Greek alphabet

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Greek alphabet
Greekalphabet.svg
Ellinikó alfávito
"Greek alphabet" in the modern Greek language
Script type
Time period
c.800 BC present [1] [2]
DirectionLeft-to-right  OOjs UI icon edit-ltr-progressive.svg
Official script
Languages Greek
Related scripts
Parent systems
Child systems
ISO 15924
ISO 15924 Grek(200),Greek
Unicode
Unicode alias
Greek

The Greek alphabet has been used to write the Greek language since the late 9th or early 8th century BC. [3] [4] It is derived from the earlier Phoenician alphabet, [5] and was the earliest known alphabetic script to have distinct letters for vowels as well as consonants. In Archaic and early Classical times, the Greek alphabet existed in many local variants, but, by the end of the 4th century BC, the Euclidean alphabet, with 24 letters, ordered from alpha to omega, had become standard and it is this version that is still used for Greek writing today.

Contents

The uppercase and lowercase forms of the 24 letters are:

Α α, Β β, Γ γ, Δ δ, Ε ε, Ζ ζ, Η η, Θ θ, Ι ι, Κ κ, Λ λ, Μ μ, Ν ν, Ξ ξ, Ο ο, Π π, Ρ ρ, Σ σ/ς, Τ τ, Υ υ, Φ φ, Χ χ, Ψ ψ, Ω ω.

The Greek alphabet is the ancestor of the Latin, Gothic, Coptic and Cyrillic scripts. [6] Like the other scripts, Greek originally had only a single form of each letter; it developed the letter case distinction between uppercase and lowercase in parallel with Latin during the modern era. Sound values and conventional transcriptions for some of the letters differ between Ancient and Modern Greek usage because the pronunciation of Greek has changed significantly between the 5th century BC and today. Modern and Ancient Greek also use different diacritics, with modern Greek keeping only the stress accent (acute) and the diaeresis.

Apart from its use in writing the Greek language, in both its ancient and its modern forms, the Greek alphabet today also serves as a source of international technical symbols and labels in many domains of mathematics, science, and other fields.

Letters

Sound values

In both Ancient and Modern Greek, the letters of the Greek alphabet have fairly stable and consistent symbol-to-sound mappings, making pronunciation of words largely predictable. Ancient Greek spelling was generally near-phonemic. For a number of letters, sound values differ considerably between Ancient and Modern Greek, because their pronunciation has followed a set of systematic phonological shifts that affected the language in its post-classical stages. [7]

LetterNameAncient pronunciationModern pronunciation
IPA [8] Approximate western European equivalentIPA [9] Approximate western European equivalent [10]
Α α alpha, άλφα Short: [ a ]
Long: [ ]
Short: similar to a as in English hat [11]
Long: a as in English father [11]
[ a ]a as in American English father, but short
Β β beta, βήτα [ b ] [12] [11] b as in English better [13] [12] [11] [ v ]v as in English vote
Γ γ gamma, γάμμα [ ɡ ]
[ ŋ ] when used before γ, κ, ξ, χ, and possibly μ
g as in English get [12] [11] ,
ng as in English sing when used before γ, κ, ξ, χ, and possibly μ [12] [11] [ex 1]
[ ɣ ] before /a/, /o/, /u/;

[ ʝ ] before /e/, /i/;

[ ŋ ] [ex 2] ~ [ ɲ ] [ex 3]

g as in Spanish lago;

Similar to y as in English yellow;

ng as in English long;

ñ as in Spanish año

Δ δ delta, δέλτα [ d ]d as in English delete [13] [12] [11] [ ð ]th as in English then
Ε ε epsilon, έψιλον [ e ]ea as in Scottish English great [11] [14]

é as in French été

Similar to ay as in English overlay, but without pronouncing y.

Ζ ζ zeta, ζήτα [zd], or possibly [ dz ]sd as in English wisdom,
or possibly dz as in English adze [15] [16] [note 1]
[ z ]z as in English zoo
Η η eta, ήτα [ ɛː ]e as in English net, but long [18]

ai as in English fairy

ê as in French tête [17]

[ i ]i as in English machine, but short
Θ θ theta, θήτα [ ]t as in English top [17] [11] [note 2] [ θ ]th as in English thin
Ι ι iota, ιώτα Short: [ i ]
Long: [ ]
Short: i as in French vite, [17]
Long: i as in English machine [10]
[ i ], [ ç ], [ex 4] [ ʝ ], [ex 5] [ ɲ ] [ex 6] i as in English machine, but short
Κ κ kappa, κάππα [ k ]k as in English, [17] [11] but completely unaspirated [17] as in asking[ k ] before /a/, /o/, /u/;

[ c ] before /e/, /i/

k as in English make;

ty as in Hungarian tyúk

Λ λ lambda, lamda, labda, λάμβδα, λάμδα, λάβδα [note 3] [ l ]l as in English lantern [13] [20] [11]
Μ μ mu, μυ [ m ]m as in English music [13] [20] [11]
Ν ν nu, νυ [ n ]n as in English net [20]
Ξ ξ xi, ξι [ks]x as in English fox [20]
Ο ο omicron, όμικρον [ o ]o as in German ohne, similar to British English call

ô as in French tôt

Π π pi, πι [ p ] Unaspirated p as in English spot [20] [11]
Ρ ρ rho, ρο [ r ] ~ [ ɾ ]rr as in Spanish carro;

r as in Spanish caro [20] [11] [13]

Σ σ/ς [note 4] sigma, σίγμα [ s ]
[ z ] before β, γ, or μ
s as in English soft [11]
s as in English muse when used before β, γ, or μ [20]
Τ τ tau, ταυ [ t ] Unaspirated t as in English stoke [20] [11]
Υ υ upsilon, ύψιλον Short: [ y ]
Long: [ ]
Short: u as in French lune, ü as in German Brüder
Long: u as in French ruse [20]
[ i ]i as in English machine, but short
Φ φ phi, φι [ ]p as in English pot [22] [note 2] [ f ]f as in English five
Χ χ chi, χι [ ]c as in English cat [11] [note 2] [ x ] before /a/, /o/, /u/;

[ ç ] before /e/, /i/

ch as in Scottish loch;

