Attic Greek Alphabet Pronunciation

An introduction to the greek alphabet using the pronunciation of the biblical era.

Attic greek alphabet pronunciation.

Ancient greek phonology is the reconstructed phonology or pronunciation of ancient greek this article mostly deals with the pronunciation of the standard attic dialect of the fifth century bc used by plato and other classical greek writers and touches on other dialects spoken at the same time or earlier. The greek alphabet and pronunciation. Greek alphabet classical attic pronunciation note. Accentuation tutorial presents information and examples to help in the understanding and.

Pronunciation was shifting during this period and shifted further over the following. These local alphabets known as epichoric can be divided into three groups. The greek alphabet was taken over from the semitic as used in the phoenician area which in turn was based on an egyptian alphabet. These were also used for the numerals so that the order of the symbols was maintained if changed at times in sound value.

Greek alphabet modern pronunciation. Green blue and red the blue group developed into the modern greek alphabet while the red group developed into the etruscan alphabet other alphabets of ancient italy and eventually the latin alphabet. Brief description of modules. The j sound is created with a combination of t and z which doesn t quite match but comes close and the same goes for the hard ch sound which is written using ts the exception to this rule is in crete where in the local dialect the letter k is often given the hard ch sound.

The pronunciation of ancient greek is not known from direct observation but determined. At first there were a number of different versions of the alphabet used in various different greek cities. The hard d sound is made using nt. According to the classification of archaic greek alphabets which was introduced by adolf kirchhoff the old attic system belongs to the eastern or blue type as it uses the letters ψ and χ with their classical values ps and kʰ unlike western or red alphabets which used χ for.

Before listing the letters let us make a brief comment on the pronunciation of the language as it evolved through the millennia. The information presented here is essentially the same as the core information in unit 1 of introduction to attic greek but broken into smaller chunks and provided with audio examples the aim is to discuss the pronunciation of attic greek in the 5th and 4th centuries b c e. The alphabet is among the few linguistic elements that have remained essentially unchanged between the ancient and modern greek languages. The b sound is created by putting together m and p.

Pronunciation guide provides information and examples including audio for the pronunciation of the sounds of ancient attic greek. σ z before voiced consonants.