Greek alphabet
Type	Alphabet
Spoken languages	Greek, with many modifications covering many languages
Time period	~800 BC to the present[1]
Parent systems	Proto-Canaanite alphabet  → Phoenician alphabet   → Greek alphabet
Child systems	Gothic Glagolitic Cyrillic Coptic Old Italic alphabet Latin alphabet
ISO 15924	Grek
Note: This page may contain IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. An alphabet is a standardized set of letters basic written symbols each of which roughly represents a Phoneme, a Spoken language, either Greek (el ελληνική γλώσσα or simply el ελληνικά — "Hellenic" is an Indo-European language, spoken today by 15-22 million people mainly The Proto-Canaanite alphabet is a consonantal alphabet of twenty-two acrophonic glyphs found in Levantine texts of the Late Bronze Age (from ca The Phoenician alphabet is a continuation of the Proto-Canaanite alphabet, by convention taken to originate around 1050 BC This article is about the 4th century alphabet of the Gothic bible The Glagolitic alphabet or Glagolitsa is the oldest known Slavic Alphabet. The Cyrillic alphabet (səˈrɪlɪk also called azbuka, from the old name of the first two letters is actually a family of Alphabets, subsets of which are used by The Coptic alphabet is the script used for writing the Coptic language. Old Italic refers to several now extinct Alphabet systems used on the Italian Peninsula in ancient times for various Indo-European (predominantly Italic ISO 15924, Codes for the representation of names of scripts, defines two sets of codes for a number of Writing systems (scripts In Computing, Unicode is an Industry standard allowing Computers to consistently represent and manipulate text expressed in most of the world's

Greek alphabet
Αα Alpha	Νν Nu
Ββ Beta	Ξξ Xi
Γγ Gamma	Οο Omicron
Δδ Delta	Ππ Pi
Εε Epsilon	Ρρ Rho
Ζζ Zeta	Σσς Sigma
Ηη Eta	Ττ Tau
Θθ Theta	Υυ Upsilon
Ιι Iota	Φφ Phi
Κκ Kappa	Χχ Chi
Λλ Lambda	Ψψ Psi
Μμ Mu	Ωω Omega
Obsolete letters
Digamma	Qoppa
San	Sampi
Greek diacritics