h as in English hue

Ψ ψ psi, ψι [ps]ps as in English lapse [22] [11]
Ω ω omega, ωμέγα [ ɔː ]aw as in English saw [11] [note 5] [ o ]o as in German ohne, similar to British English call
Examples
  1. For example, ἀγκών.
  2. For example, εγγραφή.
  3. For example, εγγεγραμμένος.
  4. For example, πάπια.
  5. For example, βια.
  6. For example, μια.
Notes
  1. By around 350 BC, zeta in the Attic dialect had shifted to become a single fricative, [ z ], as in modern Greek. [17]
  2. 1 2 3 The letters theta θ, phi φ, and chi χ are normally taught to English speakers with their modern Greek pronunciations of [ θ ], [ f ], and [ x ] ~ [ ç ] respectively, because these sounds are easier for English speakers to distinguish from the sounds made by the letters tau ([ t ]), pi ([ p ]), and kappa ([ k ]) respectively. [19] [16] These are not the sounds they made in classical Attic Greek. [19] [16] In classical Attic Greek, these three letters were always aspirated consonants, pronounced exactly like tau, pi, and kappa respectively, only with a blast of air following the actual consonant sound. [19] [16]
  3. The letter Λ is almost universally known today as lambda ( λάμβδα ) except in Modern Greek and in Unicode, where it is lamda ( λάμδα ), and the most common name for it during the Greek Classical Period (510–323 BC) appears to have been labda ( λάβδα ), without the μ. [11]
  4. The letter sigma Σ has two different lowercase forms in its standard variant, with ς being used in word-final position and σ elsewhere. [16] [20] [21] In some 19th-century typesetting, ς was also used word-medially at the end of a compound morpheme, e.g. "δυςκατανοήτων", marking the morpheme boundary between "δυς-κατανοήτων" ("difficult to understand"); modern standard practice is to spell "δυσκατανοήτων" with a non-final sigma. [21]
  5. The letter omega ω is normally taught to English speakers as [oʊ], the long o as in English go, in order to more clearly distinguish it from omicron ο. [22] [16] This is not the sound it actually made in classical Attic Greek. [22] [16]

Among consonant letters, all letters that denoted voiced plosive consonants (/b,d,g/) and aspirated plosives (/pʰ,tʰ,kʰ/) in Ancient Greek stand for corresponding fricative sounds in Modern Greek. The correspondences are as follows:

 Former voiced plosives Former aspirates
LetterAncientModernLetterAncientModern
LabialΒ β/b//v/Φ φ///f/
DentalΔ δ/d//ð/Θ θ///θ/
DorsalΓ γ/ɡ/[ ɣ ] ~ [ ʝ ]Χ χ//[ x ] ~ [ ç ]

Among the vowel symbols, Modern Greek sound values reflect the radical simplification of the vowel system of post-classical Greek, merging multiple formerly distinct vowel phonemes into a much smaller number. This leads to several groups of vowel letters denoting identical sounds today. Modern Greek orthography remains true to the historical spellings in most of these cases. As a consequence, the spellings of words in Modern Greek are often not predictable from the pronunciation alone, while the reverse mapping, from spelling to pronunciation, is usually regular and predictable.

The following vowel letters and digraphs are involved in the mergers:

LetterAncientModern
Η η ɛː > i
Ι ι i (ː)
ΕΙ ει
Υ υ u (ː) > y
ΟΙ οιoi > y
ΥΙ υι > y
Ω ω ɔː > o
Ο ο o
Ε ε e > e
ΑΙ αιai

Modern Greek speakers typically use the same, modern symbol–sound mappings in reading Greek of all historical stages. In other countries, students of Ancient Greek may use a variety of conventional approximations of the historical sound system in pronouncing Ancient Greek.

Digraphs and letter combinations

Several letter combinations have special conventional sound values different from those of their single components. Among them are several digraphs of vowel letters that formerly represented diphthongs but are now monophthongized. In addition to the four mentioned above (ει, οι, υι, pronounced /i/ and αι, pronounced /e/), there is also ηι, ωι, and ου, pronounced /u/. The Ancient Greek diphthongs αυ, ευ and ηυ are pronounced [av], [ev] and [iv] in Modern Greek. In some environments, they are devoiced to [af], [ef] and [if]. [23] The Modern Greek consonant combinations μπ and ντ stand for [b] and [d] (or [mb] and [nd]); τζ stands for [d͡z] and τσ stands for [t͡s]. In addition, both in Ancient and Modern Greek, the letter γ, before another velar consonant, stands for the velar nasal [ŋ]; thus γγ and γκ are pronounced like English ng like in the word finger (not like in the word thing). In analogy to μπ and ντ, γκ is also used to stand for [g]. There are also the combinations γχ and γξ.

CombinationPronunciationDevoiced pronunciation
ου[ u ]
αυ[av][af]
ευ[ev][ef]
ηυ[iv][if]
μπ[b] or [mb]
ντ[d] or [nd]
γκ and γγ[ɡ] or [ŋɡ]
τζ[ d͡z ]
τσ[ t͡s ]
γ in γχ and γξ[ ŋ ]

Diacritics

Greek diacritic dipthong.svg
Greek diacritic non-diphthong.svg
The acute accent in aulós [avˈlos] ('flute') distinguishes the word from its homograph áulos [ˈailos] ('immaterial'). The smooth breathing marks the absence of an initial /h/.

In the polytonic orthography traditionally used for ancient Greek and katharevousa, the stressed vowel of each word carries one of three accent marks: either the acute accent (ά), the grave accent (), or the circumflex accent (α̃ or α̑). These signs were originally designed to mark different forms of the phonological pitch accent in Ancient Greek. By the time their use became conventional and obligatory in Greek writing, in late antiquity, pitch accent was evolving into a single stress accent, and thus the three signs have not corresponded to a phonological distinction in actual speech ever since. In addition to the accent marks, every word-initial vowel must carry either of two so-called "breathing marks": the rough breathing (), marking an /h/ sound at the beginning of a word, or the smooth breathing (), marking its absence. The letter rho (ρ), although not a vowel, also carries rough breathing in a word-initial position. If a rho was geminated within a word, the first ρ always had the smooth breathing and the second the rough breathing (ῤῥ) leading to the transliteration rrh.

The vowel letters α, η, ω carry an additional diacritic in certain words, the so-called iota subscript, which has the shape of a small vertical stroke or a miniature ι below the letter. This iota represents the former offglide of what were originally long diphthongs, ᾱι, ηι, ωι (i.e. /aːi,ɛːi,ɔːi/), which became monophthongized during antiquity.

Use of diaeresis in the word aulos indicating a vowel hiatus. The acute accent is absent in the upper case. Greek diacritic non-diphthong capitals.svg
Use of diaeresis in the word áulos indicating a vowel hiatus. The acute accent is absent in the upper case.

Another diacritic used in Greek is the diaeresis (¨), indicating a hiatus.

This system of diacritics was first developed by the scholar Aristophanes of Byzantium (c. 257 – c. 185/180 BC), who worked at the Musaeum in Alexandria during the third century BC. [24] Aristophanes of Byzantium also was the first to divide poems into lines, rather than writing them like prose, and also introduced a series of signs for textual criticism. [25] In 1982, a new, simplified orthography, known as "monotonic", was adopted for official use in Modern Greek by the Greek state. It uses only a single accent mark, the acute (also known in this context as tonos, i.e. simply "accent"), marking the stressed syllable of polysyllabic words, and occasionally the diaeresis to distinguish diphthongal from digraph readings in pairs of vowel letters, making this monotonic system very similar to the accent mark system used in Spanish. The polytonic system is still conventionally used for writing Ancient Greek, while in some book printing and generally in the usage of conservative writers it can still also be found in use for Modern Greek.

