i	I	Iota may be long or short and is pronounced EE as in "see".
K	k	Kappa	k	C	An unaspirated K something like the K in "skin".
L	l	Lambda	l	L	Like English L.
M	m	Mu	m	M	Like English M.
N	n	Nu	n	N	Like English N.
X	x	Xi	x	X	Like English X in "box".
O	o	Omicron	o	O	A short vowel of uncertain quality, but probably like the O in "no" but tending to AW in "awe"; the diphthong was originally a long O as in "no," but later was pronounced like OO in "too".
P	p	Pi	p	P	Unaspirated P something like the P in "spin".
R	r	Rho	r	R	Tongue-trilled R. Its transliteration is often "rh" at the beginning of words, e.g. rhinoceros, rhythm, but just "r" in other places.
S	s V	Sigma	s	S	Like English S; when Sigma occurs before Beta, Gamma, Delta or Mu, it is pronounced like Z in "zoo". N.B. The first lowercase character, s, is used at the beginning and in the middle of words. The second lowercase character, V, is used at the end of words.
T	t	Tau	t	T	Unaspirated T something like the T in "stop".
U	u	Upsilon	u	Y	Pronounced like a German ü or a French u; in some dialects it was more like the OO in "too". Its transliteration is usually "u" when a vowel is next to it, e.g. Zeus, and is often "y" in other cases, e.g. psychê. Words beginning with upsilon have a rough breathing, which is made visible by the addition of an "h" e.g. hyacinthus, hylas, hydraulic, hypnosis, etc.
F	f	Phi	f	PH	Aspirated P something like the PH in "uphill" when spoken rapidly.
C	c	Chi	h	CH	Aspirated K something like the KH in "blockhead" when spoken rapidly.
Y	y	Psi	ps	PS	Pronounced PS as in "lapse" and "psychological".
W	w	Omega	ô	O	A long AW sound as in "awe".

If you don't see the Greek characters, you need the font file named "Symbol", which is in the standard package of many versions of Windows and Mac OS. Two Mac users have reported that their browser, Safari, does not display the Greek letters, but with Internet Explorer it works.
The ISO translation for eta and omega requires a bar instead of a circ accent, but fonts with bars are quite rare.
The Latin translation is the one that was used by the Romans.
Another translation system using only one Roman character for every Greek character is: A, B, Y, D, E, Z, H, Q, I, L, M, N, X, O, P, R, S, T, U, F, C, Y, W.
In the early times, characters could have slightly different shapes, and there were some additional characters (see http://www.parthia.com/fonts/letterforms_usage.htm).

This tutorial:

Greek alphabet
Test 01 - Uppercase	Test 02 - Uppercase	Test 03 - Lowercase	Test 04 - Lowercase

Greek gods
Test 05 - Greek gods	Test 06 - Greek gods

Selected Greek words 1
Test 07 - Greek words	Test 08 - Greek words

Selected Greek words 2
Test 09 - Greek words	Test 10 - Greek words

Selected Greek words 3
Test 11 - Greek words	Test 12 - Greek words

Selected Greek words 4
Test 13 - Greek words	Test 14 - Greek words

Selected Greek words 5
Test 15 - Greek words	Test 16 - Greek words

Selected Greek words 6
Test 17 - Greek words	Test 18 - Greek words

Selected Greek words 7
Test 19 - Greek words	Test 20 - Greek words

You can save the pages of this tutorial to the hard drive of your computer. This will speed up the display.
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