The Greek alphabet (Greek: Ελληνικό αλφάβητο) is a set of twenty-four letters that has been used to write the Greek language since the late 9th or early 8th century BC. Alpha (uppercase Α, lowercase α; Αλφα is the first letter of the Greek alphabet. Nu (uppercase Ν, lowercase ν; Νι Ni is the 13th letter of the Greek alphabet. Beta (uppercase Β, lowercase β, internal ϐ; Βήτα Vita is the second letter of the Greek alphabet. Xi (uppercase Ξ, lowercase ξ) is the 14th letter of the Greek alphabet. Gamma (uppercase &Gamma, lowercase γ Γάμμα is the third letter of the Greek alphabet. Omicron or Omikron (uppercase Ο, lowercase ο, literally "small o": Όμικρον o mikron, micron meaning 'small' in contrast Delta (uppercase Δ, lowercase δ; Δέλτα Thelta is the fourth letter of the Greek alphabet. Pi (uppercase &Pi, lower case &pi) is the sixteenth letter of the Greek alphabet. Epsilon (uppercase Ε, lowercase ε; Έψιλον is the fifth letter of the Greek alphabet, corresponding phonetically to a Close-mid front unrounded Rho (uppercase Ρ, lowercase ρ or ϱ) is the 17th letter of the Greek alphabet. See also Principality of Zeta Zeta (uppercase Ζ, lowercase ζ; Ζήτα Zita is the sixth letter of the Greek alphabet. Sigma (upper case Σ, lower case σ; Greek Σιγμα lower case in word-final position ς) is the eighteenth letter of the Greek Eta (uppercase &Eta, lowercase η Ήτα) is the seventh letter of the Greek alphabet. Tau (uppercase Τ, lowercase τ; Ταυ) is the 19th letter of the Greek alphabet. Theta (uppercase Θ, lowercase θ or ϑ; Θήτα is the eighth letter of the Greek alphabet, derived from the Phoenician letter Teth Upsilon (uppercase &Upsilon, lowercase υ Ύψιλον is the 20th letter of the Greek alphabet. Iota (uppercase &Iota, lowercase ι Ιώτα Yota is the ninth letter of the Greek alphabet. Phi (uppercase Φ, lowercase φ or ϕ) pronounced in modern Greek and as in English is the 21st letter of the Greek alphabet Kappa (uppercase &Kappa, lowercase &kappa or ϰ; Κάππα is the 10th letter of the Greek alphabet, used to represent the Voiceless Chi ( Uppercase Χ, Lowercase χ; Χι He is the 22nd letter of the Greek alphabet, pronounced as in English Lambda (uppercase Λ, lowercase λ; Λάμβδα or el Λάμδα Lamda is the 11th letter of the Greek alphabet. For other uses see Psi. Psi (uppercase Ψ, lowercase ψ) is the 23rd letter of the Greek alphabet and has a Mu (uppercase Μ, lowercase μ; Μι or el Μυ) is the 12th letter of the Greek alphabet. OMEGA is the premier Counter-terrorism unit of Latvia. Founded in 1992 OMEGA cooperates with many other counter-terrorism units over the world Digamma (uppercase Ϝ, lowercase ϝ) is an archaic letter of the Greek alphabet, used primarily as a Greek numeral. Qoppa or Koppa ( Ϙ) is a letter that was used in early forms of the Greek alphabet, derived from Phoenician Qoph. San (uppercase Ϻ lowercase ϻ was a letter of the Greek alphabet, appearing between Pi and Qoppa in alphabetical Sampi (Ϡ is an obsolete letter of the Greek alphabet and has a numeric value of 900 when used as a mathematical character. Greek (el ελληνική γλώσσα or simply el ελληνικά — "Hellenic" is an Indo-European language, spoken today by 15-22 million people mainly Greek (el ελληνική γλώσσα or simply el ελληνικά — "Hellenic" is an Indo-European language, spoken today by 15-22 million people mainly The 9th century BC started the first day of 900 BC and ended the last day of 801 BC The 8th century BC started the first day of 800 BC and ended the last day of 701 BC. It was the first alphabet in the narrow sense, that is, a writing system that uses a separate symbol for each vowel and consonant. An alphabet is a standardized set of letters basic written symbols each of which roughly represents a Phoneme, a Spoken language, either ^[2] It is the oldest alphabetic script in continuous use today. The letters were also used to represent Greek numerals, beginning in the 2nd century BC. ʹ the numeral sign redirects here For the accent ´ see Acute accent. The 2nd century BC started the first day of 200 BC and ended the last day of 101 BC.

The Greek alphabet is descended from the Phoenician alphabet, and unrelated to Linear B and the Cypriot syllabary, earlier writing systems for Greek. The Phoenician alphabet is a continuation of the Proto-Canaanite alphabet, by convention taken to originate around 1050 BC Linear B is a script that was used for writing Mycenaean, an early form of Greek. The Cypriot syllabary is a syllabic script used in Iron Age Cyprus, from ca It has given rise to many other alphabets used in Europe and the Middle East, including the Latin alphabet. The Middle East is a Subcontinent with no clear boundaries often used as a synonym to Near East, in opposition to Far East. ^[2] In addition to being used for writing Modern Greek, its letters are today used as symbols in mathematics and science, particle names in physics, as names of stars, in the names of fraternities and sororities, in the naming of supernumerary tropical cyclones, and for other purposes. Modern Greek (el Νέα Ελληνικά or el Νεοελληνική lit Greek letters are used in Mathematics, Science, Engineering, and other areas where mathematical notation is used as symbols for Constants Particle physics is a branch of Physics that studies the elementary constituents of Matter and Radiation, and the interactions between them In ancient times only the Sun and Moon, a few hundred Stars and the most easily visible Planets had names Fraternities and sororities (from the Latin words la frater and la soror, meaning "brother" and "sister" respectively are fraternal Due to their long-term persistence and the need for a unique identifier in issuing forecasts and warnings Tropical cyclones and Subtropical cyclones are given names according