Although it is not a diacritic, the comma has a similar function as a silent letter in a handful of Greek words, principally distinguishing ό,τι (ó,ti, "whatever") from ότι (óti, "that"). [26]

Romanization

There are many different methods of rendering Greek text or Greek names in the Latin script. [27] The form in which classical Greek names are conventionally rendered in English goes back to the way Greek loanwords were incorporated into Latin in antiquity. [28] In this system, κ is replaced with c, the diphthongs αι and οι are rendered as ae and oe (or æ,œ); and ει and ου are simplified to i and u. [29] Smooth breathing marks are usually ignored and rough breathing marks are usually rendered as the letter h. [30] In modern scholarly transliteration of Ancient Greek, κ will usually be rendered as k, and the vowel combinations αι, οι, ει, ου as ai, oi, ei, ou. [27] The letters θ and φ are generally rendered as th and ph; χ as either ch or kh; and word-initial ρ as rh. [31]

Transcription conventions for Modern Greek [32] differ widely, depending on their purpose, on how close they stay to the conventional letter correspondences of Ancient Greek-based transcription systems, and to what degree they attempt either an exact letter-by-letter transliteration or rather a phonetically based transcription. [32] Standardized formal transcription systems have been defined by the International Organization for Standardization (as ISO 843), [32] [33] by the United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names, [34] by the Library of Congress, [35] and others.

LetterTraditional Latin transliteration [31]
Α αA a
Β βB b
Γ γG g
Δ δD d
Ε εE e
Ζ ζZ z
Η ηĒ ē
Θ θTh th
Ι ιI i
Κ κC c, K k
Λ λL l
Μ μM m
Ν νN n
Ξ ξX x
Ο οO o
Π πP p
Ρ ρR r, Rh rh
Σ σS s
Τ τT t
Υ υY y, U u
Φ φPh ph
Χ χCh ch, Kh kh
Ψ ψPs ps
Ω ωŌ ō

History

Origins

Dipylon inscription, one of the oldest known samples of the use of the Greek alphabet, c. 740 BC Dipylon Inscription.JPG
Dipylon inscription, one of the oldest known samples of the use of the Greek alphabet, c.740 BC

During the Mycenaean period, from around the sixteenth century to the twelfth century BC, Linear B was used to write the earliest attested form of the Greek language, known as Mycenaean Greek. This writing system, unrelated to the Greek alphabet, last appeared in the thirteenth century BC. In the late ninth century BC or early eighth century BC, the Greek alphabet emerged. [2] The period between the use of the two writing systems, during which no Greek texts are attested, is known as the Greek Dark Ages. The Greeks adopted the alphabet from the earlier Phoenician alphabet, one of the closely related scripts used for the West Semitic languages, calling it Φοινικήια γράμματα 'Phoenician letters'. [36] However, the Phoenician alphabet is limited to consonants. When it was adopted for writing Greek, certain consonants were adapted to express vowels. The use of both vowels and consonants makes Greek the first alphabet in the narrow sense, [6] as distinguished from the abjads used in Semitic languages, which have letters only for consonants. [37]

Early Greek alphabet on pottery in the National Archaeological Museum of Athens NAMA Alphabet grec.jpg
Early Greek alphabet on pottery in the National Archaeological Museum of Athens

Greek initially took over all of the 22 letters of Phoenician. Five were reassigned to denote vowel sounds: the glide consonants /j/ ( yodh ) and /w/ ( waw ) were used for [i] (Ι, iota ) and [u] (Υ, upsilon ); the glottal stop consonant /ʔ/ ( aleph ) was used for [a] (Α, alpha ); the pharyngeal /ʕ/ ( ʿayin ) was turned into [o] (Ο, omicron ); and the letter for /h/ ( he ) was turned into [e] (Ε, epsilon ). A doublet of waw was also borrowed as a consonant for [w] (Ϝ, digamma). In addition, the Phoenician letter for the emphatic glottal /ħ/ ( heth ) was borrowed in two different functions by different dialects of Greek: as a letter for /h/ (Η, heta) by those dialects that had such a sound, and as an additional vowel letter for the long /ɛː/ (Η, eta) by those dialects that lacked the consonant. Eventually, a seventh vowel letter for the long /ɔː/ (Ω, omega) was introduced.

Greek also introduced three new consonant letters for its aspirated plosive sounds and consonant clusters: Φ ( phi ) for /pʰ/, Χ ( chi ) for /kʰ/ and Ψ ( psi ) for /ps/. In western Greek variants, Χ was instead used for /ks/ and Ψ for /kʰ/. The origin of these letters is a matter of some debate.

PhoenicianGreek
Phoenician aleph.svg aleph /ʔ/ Greek Alpha 03.svg Α alpha /a/, //
Phoenician beth.svg beth /b/ Greek Beta 16.svg Β beta /b/
Phoenician gimel.svg gimel /ɡ/ Greek Gamma archaic 1.svg Γ gamma /ɡ/
Phoenician daleth.svg daleth /d/ Greek Delta 04.svg Δ delta /d/
Phoenician he.svg he /h/ Greek Epsilon archaic.svg Ε epsilon /e/, // [note 1]
Phoenician waw.svg waw /w/ Greek Digamma oblique.svg Ϝ(digamma)/w/
Phoenician zayin.svg zayin /z/ Greek Zeta archaic.svg Ζ zeta [zd](?)
Phoenician heth.svg heth /ħ/ Greek Eta archaic.svg Η eta /h/, /ɛː/
Phoenician teth.svg teth // Greek Theta archaic.svg Θ theta //
Phoenician yodh.svg yodh /j/ Greek Iota normal.svg Ι iota /i/, //
Phoenician kaph.svg kaph /k/ Greek Kappa normal.svg Κ kappa /k/
Phoenician lamedh.svg lamedh /l/ Greek Lambda 09.svg Λ lambda /l/
Phoenician mem.svg mem /m/ Greek Mu 04.svg Μ mu /m/
Phoenician nun.svg nun /n/ Greek Nu 01.svg Ν nu /n/
PhoenicianGreek
Phoenician samekh.svg samekh /s/ Greek Xi archaic.svg Ξ xi /ks/
Phoenician ayin.svg ʿayin /ʕ/ Greek Omicron 04.svg Ο omicron /o/, // [note 1]
Phoenician pe.svg pe /p/ Greek Pi archaic.svg Π pi /p/
Phoenician sade.svg ṣade // Greek San 02.svg Ϻ(san)/s/
Phoenician qoph.svg qoph /q/ Greek Koppa normal.svg Ϙ(koppa)/k/
Phoenician res.svg reš /r/ Greek Rho pointed.svg Ρ rho /r/
Phoenician sin.svg šin /ʃ/ Greek Sigma normal.svg Σ sigma /s/
Phoenician taw.svg taw /t/ Greek Tau normal.svg Τ tau /t/
Phoenician waw.svg (waw)/w/ Greek Upsilon normal.svg Υ upsilon /u/, //
Greek Phi archaic.svg Φ phi //
Greek Chi normal.svg Χ chi //
Greek Psi straight.svg Ψ psi /ps/
Greek Omega normal.svg Ω omega /ɔː/

Three of the original Phoenician letters dropped out of use before the alphabet took its classical shape: the letter Ϻ ( san ), which had been in competition with Σ ( sigma ) denoting the same phoneme /s/; the letter Ϙ ( qoppa ), which was redundant with Κ ( kappa ) for /k/, and Ϝ ( digamma ), whose sound value /w/ dropped out of the spoken language before or during the classical period.

