Alphabets

Alphabets

WARNING: The following statements may not be necessarily true as I am just beginning to learn Classical Greek. I will do my best to avoid errors, but do bear in mind that I am a beginner and, right now, I have no access to a Greek scholar or national of that country: hence I am on my own. What is driving my desire to learn Classical Greek is the need to be able to cross check translations of the Odyssey and the Iliad myself.

The ancient (Classical) and Modern Greek alphabets are the same, at least in spelling, but the sound is different, at least that of some vowels. While I am almost certain of the correct sound of the alphabet in Modern Greek, I am not at all certain about Classical Greek. I do know, however, that there are two schools of thought: some say that the Classical Greek alphabet should be pronounced according to the rules defined by Erasmus and some by Reuchlin. Personally, I side with Erasmus. Don'ty ask me why. Probably because I have known Erasmus but not Reuchlin.

My current problem is that the pronounciation of Modern Greek is quite complex and somewhat confusing. It seems to me that Greek linguists have chosen to remain faithful to the spelling of the Classical letters, but pronounce many of them with the benefit of phonetic changes that have occurred over the last 20 centuries. I suppose that another difficulty is that the starting base was not a homogeneous language but a set of similar Greek dialects, a question that has not yet been resolved in the current Modern Greek language. The transition from Latin to Italian was not so abrupt as for Ancient and Modern Greek: “It can, howewer, be argued that Italian bears a greater resemblance to Latin than Modern Greek does to Classical Greek and than contemporary English does to Old English/Anglo-Saxon” (Tom McArthur, “The English Languages”, 1998, Cambridge Univesity Press, p. 88).

As a consequence of this historic development, any newcomer to Modern Greek will encounter some apparent phonetic inconsistencies: for example the letter "iota" represented as a Latin "i" but without the dot, is pronounced as "ee" as in "beet" or "i" as in bit, but the letter "eta" which is transliterated as an "e" is pronounced in the same way as the "iota".

The problem is compounded to a second order by the fact that the letter "upsilon" generally represented by the Latin "u" or "y" is also pronounced like the letter "iota". But that is not enough: a third level of problem is that the diphthong of the two letters "epsilon" and "iota" are also pronounced as a single "iota" sound. But wait: there is a fourth level of complexity, because the other diphthong "oi" is also pronounced as an "ee".

As a beginner I have struggled with these rules, and several others I must add. I have not mastered them all yet, but they do become easier the more you work and play with them!

Orthography: Alphabet

The letters of the alphabet (Classical and Modern Greek) are 24 and their alphabetical order is as shown below:

Majuscule

Miniscule

Latin

u/y

English

u/y

Order

N.B.:

The letters ε and η are translated like the Latin (or English) vowel e. The former is short and the latter is long.
The miniscule consonant sigma can be written in two ways: σ at the beginning or in the middle of a word and ς at the end of a word. A similar fashion existed in some Medieval Latin scripts where the long (s) was used other than at the end of a word when a standard s was used (see the page Carolingian where the long s is used also at the end of words).
The letters ο and ω are both equivalent to the Latin letter o.
Five of the consonants are actually double consonants. θ, ξ, φ, χ and ψ.
The letter Y can be translated as either a Latin u or y.
When consulting a Greek dictionary it is essential to remember the order of the alphabet!

Orthography: Pronunciation for Classical Greek (does not apply to Modern Greek)

Following the Erasmian School.

Letter Name	Miniscule Form	Majuscule Form	Pronunciation	Letter Name	Miniscule Form	Majuscule Form	Pronunciation
Alpha	α	Α	a short as in Anthony	Nu	ν	Ν	n as in No
Beta	β	Β	b as in bee	Xi	ξ	Χ	x as in box
Gamma	γ	Γ	g as in garden	Omicron	ο	Ο	o short as in pot
Delta	δ	Δ	d as in Dude	Pi	π	Π	p as in pot
Epsilon	ε	Ε	e short as in Emily	Rho	ρ	Ρ	r rolled as in Rome
Zeta	ζ	Ζ	sd as in wisdom	Sigma	σ, ς	Σ	s as in song
Eta	η	Η	e long as in air	Tau	τ	Τ	t as in stop, tongue on teeth not gums
Theta	θ	Θ	th as in throng	Upsilon Ypsilon	υ	Υ
Iota	ι	Ι	i as in Italy	Phi	φ	Φ
Kappa	κ	Κ	k as in Kilo	Chi	χ	Χ
Lambda	λ	Λ	l as in London	Psi	ψ	Ψ
Mu	μ	Μ	m as in My	Omega	ω	Ω

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