History

Main article: History of the Greek alphabet

The Greek alphabet emerged several centuries after the fall of the Mycenaean civilization and consequent abandonment of its Linear B script, an early Greek writing system. The History of the Greek alphabet starts with the adoption of Phoenician letter forms and continues to the present day Mycenaean Greece is a cultural period of ancient Greece taking its name from the archaeological site of Mycenae in northeastern Argolis, in the Peloponnese Linear B is a script that was used for writing Mycenaean, an early form of Greek. Greek (el ελληνική γλώσσα or simply el ελληνικά — "Hellenic" is an Indo-European language, spoken today by 15-22 million people mainly Linear B is descended from Linear A, which was developed by the Minoans, whose language was probably unrelated to Greek; consequently the Minoan syllabary did not provide an ideal medium for the transliteration of the sounds of the Greek language. Linear A is one of two linear scripts used in ancient Crete before Greek Mycenaean Linear B. The Minoan civilization was a Bronze Age civilization which arose on the island of Crete.

The Greek alphabet we recognize today arose after the Greek Dark Ages — the period between the downfall of Mycenae (ca. The Dark Ages (ca 1150 BC–800 BC refers to Greek history from the presumed Dorian invasion and end of the Mycenaean civilization in the 11th century "Lion Gate" redirects here For other uses see Lions' Gate (disambiguation. 1200 BC) and the rise of Ancient Greece, which begins with the appearance of the epics of Homer, around 800 BC, and the institution of the Ancient Olympic Games in 776 BC. The term ancient Greece refers to the period of Greek history lasting from the Greek Dark Ages ca Homer ( Ancient Greek:, Homēros) is a legendary ancient Greek epic Poet, traditionally said to be the author of the epic poems the The Ancient Olympic Games, originally referred to as simply the Olympic Games (Ολυμπιακοί Αγώνες Olympiakoi Agones) were a series of Athletic Events and trends 778 BC — Agamestor King of Athens, dies after a reign of 17 years and is succeeded by his son Aeschylus Its most notable change, as an adaptation of the Phoenician alphabet, is the introduction of vowel letters, without which Greek would be illegible. The Phoenician alphabet is a continuation of the Proto-Canaanite alphabet, by convention taken to originate around 1050 BC ^[2]

Vowel signs were originally not used in Semitic alphabets. Whereas in the earlier West Semitic family of scripts (Phoenician, Hebrew, Moabite etc. Phoenician was a language originally spoken in the coastal region then called Pūt in Ancient Egyptian Canaan in Phoenician, Hebrew, and The Moabite language is an extinct Canaanite language spoken in Moab (modern-day northwestern Jordan) in the early first millennium BC ) a letter always stood for a consonant in association with an unspecified vowel or no vowel, the Greek alphabet divided the letters into two categories, consonants ("things that sound along") and vowels, where the consonant letters always had to be accompanied by vowels to create a pronounceable unit. In Articulatory phonetics, a consonant is a Speech sound that is articulated with complete or partial closure of the upper Vocal tract, the upper vocal In Phonetics, a vowel is a Sound in spoken Language, such as English ah! or oh!, pronounced with an open Vocal tract Although the old Ugaritic alphabet did develop matres lectionis, i. The Ugaritic alphabet is a Cuneiform Abjad (alphabet without vowels used from around 1500 BCE for the Ugaritic language, an extinct In the spelling of Hebrew and some other Semitic languages, Matres lectionis ( Latin "mothers of reading" singular form mater lectionis e. , use of consonant letters to denote vowels, they were never employed systematically.