Greek was originally written predominantly from right to left, just like Phoenician, but scribes could freely alternate between directions. For a time, a writing style with alternating right-to-left and left-to-right lines (called boustrophedon , literally "ox-turning", after the manner of an ox ploughing a field) was common, until in the classical period the left-to-right writing direction became the norm. Individual letter shapes were mirrored depending on the writing direction of the current line.

Archaic variants

Distribution of "green", "red" and "blue" alphabet types, after Kirchhoff. Ancient Greek epichoric alphabets.svg
Distribution of "green", "red" and "blue" alphabet types, after Kirchhoff.

There were initially numerous local (epichoric) variants of the Greek alphabet, which differed in the use and non-use of the additional vowel and consonant symbols and several other features. Epichoric alphabets are commonly divided into four major types according to their different treatments of additional consonant letters for the aspirated consonants (/pʰ, kʰ/) and consonant clusters (/ks, ps/) of Greek. [38] These four types are often conventionally labelled as "green", "red", "light blue" and "dark blue" types, based on a colour-coded map in a seminal 19th-century work on the topic, Studien zur Geschichte des griechischen Alphabets by Adolf Kirchhoff (1867). [38]

The "green" (or southern) type is the most archaic and closest to the Phoenician. [39] The "red" (or western) type is the one that was later transmitted to the West and became the ancestor of the Latin alphabet, and bears some crucial features characteristic of that later development. [39] The "blue" (or eastern) type is the one from which the later standard Greek alphabet emerged. [39] Athens used a local form of the "light blue" alphabet type until the end of the fifth century BC, which lacked the letters Ξ and Ψ as well as the vowel symbols Η and Ω. [39] [40] In the Old Attic alphabet, ΧΣ stood for /ks/ and ΦΣ for /ps/. Ε was used for all three sounds /e,eː,ɛː/ (correspondinɡ to classical Ε, ΕΙ, Η), and Ο was used for all of /o,oː,ɔː/ (corresponding to classical Ο, ΟΥ, Ω). [40] The letter Η (heta) was used for the consonant /h/. [40] Some variant local letter forms were also characteristic of Athenian writing, some of which were shared with the neighboring (but otherwise "red") alphabet of Euboia: a form of Λ that resembled a Latin L ( Greek Lambda Athenian.svg ) and a form of Σ that resembled a Latin S ( Greek Sigma Z-shaped.svg ). [40]

Phoenician model Phoenician aleph.svg Phoenician beth.svg Phoenician gimel.svg Phoenician daleth.svg Phoenician he.svg Phoenician waw.svg Phoenician zayin.svg Phoenician heth.svg Phoenician teth.svg Phoenician yodh.svg Phoenician kaph.svg Phoenician lamedh.svg Phoenician mem.svg Phoenician nun.svg Phoenician samekh.svg Phoenician ayin.svg Phoenician pe.svg Phoenician sade.svg Phoenician qoph.svg Phoenician res.svg Phoenician sin.svg Phoenician taw.svg
Southern"green" Greek Alpha 03.svg Greek Beta 16.svg Greek Gamma archaic 1.svg Greek Delta 04.svg Greek Epsilon archaic.svg Greek Digamma oblique.svg Greek Zeta archaic.svg Greek Eta archaic.svg Greek Theta archaic.svg Greek Iota normal.svg Greek Kappa normal.svg Greek Lambda 09.svg Greek Mu 04.svg Greek Nu 01.svg Greek Omicron 04.svg Greek Pi archaic.svg Greek San 02.svg Greek Koppa normal.svg Greek Rho pointed.svg Greek Sigma normal.svg Greek Tau normal.svg Greek Upsilon normal.svg *
Western"red" Greek Chi normal.svg Greek Phi archaic.svg Greek Psi straight.svg
Eastern"light blue" Greek Chi normal.svg
"dark blue" Greek Xi archaic.svg Greek Psi straight.svg
Classic Ionian Greek Eta normal.svg Greek Omega normal.svg
Modern alphabet Α Β Γ Δ Ε Ζ Η Θ Ι Κ Λ Μ Ν Ξ Ο Π Ρ Σ Τ Υ Φ Χ Ψ Ω
Sound in Ancient Greekabgdewzdhēiklmnksopskrstukspsō

*Upsilon is also derived from waw ( Phoenician waw.svg ).

The classical twenty-four-letter alphabet that is now used to represent the Greek language was originally the local alphabet of Ionia. [41] By the late fifth century BC, it was commonly used by many Athenians. [41] In c. 403 BC, at the suggestion of the archon Eucleides, the Athenian Assembly formally abandoned the Old Attic alphabet and adopted the Ionian alphabet as part of the democratic reforms after the overthrow of the Thirty Tyrants. [41] [42] Because of Eucleides's role in suggesting the idea to adopt the Ionian alphabet, the standard twenty-four-letter Greek alphabet is sometimes known as the "Eucleidean alphabet". [41] Roughly thirty years later, the Eucleidean alphabet was adopted in Boeotia and it may have been adopted a few years previously in Macedonia. [43] By the end of the fourth century BC, it had displaced local alphabets across the Greek-speaking world to become the standard form of the Greek alphabet. [43]

Letter names

When the Greeks adopted the Phoenician alphabet, they took over not only the letter shapes and sound values but also the names by which the sequence of the alphabet could be recited and memorized. In Phoenician, each letter name was a word that began with the sound represented by that letter; thus ʾaleph , the word for "ox", was used as the name for the glottal stop /ʔ/, bet , or "house", for the /b/ sound, and so on. When the letters were adopted by the Greeks, most of the Phoenician names were maintained or modified slightly to fit Greek phonology; thus, ʾaleph, bet, gimel became alpha, beta, gamma.

The Greek names of the following letters are more or less straightforward continuations of their Phoenician antecedents. Between Ancient and Modern Greek, they have remained largely unchanged, except that their pronunciation has followed regular sound changes along with other words (for instance, in the name of beta, ancient /b/ regularly changed to modern /v/, and ancient /ɛː/ to modern /i/, resulting in the modern pronunciation vita). The name of lambda is attested in early sources as λάβδα besides λάμβδα; [44] [11] in Modern Greek the spelling is often λάμδα, reflecting pronunciation. [11] Similarly, iota is sometimes spelled γιώτα in Modern Greek ([ʝ] is conventionally transcribed γ{ι,η,υ,ει,οι} word-initially and intervocalically before back vowels and /a/). In the tables below, the Greek names of all letters are given in their traditional polytonic spelling; in modern practice, like with all other words, they are usually spelled in the simplified monotonic system.

LetterNamePronunciation
GreekPhoenician originalEnglishGreek (Ancient)Greek (Modern)English
Αἄλφαalephalpha[alpʰa][ˈalfa] /ˈælfə/
Ββῆταbethbeta[bɛːta][ˈvita] /ˈbtə/ , US: /ˈbtə/
Γγάμμαgimelgamma[ɡamma][ˈɣama] /ˈɡæmə/
Δδέλταdalethdelta[delta][ˈðelta] /ˈdɛltə/
Ηἦταhetheta[hɛːta],[ɛːta][ˈita] /ˈtə/ , US: /ˈtə/
Θθῆταteththeta[tʰɛːta][ˈθita] /ˈθtə/ , US: /ˈθtə/
Ιἰῶταyodhiota[iɔːta][ˈʝota] /ˈtə/
Κκάππαkaphkappa[kappa][ˈkapa] /ˈkæpə/
Λλάμβδαlamedhlambda[lambda][ˈlamða] /ˈlæmdə/
Μμῦmemmu[myː][mi] /mj/ ; occasionally US: /m/
Ννῦnunnu[nyː][ni] /nj/
Ρῥῶrešrho[rɔː][ro] /r/
Τταῦtawtau[tau][taf] /t,tɔː/

In the cases of the three historical sibilant letters below, the correspondence between Phoenician and Ancient Greek is less clear, with apparent mismatches both in letter names and sound values. The early history of these letters (and the fourth sibilant letter, obsolete san) has been a matter of some debate. Here too, the changes in the pronunciation of the letter names between Ancient and Modern Greek are regular.

LetterNamePronunciation
GreekPhoenician originalEnglishGreek (Ancient)Greek (Modern)English
Ζζῆταzayinzeta[zdɛːta][ˈzita] /ˈztə/ , US: /ˈztə/
Ξξεῖ, ξῖsamekhxi[kseː][ksi] /z,ks/
Σσίγμαšinsiɡma[siɡma][ˈsiɣma] /ˈsɪɡmə/

In the following group of consonant letters, the older forms of the names in Ancient Greek were spelled with -εῖ, indicating an original pronunciation with . In Modern Greek these names are spelled with .

LetterNamePronunciation
GreekEnglishGreek (Ancient)Greek (Modern)English
Ξξεῖ, ξῖxi[kseː][ksi] /z,ks/
Ππεῖ, πῖpi[peː][pi] /p/
Φφεῖ, φῖphi[pʰeː][fi] /f/
Χχεῖ, χῖchi[kʰeː][çi] /k/
Ψψεῖ, ψῖpsi[pseː][psi] /s/ , /ps/

The following group of vowel letters were originally called simply by their sound values as long vowels: ē, ō, ū, and ɔ. Their modern names contain adjectival qualifiers that were added during the Byzantine period, to distinguish between letters that had become confusable. [11] Thus, the letters ο and ω, pronounced identically by this time, were called o mikron ("small o") and o mega ("big o"). [11] The letter ε was called e psilon ("plain e") to distinguish it from the identically pronounced digraph αι, while, similarly, υ, which at this time was pronounced [ y ], was called y psilon ("plain y") to distinguish it from the identically pronounced digraph οι. [11]

LetterNamePronunciation
Greek (Ancient)Greek (Medieval)Greek (Modern)EnglishGreek (Ancient)Greek (Modern)English
Εεἶἐ ψιλόνἔψιλονepsilon[eː][ˈepsilon] /ˈɛpsɪlɒn/ , some UK: /ɛpˈslən/
Οοὖὀ μικρόνὄμικρονomicron[oː][ˈomikron] /ˈɒmɪkrɒn/ , traditional UK: /ˈmkrɒn/
Υὐ ψιλόνὔψιλονupsilon[uː], [yː][ˈipsilon] /jpˈslən,ˈʊpsɪlɒn/ , also UK: /ʌpˈslən/ , US: /ˈʌpsɪlɒn/
Ωὠ μέγαὠμέγαomega[ɔː][oˈmeɣa] US: /ˈmɡə/ , traditional UK: /ˈmɪɡə/

Some dialects of the Aegean and Cypriot have retained long consonants and pronounce [ˈɣamːa] and [ˈkapʰa]; also, ήτα has come to be pronounced [ˈitʰa] in Cypriot. [45]

Letter shapes

A 16th-century edition of the New Testament (Gospel of John), printed in a renaissance typeface by Claude Garamond Gospel Estienne 1550.jpg
A 16th-century edition of the New Testament (Gospel of John), printed in a renaissance typeface by Claude Garamond
Theocritus Idyll 1, lines 12-14, in script with abbreviations and ligatures from a caption in an illustrated edition of Theocritus. Lodewijk Caspar Valckenaer: Carmina bucolica, Leiden 1779. Theocritus-Syracusanus-et-al-Lodewijk-Caspar-Valckenaer MG 0683 - detail - Greek text - Theocritus - Idyll 1.jpg
Theocritus Idyll 1, lines 12–14, in script with abbreviations and ligatures from a caption in an illustrated edition of Theocritus. Lodewijk Caspar Valckenaer: Carmina bucolica, Leiden 1779.

Like Latin and other alphabetic scripts, Greek originally had only a single form of each letter, without a distinction between uppercase and lowercase. This distinction is an innovation of the modern era, drawing on different lines of development of the letter shapes in earlier handwriting.

The oldest forms of the letters in antiquity are majuscule forms. Besides the upright, straight inscriptional forms (capitals) found in stone carvings or incised pottery, more fluent writing styles adapted for handwriting on soft materials were also developed during antiquity. Such handwriting has been preserved especially from papyrus manuscripts in Egypt since the Hellenistic period. Ancient handwriting developed two distinct styles: uncial writing, with carefully drawn, rounded block letters of about equal size, used as a book hand for carefully produced literary and religious manuscripts, and cursive writing, used for everyday purposes. [46] The cursive forms approached the style of lowercase letter forms, with ascenders and descenders, as well as many connecting lines and ligatures between letters.

In the ninth and tenth century, uncial book hands were replaced with a new, more compact writing style, with letter forms partly adapted from the earlier cursive. [46] This minuscule style remained the dominant form of handwritten Greek into the modern era. During the Renaissance, western printers adopted the minuscule letter forms as lowercase printed typefaces, while modeling uppercase letters on the ancient inscriptional forms. The orthographic practice of using the letter case distinction for marking proper names, titles, etc. developed in parallel to the practice in Latin and other western languages.