The first vowel letters were Α (alpha), Ε (epsilon), Ι (iota), Ο (omicron), and Υ (upsilon), modifications of Semitic glottal, pharyngeal, or glide consonants that were mostly superfluous in Greek: /ʔ/ ('aleph), /h/ (he), /j/ (yodh), /ʕ/ (ʿayin), and /w/ (waw), respectively. Canadian Aboriginal syllabic writing', or simply syllabics, is a family of Abugidas {dubious}} used to write a number of Aboriginal Canadian Nearly all the segmental scripts (loosely " Alphabets " but see below for more precise terminology used around the globe appear to have derived from the A letter is an element in an Alphabetic system of writing such as the Greek alphabet and its descendants Alpha (uppercase Α, lowercase α; Αλφα is the first letter of the Greek alphabet. Epsilon (uppercase Ε, lowercase ε; Έψιλον is the fifth letter of the Greek alphabet, corresponding phonetically to a Close-mid front unrounded Iota (uppercase &Iota, lowercase ι Ιώτα Yota is the ninth letter of the Greek alphabet. Omicron or Omikron (uppercase Ο, lowercase ο, literally "small o": Όμικρον o mikron, micron meaning 'small' in contrast Upsilon (uppercase &Upsilon, lowercase υ Ύψιλον is the 20th letter of the Greek alphabet. In Articulatory phonetics, a consonant is a Speech sound that is articulated with complete or partial closure of the upper Vocal tract, the upper vocal is the reconstructed name of the first letter of the Proto-Canaanite alphabet, continued in descended Semitic alphabets as Phoenician He is the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets, including Phoenician, Aramaic, Hebrew, Syriac ܗ and Arabic Yodh (also spelled Yud or Yod) is the tenth letter of many Semitic alphabets, including Phoenician, Aramaic, Hebrew For the village in Azerbaijan see Əyin. or is the sixteenth letter in many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician Waw ( also spelled vav or vau) (In Hebrew Vav) is the sixth letter of many Semitic alphabets, including Phoenician, Aramaic In eastern Greek, which lacked aspiration entirely, the letter Η (eta), from the Semitic glottal consonant /ħ/ (heth) was also used for the long vowel /εː/, and eventually the letter Ω (omega) was introduced for a long /ɔː/. Eta (uppercase &Eta, lowercase η Ήτα) is the seventh letter of the Greek alphabet. or H̱et (also spelled Khet, Kheth, Chet, Cheth, Het, or Heth) is the reconstructed name of the eighth letter In Linguistics, vowel length is the perceived duration of a Vowel sound OMEGA is the premier Counter-terrorism unit of Latvia. Founded in 1992 OMEGA cooperates with many other counter-terrorism units over the world

Greek also introduced three new consonant letters, Φ (phi), Χ (chi) and Ψ (psi), appended to the end of the alphabet as they were developed. Phi (uppercase Φ, lowercase φ or ϕ) pronounced in modern Greek and as in English is the 21st letter of the Greek alphabet Chi ( Uppercase Χ, Lowercase χ; Χι He is the 22nd letter of the Greek alphabet, pronounced as in English For other uses see Psi. Psi (uppercase Ψ, lowercase ψ) is the 23rd letter of the Greek alphabet and has a These consonants made up for the lack of comparable aspirates in Phoenician. Description Voiceless consonants are produced with the Vocal cords open and voiced consonants are produced when the vocal folds are fractionally closed In western Greek, Χ was used for /ks/ and Ψ for /kʰ/ — hence the value of the Latin letter X, derived from the western Greek alphabet. The Cumae alphabet, was a western variant of the early Greek alphabet, used between the 8th to 5th centuries BC The origin of these letters is disputed.

The letter Ϻ (san) was used at variance with Σ (sigma), and by classical times the latter won out, san disappearing from the alphabet. San (uppercase Ϻ lowercase ϻ was a letter of the Greek alphabet, appearing between Pi and Qoppa in alphabetical Sigma (upper case Σ, lower case σ; Greek Σιγμα lower case in word-final position ς) is the eighteenth letter of the Greek The letters Ϝ (wau, later called digamma) and Ϙ (qoppa) also fell into disuse. Digamma (uppercase Ϝ, lowercase ϝ) is an archaic letter of the Greek alphabet, used primarily as a Greek numeral. Qoppa or Koppa ( Ϙ) is a letter that was used in early forms of the Greek alphabet, derived from Phoenician Qoph. The former was only needed for the western dialects and the latter was never truly needed at all. These lived on in the Ionic numeral system, however, which consisted of writing a series of letters with precise numerical values. ʹ the numeral sign redirects here For the accent ´ see Acute accent. Ϡ (sampi), apparently is a rare local glyph form from Ionia, was introduced at latter times to stand for 900. Sampi (Ϡ is an obsolete letter of the Greek alphabet and has a numeric value of 900 when used as a mathematical character. A glyph is an element of writing Two or more glyphs representing the same symbol whether interchangeable or context-dependent are called Allographs the abstract unit they Thousands were written using a mark at the upper left ('A for 1000, etc).