InscriptionManuscriptModern print
ArchaicClassical Uncial Minuscule LowercaseUppercase
Greek Alpha 03.svg Greek Alpha classical.svg Greek uncial Alpha.svg Greek minuscule Alpha.svg αΑ
Greek Beta 16.svg Greek Beta classical.svg Greek uncial Beta.svg Greek minuscule Beta.svg βΒ
Greek Gamma archaic 1.svg Greek Gamma classical.svg Greek uncial Gamma.svg Greek minuscule Gamma.svg γΓ
Greek Delta 04.svg Greek Delta classical.svg Greek uncial Delta.svg Greek minuscule Delta.svg δΔ
Greek Epsilon archaic.svg Greek Epsilon classical.svg Greek uncial Epsilon.svg Greek minuscule Epsilon.svg εΕ
Greek Zeta archaic.svg Greek Zeta classical.svg Greek uncial Zeta.svg Greek minuscule Zeta.svg ζΖ
Greek Eta archaic.svg Greek Eta classical.svg Greek uncial Eta.svg Greek minuscule Eta.svg ηΗ
Greek Theta archaic.svg Greek Theta classical.svg Greek uncial Theta.svg Greek minuscule Theta.svg θΘ
Greek Iota normal.svg Greek Iota classical.svg Greek uncial Iota.svg Greek minuscule Iota.svg ιΙ
Greek Kappa normal.svg Greek Kappa classical.svg Greek uncial Kappa.svg Greek minuscule Kappa.svg κΚ
Greek Lambda 09.svg Greek Lambda classical.svg Greek uncial Lambda.svg Greek minuscule Lambda.svg λΛ
Greek Mu 04.svg Greek Mu classical.svg Greek uncial Mu.svg Greek minuscule Mu.svg μΜ
Greek Nu 01.svg Greek Nu classical.svg Greek uncial Nu.svg Greek minuscule Nu.svg νΝ
Greek Xi archaic.svg Greek Xi classical.svg Greek uncial Xi.svg Greek minuscule Xi.svg ξΞ
Greek Omicron 04.svg Greek Omicron classical.svg Greek uncial Omicron.svg Greek minuscule Omicron.svg οΟ
Greek Pi archaic.svg Greek Pi classical.svg Greek uncial Pi.svg Greek minuscule Pi.svg πΠ
Greek Rho pointed.svg Greek Rho classical.svg Greek uncial Rho.svg Greek minuscule Rho.svg ρΡ
Greek Sigma normal.svg Greek Sigma classical.svg Greek uncial Sigma.svg Greek minuscule Sigma.svg σςΣ
Greek Tau normal.svg Greek Tau classical.svg Greek uncial Tau.svg Greek minuscule Tau.svg τΤ
Greek Upsilon normal.svg Greek Upsilon classical.svg Greek uncial Upsilon.svg Greek minuscule Upsilon.svg υΥ
Greek Phi 03.svg Greek Phi archaic.svg Greek uncial Phi.svg Greek minuscule Phi.svg φΦ
Greek Chi normal.svg Greek Chi classical.svg Greek uncial Chi.svg Greek minuscule Chi.svg χΧ
Greek Psi straight.svg Greek Psi classical.svg Greek uncial Psi.svg Greek minuscule Psi.svg ψΨ
Greek Omega normal.svg Greek Omega classical.svg Greek uncial Omega.svg Greek minuscule Omega.svg ωΩ

Derived alphabets

The earliest Etruscan abecedarium, from Marsiliana d'Albegna, still almost identical with contemporaneous archaic Greek alphabets Marsiliana tablet.svg
The earliest Etruscan abecedarium, from Marsiliana d'Albegna, still almost identical with contemporaneous archaic Greek alphabets
A page from the Codex Argenteus
, a 6th-century Bible manuscript in Gothic Wulfila bibel.jpg
A page from the Codex Argenteus , a 6th-century Bible manuscript in Gothic

The Greek alphabet was the model for various others: [6]

The Armenian and Georgian alphabets are almost certainly modeled on the Greek alphabet, but their graphic forms are quite different. [48]

Other uses

Use for other languages

Apart from the daughter alphabets listed above, which were adapted from Greek but developed into separate writing systems, the Greek alphabet has also been adopted at various times and in various places to write other languages. [49] For some of them, additional letters were introduced.

Antiquity

Middle Ages

Early modern

18th-century title page of a book printed in Karamanli Turkish Karamanlidika title page 1784.JPG
18th-century title page of a book printed in Karamanli Turkish

In mathematics and science

Greek symbols are used as symbols in mathematics, physics and other sciences. Many symbols have traditional uses, such as lower case epsilon (ε) for an arbitrarily small positive number, lower case pi (π) for the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter, capital sigma (Σ) for summation, and lower case sigma (σ) for standard deviation. For many years the Greek alphabet was used by the World Meteorological Organization for naming North Atlantic hurricanes if a season was so active that it exhausted the regular list of storm names. This happened during the 2005 season (when Alpha through Zeta were used), and the 2020 season (when Alpha through Iota were used), after which the practice was discontinued. [67] [68] In May 2021 the World Health Organization announced that the variants of SARS-CoV-2 of the virus would be named using letters of the Greek alphabet to avoid stigma and simplify communications for non-scientific audiences. [69] [70]

Astronomy

Greek letters are used to denote the brighter stars within each of the eighty-eight constellations. In most constellations, the brightest star is designated Alpha and the next brightest Beta etc. For example, the brightest star in the constellation of Centaurus is known as Alpha Centauri. For historical reasons, the Greek designations of some constellations begin with a lower ranked letter.

International Phonetic Alphabet

Several Greek letters are used as phonetic symbols in the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA). [71] Several of them denote fricative consonants; the rest stand for variants of vowel sounds. The glyph shapes used for these letters in specialized phonetic fonts is sometimes slightly different from the conventional shapes in Greek typography proper, with glyphs typically being more upright and using serifs, to make them conform more with the typographical character of other, Latin-based letters in the phonetic alphabet. Nevertheless, in the Unicode encoding standard, the following three phonetic symbols are considered the same characters as the corresponding Greek letters proper: [72]

βbetaU+03B2 voiced bilabial fricative
θthetaU+03B8 voiceless dental fricative
χchiU+03C7 voiceless uvular fricative

On the other hand, the following phonetic letters have Unicode representations separate from their Greek alphabetic use, either because their conventional typographic shape is too different from the original, or because they also have secondary uses as regular alphabetic characters in some Latin-based alphabets, including separate Latin uppercase letters distinct from the Greek ones.

Greek letterPhonetic letterUppercase
φphiU+03C6ɸU+0278 Voiceless bilabial fricative
γgammaU+03B3ɣU+0263 Voiced velar fricative Ɣ U+0194
εepsilonU+03B5ɛU+025B Open-mid front unrounded vowel Ɛ U+0190
αalphaU+03B1ɑU+0251 Open back unrounded vowel Ɑ U+2C6D
υupsilonU+03C5ʊU+028A near-close near-back rounded vowel Ʊ U+01B1
ιiotaU+03B9ɩU+0269Obsolete for near-close near-front unrounded vowel now ɪ Ɩ U+0196

The symbol in Americanist phonetic notation for the voiceless alveolar lateral fricative is the Greek letter lambda λ, but ɬ in the IPA. The IPA symbol for the palatal lateral approximant is ʎ, which looks similar to lambda, but is actually an inverted lowercase y.

Use as numerals

Greek letters were also used to write numbers. In the classical Ionian system, the first nine letters of the alphabet stood for the numbers from 1 to 9, the next nine letters stood for the multiples of 10, from 10 to 90, and the next nine letters stood for the multiples of 100, from 100 to 900. For this purpose, in addition to the 24 letters which by that time made up the standard alphabet, three otherwise obsolete letters were retained or revived: digamma Ϝ for 6, koppa Ϙ for 90, and a rare Ionian letter for [ss], today called sampi Ͳ, for 900. This system has remained in use in Greek up to the present day, although today it is only employed for limited purposes such as enumerating chapters in a book, similar to the way Roman numerals are used in English. The three extra symbols are today written as ϛ, ϟ and ϡ. To mark a letter as a numeral sign, a small stroke called keraia is added to the right of it.