Because Greek minuscules arose at a much later date, no historic minuscule actually exists for san. Lower case (also lower-case or lowercase) minuscule, or small letters are the smaller form of letters as opposed to upper Minuscule forms for the other letters were only used as numbers. For the number 6, modern Greeks use an old ligature called stigma (Ϛ, ϛ) instead of digamma, or ΣΤ/στ if this is not available. Stigma (uppercase Ϛ, lowercase ϛ) is a ligature of the Greek letters sigma and tau, sometimes used in modern times For 90 the modern Z-shaped qoppa forms were used: Ϟ, ϟ. (Note that some web browser/font combinations will show the other qoppa here. )

Originally there were several variants of the Greek alphabet, most importantly western (Chalcidian) and eastern (Ionic) Greek. The Cumae alphabet, was a western variant of the early Greek alphabet, used between the 8th to 5th centuries BC The former gave rise to the Old Italic alphabet and thence to the Latin alphabet, while the latter is the basis of the present Greek alphabet. Old Italic refers to several now extinct Alphabet systems used on the Italian Peninsula in ancient times for various Indo-European (predominantly Italic Athens originally used the Attic script for official documents such as laws and the works of Homer: this contained only the letters from alpha to upsilon, and used the letter eta for the sound "h" instead of the long "e". Athens (ˈæθənz Αθήνα Athina,) the Capital and largest city of Greece, dominates the Attica periphery as one of the world's In 403 BC Athens adopted the Ionic script as its standard, and shortly thereafter the other versions disappeared. Events By place Greece Thrasybulus leads the democratic resistance to the new oligarchic government known as the Thirty

By then Greek was written left to right, but originally it had been written right to left (with asymmetrical characters flipped), and in-between written either way — or, most likely, in the so-called boustrophedon style, where successive lines alternate direction. Boustrophedon (ˌbustroʊˈfiːdən from Greek βουστροφηδόν "ox-turning"&mdashthat is turning like Oxen in Ploughing

Early Greek alphabet on pottery in the National Archaeological Museum of Athens

In the Hellenistic period, Aristophanes of Byzantium introduced the process of accenting Greek letters for easier pronunciation. The National Archaeological Museum of Athens (Εθνικό Αρχαιολογικό Μουσείο in Athens houses some of the most important artifacts from a variety This article focuses on the cultural aspects of the Hellenistic age for the historical aspects see Hellenistic period. Aristophanes ( Greek: Ἀριστοφάνης of Byzantium (c A diacritic ( also called a diacritic or diacritical mark, point, or sign, is a small sign added to a letter to alter pronunciation During the Middle Ages, the Greek scripts underwent changes paralleling those of the Latin alphabet: while the old forms were retained as a monumental script, uncial and eventually minuscule hands came to dominate. Uncial is a Majuscule script commonly used from the 3rd to 8th centuries AD by Latin and Greek Scribes From the 8th century to the The letter σ is even written ς at the ends of words, paralleling the use of the Latin long and short s. The long, medial or descending s ( ſ) is a form of the minuscule letter ' S ' formerly used where 's' occurred in the middle

Letter names

Each of the Phoenician letter names was a word that began with the sound represented by that letter; thus 'aleph, the word for “ox”, was adopted for the glottal stop /ʔ/, bet, or “house”, for the /b/ sound, and so on. is the reconstructed name of the first letter of the Proto-Canaanite alphabet, continued in descended Semitic alphabets as Phoenician Bet, Beth, or Vet is the second letter of many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician When the letters were adopted by the Greeks, most of the Phoenician names were maintained or modified slightly to fit Greek phonology; thus, 'aleph, bet, gimel became alpha, beta, gamma. These borrowed names had no meaning in Greek except as labels for the letters. However, a few signs that were added or modified later by the Greeks do in fact have names with a meaning. For example, o mikron and o mega mean “small o” and “big o”. Similarly, e psilon and u psilon mean “plain e” and “plain u”, respectively.

Main letters

Below is a table listing the modern Greek letters, as well as their forms when romanized. In Linguistics, romanization (or latinization, also spelled romanisation or latinisation) is the representation of a Word or The table also provides the equivalent Phoenician letter from which each Greek letter is derived. The Phoenician alphabet is a continuation of the Proto-Canaanite alphabet, by convention taken to originate around 1050 BC Pronunciations transcribed using the International Phonetic Alphabet. The International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA is a system of phonetic notation based on the Latin alphabet, devised by the International Phonetic

Also note that the classical pronunciation given below is the reconstructed pronunciation of Attic in the late 5th and early 4th century (BC). Some of the letters had different pronunciations in pre-classical times or in non-Attic dialects. For details, see History of the Greek alphabet and Ancient Greek phonology. The History of the Greek alphabet starts with the adoption of Phoenician letter forms and continues to the present day Ancient Greek phonology is the study of the Phonology, or Pronunciation, of Ancient Greek. For details on post-classical Ancient Greek pronunciation, see Koine Greek phonology. Koine Greek is phonologically a transition period at the start of the period the language was generally virtually identical to Classical Ancient Greek, whereas in

Letter	Corresponding Phoenician letter	Name				Transliteration1		Pronunciation		Numeric value
		English	Ancient Greek	Medieval Greek (polytonic)	Modern Greek (info)	Ancient Greek	Modern Greek	Classical Ancient Greek	Modern Greek
Α α	Aleph	Alpha	ἄλφα		άλφα	a		[a] [aː]	[a]	1
Β β	Beth	Beta	βῆτα		βήτα	b	v	[b]	[v]	2
Γ γ	Gimel	Gamma	γάμμα		γάμμα γάμα	g	gh, g, y	[g]	[ɣ], [ʝ]	3
Δ δ	Daleth	Delta	δέλτα		δέλτα	d	d, dh	[d]	[ð]	4
Ε ε	He	Epsilon	εἶ	ἒ ψιλόν	έψιλον	e		[e]		5
Ζ ζ	Zayin	Zeta	ζήτα		ζήτα	z		[zd] (or [dz]) later [zː]	[z]	7
Η η	Heth	Eta	ἦτα		ήτα	e, ē	i	[ɛː]	[i]	8
Θ θ	Teth	Theta	θῆτα		θήτα	th		[tʰ]	[θ]	9
Ι ι	Yodh	Iota	ἰῶτα		ιώτα γιώτα	i		[i] [iː]	[i], [ʝ]	10
Κ κ	Kaph	Kappa	κάππα		κάππα κάπα	k		[k]	[k], [c]	20
Λ λ	Lamedh	Lambda	λάβδα	λάμβδα	λάμδα λάμβδα	l		[l]		30
Μ μ	Mem	Mu	μῦ		μι μυ	m		[m]		40
Ν ν	Nun	Nu	νῦ		νι νυ	n		[n]		50
Ξ ξ	Samekh	Xi	ξεῖ	ξῖ	ξι	x	x, ks	[ks]		60
Ο ο	'Ayin	Omicron	οὖ	ὂ μικρόν	όμικρον	o		[o]		70
Π π	Pe	Pi	πεῖ	πῖ	πι	p		[p]		80
Ρ ρ	Resh	Rho	ῥῶ		ρω	r (ῥ: rh)	r	[r], [r̥]	[r]	100
Σ σ ς	Sin	Sigma	σῖγμα		σίγμα	s		[s]		200
Τ τ	Taw	Tau	ταῦ		ταυ	t		[t]		300
Υ υ	Waw	Upsilon	ὗ	ὓ ψιλόν	ύψιλον	u, y	y, v, f	[y] [yː] (earlier [ʉ] [ʉː])	[i]	400
Φ φ	origin disputed (see text)	Phi	φεῖ	φῖ	φι	ph	f	[pʰ]	[f]	500
Χ χ		Chi	χεῖ	χῖ	χι	ch	ch, kh	[kʰ]	[x], [ç]	600
Ψ ψ		Psi	ψεῖ	ψῖ	ψι	ps		[ps]		700
Ω ω	'Ayin	Omega	ὦ	ὦ μέγα	ωμέγα	o, ō	o	[ɔː]	[o]	800