Αʹ αʹ alpha 1
Βʹ βʹ beta 2
Γʹ γʹ gamma 3
Δʹ δʹ delta 4
Εʹ εʹ epsilon 5
ϛʹ digamma (stigma)6
Ζʹ ζʹ zeta 7
Ηʹ ηʹ eta 8
Θʹ θʹ theta 9
Ιʹ ιʹ iota 10
Κʹ κʹ kappa 20
Λʹ λʹ lambda 30
Μʹ μʹ mu 40
Νʹ νʹ nu 50
Ξʹ ξʹ xi 60
Οʹ οʹ omicron 70
Πʹ πʹ pi 80
ϟʹ koppa 90
Ρʹ ρʹ rho 100
Σʹ σʹ sigma 200
Τʹ τʹ tau 300
Υʹ υʹ upsilon 400
Φʹ φʹ phi 500
Χʹ χʹ chi 600
Ψʹ ψʹ psi 700
Ωʹ ωʹ omega 800
ϡʹ sampi 900

Use by student fraternities and sororities

In North America, many college fraternities and sororities are named with combinations of Greek letters, and are hence also known as "Greek letter organizations". [73] This naming tradition was initiated by the foundation of the Phi Beta Kappa Society at the College of William and Mary in 1776. [73] The name of this fraternal organization is an acronym for the ancient Greek phrase Φιλοσοφία Βίου Κυβερνήτης (Philosophia Biou Kybernētēs), which means "Love of wisdom, the guide of life" and serves as the organization's motto. [73] Sometimes early fraternal organizations were known by their Greek letter names because the mottos that these names stood for were secret and revealed only to members of the fraternity. [73]

Different chapters within the same fraternity are almost always (with a handful of exceptions) designated using Greek letters as serial numbers. The founding chapter of each organization is its A chapter. As an organization expands, it establishes a B chapter, a Γ chapter, and so on and so forth. In an organization that expands to more than 24 chapters, the chapter after Ω chapter is AA chapter, followed by AB chapter, etc. Each of these is still a "chapter Letter", albeit a double-digit letter just as 10 through 99 are double-digit numbers. The Roman alphabet has a similar extended form with such double-digit letters when necessary, but it is used for columns in a table or chart rather than chapters of an organization.[ citation needed ]

Glyph variants

Some letters can occur in variant shapes, mostly inherited from medieval minuscule handwriting. While their use in normal typography of Greek is purely a matter of font styles, some such variants have been given separate encodings in Unicode.

Computer encodings

For computer usage, a variety of encodings have been used for Greek online, many of them documented in RFC   1947.

The two principal ones still used today are ISO/IEC 8859-7 and Unicode. ISO 8859-7 supports only the monotonic orthography; Unicode supports both the monotonic and polytonic orthographies.

ISO/IEC 8859-7

For the range A0–FF (hex), it follows the Unicode range 370–3CF (see below) except that some symbols, like ©, ½, § etc. are used where Unicode has unused locations. Like all ISO-8859 encodings, it is equal to ASCII for 00–7F (hex).

Greek in Unicode

Unicode supports polytonic orthography well enough for ordinary continuous text in modern and ancient Greek, and even many archaic forms for epigraphy. With the use of combining characters, Unicode also supports Greek philology and dialectology and various other specialized requirements. Most current text rendering engines do not render diacritics well, so, though alpha with macron and acute can be represented as U+03B1 U+0304 U+0301, this rarely renders well: ᾱ́.[ citation needed ]

There are two main blocks of Greek characters in Unicode. The first is "Greek and Coptic" (U+0370 to U+03FF). This block is based on ISO 8859-7 and is sufficient to write Modern Greek. There are also some archaic letters and Greek-based technical symbols.

This block also supports the Coptic alphabet. Formerly, most Coptic letters shared codepoints with similar-looking Greek letters; but in many scholarly works, both scripts occur, with quite different letter shapes, so as of Unicode 4.1, Coptic and Greek were disunified. Those Coptic letters with no Greek equivalents still remain in this block (U+03E2 to U+03EF).

To write polytonic Greek, one may use combining diacritical marks or the precomposed characters in the "Greek Extended" block (U+1F00 to U+1FFF).

Greek and Coptic [1] [2]
Official Unicode Consortium code chart (PDF)
 0123456789ABCDEF
U+037x Ͱ ͱ Ͳ ͳ ʹ ͵ Ͷ ͷ ͺ ͻ ͼ ͽ ; Ϳ
U+038x ΄ ΅ Ά · Έ Ή Ί Ό Ύ Ώ
U+039x ΐ Α Β Γ Δ Ε Ζ Η Θ Ι Κ Λ Μ Ν Ξ Ο
U+03Ax Π Ρ Σ Τ Υ Φ Χ Ψ Ω Ϊ Ϋ ά έ ή ί
U+03Bx ΰ α β γ δ ε ζ η θ ι κ λ μ ν ξ ο
U+03Cx π ρ ς σ τ υ φ χ ψ ω ϊ ϋ ό ύ ώ Ϗ
U+03Dx ϐ ϑ ϒ ϓ ϔ ϕ ϖ ϗ Ϙ ϙ Ϛ ϛ Ϝ ϝ Ϟ ϟ
U+03Ex Ϡ ϡ Ϣ ϣ Ϥ ϥ Ϧ ϧ Ϩ ϩ Ϫ ϫ Ϭ ϭ Ϯ ϯ
U+03Fx ϰ ϱ ϲ ϳ ϴ ϵ ϶ Ϸ ϸ Ϲ Ϻ ϻ ϼ Ͻ Ͼ Ͽ
Notes
1. ^ As of Unicode version 16.0
2. ^ Grey areas indicate non-assigned code points
Greek Extended [1] [2]
Official Unicode Consortium code chart (PDF)
 0123456789ABCDEF
U+1F0x
U+1F1x
U+1F2x
U+1F3x Ἷ
U+1F4x
U+1F5x
U+1F6x
U+1F7x
U+1F8x
U+1F9x
U+1FAx
U+1FBx ᾿
U+1FCx
U+1FDx
U+1FEx
U+1FFx
Notes
1. ^ As of Unicode version 16.0
2. ^ Grey areas indicate non-assigned code points

Combining and letter-free diacritics

Combining and spacing (letter-free) diacritical marks pertaining to Greek language:

CombiningSpacingSampleDescription
U+0300U+0060(  ̀ )"varia / grave accent"
U+0301U+00B4, U+0384(  ́ )"oxia / tonos / acute accent"
U+0304U+00AF( ̄ )"macron"
U+0306U+02D8( ̆ )"vrachy / breve"
U+0308U+00A8( ̈ )"dialytika / diaeresis"
U+0313U+02BC( ̓ )"psili / comma above" (spiritus lenis)
U+0314U+02BD( ̔ )"dasia / reversed comma above" (spiritus asper)
U+0342( ͂ )"perispomeni" (circumflex)
U+0343( ̓ )"koronis" (= U+0313)
U+0344U+0385( ̈́ )"dialytika tonos" (deprecated, = U+0308 U+0301)
U+0345U+037A( ͅ )"ypogegrammeni / iota subscript".

Encodings with a subset of the Greek alphabet

IBM code pages 437, 860, 861, 862, 863, and 865 contain the letters ΓΘΣΦΩαδεπστφ (plus β as an alternative interpretation for ß).