1. For details and different transliteration systems see Romanization of Greek. The Phoenician alphabet is a continuation of the Proto-Canaanite alphabet, by convention taken to originate around 1050 BC There are several methods for the romanization of Greek, especially depending whether the language written with Greek letters is Ancient Greek or Modern Greek and ʹ the numeral sign redirects here For the accent ´ see Acute accent. is the reconstructed name of the first letter of the Proto-Canaanite alphabet, continued in descended Semitic alphabets as Phoenician Alpha (uppercase Α, lowercase α; Αλφα is the first letter of the Greek alphabet. Bet, Beth, or Vet is the second letter of many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician Beta (uppercase Β, lowercase β, internal ϐ; Βήτα Vita is the second letter of the Greek alphabet. Gimmel redirects here for the musical group see Gimmel (music group. Gamma (uppercase &Gamma, lowercase γ Γάμμα is the third letter of the Greek alphabet. Dalet ( also spelled Daleth or Daled) is the fourth letter of many Semitic alphabets including Phoenician, Aramaic Delta (uppercase Δ, lowercase δ; Δέλτα Thelta is the fourth letter of the Greek alphabet. He is the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets, including Phoenician, Aramaic, Hebrew, Syriac ܗ and Arabic Epsilon (uppercase Ε, lowercase ε; Έψιλον is the fifth letter of the Greek alphabet, corresponding phonetically to a Close-mid front unrounded Zayin (also spelled Zain or Zayn) is the seventh letter of many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician 𐤆 Aramaic, Hebrew See also Principality of Zeta Zeta (uppercase Ζ, lowercase ζ; Ζήτα Zita is the sixth letter of the Greek alphabet. See also Principality of Zeta Zeta (uppercase Ζ, lowercase ζ; Ζήτα Zita is the sixth letter of the Greek alphabet. or H̱et (also spelled Khet, Kheth, Chet, Cheth, Het, or Heth) is the reconstructed name of the eighth letter Eta (uppercase &Eta, lowercase η Ήτα) is the seventh letter of the Greek alphabet. (also Teth, Tet) is the ninth letter of many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician, Aramaic, Hebrew Tet, Theta (uppercase Θ, lowercase θ or ϑ; Θήτα is the eighth letter of the Greek alphabet, derived from the Phoenician letter Teth Yodh (also spelled Yud or Yod) is the tenth letter of many Semitic alphabets, including Phoenician, Aramaic, Hebrew Iota (uppercase &Iota, lowercase ι Ιώτα Yota is the ninth letter of the Greek alphabet. Kaph (also spelled Kap or Kaf) is the eleventh letter of many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician, Aramaic, Hebrew Kappa (uppercase &Kappa, lowercase &kappa or ϰ; Κάππα is the 10th letter of the Greek alphabet, used to represent the Voiceless Lamed or Lamedh is the twelfth letter in many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician, Aramaic, Hebrew Lamed and Arabic Lambda (uppercase Λ, lowercase λ; Λάμβδα or el Λάμδα Lamda is the 11th letter of the Greek alphabet. Mem (also spelled Meem or Mim) is the thirteenth letter of many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician, Aramaic, Hebrew Mu (uppercase Μ, lowercase μ; Μι or el Μυ) is the 12th letter of the Greek alphabet. Nun is the fourteenth letter of many Semitic Abjads including Phoenician, Aramaic, Hebrew and Arabic alphabet ar ن (in Nu (uppercase Ν, lowercase ν; Νι Ni is the 13th letter of the Greek alphabet. Samekh or Simketh is the fifteenth letter in many Semitic alphabets including Phoenician, Hebrew, and Aramaic, representing /s/ Xi (uppercase Ξ, lowercase ξ) is the 14th letter of the Greek alphabet. For the village in Azerbaijan see Əyin. or is the sixteenth letter in many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician Omicron or Omikron (uppercase Ο, lowercase ο, literally "small o": Όμικρον o mikron, micron meaning 'small' in contrast Pe is the seventeenth letter in many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician, Aramaic, Hebrew Pei, Persian alphabet Pe pr Pi (uppercase &Pi, lower case &pi) is the sixteenth letter of the Greek alphabet. for the town in Nepal see Resh Nepal Resh is the twentieth letter of many Semitic alphabets, including Phoenician Rho (uppercase Ρ, lowercase ρ or ϱ) is the 17th letter of the Greek alphabet. Shin (also spelled Šin or Sheen) is the twenty-first letter in many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician, Aramaic, Hebrew Sigma (upper case Σ, lower case σ; Greek Σιγμα lower case in word-final position ς) is the eighteenth letter of the Greek Taw or Tav is the twenty-second and last letter in many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician, Aramaic, Hebrew Tav Tau (uppercase Τ, lowercase τ; Ταυ) is the 19th letter of the Greek alphabet. Waw ( also spelled vav or vau) (In Hebrew Vav) is the sixth letter of many Semitic alphabets, including Phoenician, Aramaic Upsilon (uppercase &Upsilon, lowercase υ Ύψιλον is the 20th letter of the Greek alphabet. Phi (uppercase Φ, lowercase φ or ϕ) pronounced in modern Greek and as in English is the 21st letter of the Greek alphabet Chi ( Uppercase Χ, Lowercase χ; Χι He is the 22nd letter of the Greek alphabet, pronounced as in English For other uses see Psi. Psi (uppercase Ψ, lowercase ψ) is the 23rd letter of the Greek alphabet and has a For the village in Azerbaijan see Əyin. or is the sixteenth letter in many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician OMEGA is the premier Counter-terrorism unit of Latvia. Founded in 1992 OMEGA cooperates with many other counter-terrorism units over the world There are several methods for the romanization of Greek, especially depending whether the language written with Greek letters is Ancient Greek or Modern Greek and