See also

Notes

  1. 1 2 Epsilon ε and omicron ο originally could denote both short and long vowels in pre-classical archaic Greek spelling, just like other vowel letters. They were restricted to the function of short vowel signs in classical Greek, as the long vowels // and // came to be spelled instead with the digraphs ει and ου, having phonologically merged with a corresponding pair of former diphthongs /ei/ and /ou/ respectively.

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San (Ϻ) was an archaic letter of the Greek alphabet. Its shape was similar to modern M or Mu, or to a modern Greek Sigma (Σ) turned sideways, and it was used as an alternative to Sigma to denote the sound. Unlike Sigma, whose position in the alphabet is between Rho and Tau, San appeared between Pi and Qoppa in alphabetic order. In addition to denoting this separate archaic character, the name San was also used as an alternative name to denote the standard letter Sigma.

Sigma is the eighteenth letter of the Greek alphabet. In the system of Greek numerals, it has a value of 200. In general mathematics, uppercase Σ is used as an operator for summation. When used at the end of a letter-case word, the final form (ς) is used. In Ὀδυσσεύς (Odysseus), for example, the two lowercase sigmas (σ) in the center of the name are distinct from the word-final sigma (ς) at the end. The Latin letter S derives from sigma while the Cyrillic letter Es derives from a lunate form of this letter.

The history of the alphabet goes back to the consonantal writing system used to write Semitic languages in the Levant during the 2nd millennium BCE. Nearly all alphabetic scripts used throughout the world today ultimately go back to this Semitic script. Its first origins can be traced back to a Proto-Sinaitic script developed in Ancient Egypt to represent the language of Semitic-speaking workers and slaves in Egypt. Unskilled in the complex hieroglyphic system used to write the Egyptian language, which required a large number of pictograms, they selected a small number of those commonly seen in their surroundings to describe the sounds, as opposed to the semantic values, of their own Canaanite language. This script was partly influenced by the older Egyptian hieratic, a cursive script related to Egyptian hieroglyphs. The Semitic alphabet became the ancestor of multiple writing systems across the Middle East, Europe, northern Africa, and South Asia, mainly through Phoenician and the closely related Paleo-Hebrew alphabet, and later Aramaic and the Nabatean—derived from the Aramaic alphabet and developed into the Arabic alphabet—five closely related members of the Semitic family of scripts that were in use during the early first millennium BCE.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Geʽez script</span> Script used for languages in Ethiopia and Eritrea

Geʽez is a script used as an abugida (alphasyllabary) for several Afro-Asiatic and Nilo-Saharan languages of Ethiopia and Eritrea. It originated as an abjad and was first used to write the Geʽez language, now the liturgical language of the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church, the Eritrean Orthodox Tewahedo Church, the Eritrean Catholic Church, the Ethiopian Catholic Church, and Haymanot Judaism of the Beta Israel Jewish community in Ethiopia. In the languages Amharic and Tigrinya, the script is often called fidäl (ፊደል), meaning "script" or "letter". Under the Unicode Standard and ISO 15924, it is defined as Ethiopic text.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">History of the Greek alphabet</span>

The history of the Greek alphabet starts with the adoption of Phoenician letter forms in the 9th–8th centuries BC during early Archaic Greece and continues to the present day. The Greek alphabet was developed during the Iron Age, centuries after the loss of Linear B, the syllabic script that was used for writing Mycenaean Greek until the Late Bronze Age collapse and Greek Dark Age. This article concentrates on the development of the alphabet before the modern codification of the standard Greek alphabet.

Heta is a conventional name for the historical Greek alphabet letter Eta (Η) and several of its variants, when used in their original function of denoting the consonant.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Archaic Greek alphabets</span> Local variants of the ancient Greek alphabet

Many local variants of the Greek alphabet were employed in ancient Greece during the archaic and early classical periods, until around 400 BC, when they were replaced by the classical 24-letter alphabet that is the standard today. All forms of the Greek alphabet were originally based on the shared inventory of the 22 symbols of the Phoenician alphabet, with the exception of the letter Samekh, whose Greek counterpart Xi (Ξ) was used only in a sub-group of Greek alphabets, and with the common addition of Upsilon (Υ) for the vowel. The local, so-called epichoric, alphabets differed in many ways: in the use of the consonant symbols Χ, Φ and Ψ; in the use of the innovative long vowel letters, in the absence or presence of Η in its original consonant function ; in the use or non-use of certain archaic letters ; and in many details of the individual shapes of each letter. The system now familiar as the standard 24-letter Greek alphabet was originally the regional variant of the Ionian cities in Anatolia. It was officially adopted in Athens in 403 BC and in most of the rest of the Greek world by the middle of the 4th century BC.

References

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    1 According to Herodutous "the Phoenicians who came with Cadmus... brought into Hellas the alphabet, which had hitherto been unknown, as I think, to the Greeks."
    2 The Greek Letters, alpha, beta, gimmel have no meaning in Greek but the meaning of most of their Semitic equivalents is known. For example, 'aleph' means 'ox', 'bet' means 'house' and 'gimmel' means 'throw stick'.
    3 Early Greek letters are very similar and sometimes identical to the West Semitic letters.
    4 The letter sequence between the Semitic and Greek alphabets is identical. (Naveh 1982)"
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  50. Understanding Relations Between Scripts II Archived 2022-05-22 at the Wayback Machine by Philip J Boyes & Philippa M Steele. Published in the UK in 2020 by Oxbow Books: "The Carian alphabet resembles the Greek alphabet, though, as in the case of Phrygian, no single Greek variant can be identified as its ancestor", "It is generally assumed that the Lydian alphabet is derived from the Greek alphabet, but the exact relationship remains unclear (Melchert 2004)"
  51. Britannica – Lycian Alphabet Archived 2024-07-10 at the Wayback Machine "The Lycian alphabet is clearly related to the Greek, but the exact nature of the relationship is uncertain. Several letters appear to be related to symbols of the Cretan and Cyprian writing systems."
  52. Scriptsource.org – Carian Archived 2023-10-29 at the Wayback Machine "Visually, the letters bear a close resemblance to Greek letters. Decipherment was initially attempted on the assumption that those letters which looked like Greek represented the same sounds as their closest visual Greek equivalents. However it has since been established that the phonetic values of the two scripts are very different. For example the theta θ symbol represents 'th' in Greek but 'q' in Carian. Carian was generally written from left to right, although Egyptian writers wrote primarily from right to left. It was written without spaces between words."
  53. Omniglot.com – Carian Archived 2024-08-27 at the Wayback Machine "The Carian alphabet appears in about 100 pieces of graffiti inscriptions left by Carian mercenaries who served in Egypt. A number of clay tablets, coins and monumental inscriptions have also been found. It was possibly derived from the Phoenician alphabet."
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  71. Handbook of the International Phonetic Association. Cambridge: University Press. 1999. pp. 176–181.
  72. For chi and beta, separate codepoints for use in a Latin-script environment were added in Unicode versions 7.0 (2014) and 8.0 (2015) respectively: U+AB53 "Latin small letter chi" (ꭓ) and U+A7B5 "Latin small letter beta" (ꞵ). As of 2017, the International Phonetic Association still lists the original Greek codepoints as the standard representations of the IPA symbols in question Archived 2019-10-14 at the Wayback Machine .
  73. 1 2 3 4 Winterer 2010, p. 377.

Bibliography