Variant forms

Some letters can occur in variant shapes, mostly inherited from medieval minuscule handwriting. The History of the Greek alphabet starts with the adoption of Phoenician letter forms and continues to the present day 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. In Computing, Unicode is an Industry standard allowing Computers to consistently represent and manipulate text expressed in most of the world's

• The symbol ϐ ("curled beta") is a cursive variant form of beta (β). BETA is a pure Object-oriented language originating within the "Scandinavian School" in object-orientation where the first object-oriented language Simula
• The letter epsilon can occur in two equally frequent stylistic variants, either shaped ('lunate epsilon', like a semicircle with a stroke) or (similar to a reversed number 3). Epsilon (uppercase Ε, lowercase ε; Έψιλον is the fifth letter of the Greek alphabet, corresponding phonetically to a Close-mid front unrounded The symbol ϵ (U+03F5) is designated specifically for the lunate form, used as a technical symbol.
• The symbol ϑ ("script theta") is a cursive form of theta (θ), frequent in handwriting, and used with a specialised meaning as a technical symbol. Theta (uppercase Θ, lowercase θ or ϑ; Θήτα is the eighth letter of the Greek alphabet, derived from the Phoenician letter Teth
• The symbol ϰ ("kappa symbol") is a cursive form of kappa (κ), used as a technical symbol. Kappa (uppercase &Kappa, lowercase &kappa or ϰ; Κάππα is the 10th letter of the Greek alphabet, used to represent the Voiceless
• The symbol ϖ ("omega-shaped pi") is an archaic script form of pi (π), also used as a technical symbol. IMPORTANT NOTICE Please note that Wikipedia is not a database to store the millions of digits of π please refrain from adding those to Wikipedia as it could cause technical problems
• The letter rho (ρ) can occur in different stylistic variants, with the descending tail either going straight down or curled to the right. The symbol ϱ (U+03F1) is designated specifically for the curled form, used as a technical symbol.
• The letter sigma, in standard orthography, has two variants: ς, used only at the ends of words, and σ, used elsewhere. Sigma (upper case Σ, lower case σ; Greek Σιγμα lower case in word-final position ς) is the eighteenth letter of the Greek The form ϲ ("lunate sigma", resembling a Latin c) is a medieval stylistic variant that can be used in both environments without the final/non-final distinction. C is the third letter in the Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled cee or occasionally ce (siː
• The capital letter upsilon (Υ) can occur in different stylistic variants, with the upper strokes either straight like a Latin Y, or slightly curled. Upsilon (uppercase &Upsilon, lowercase υ Ύψιλον is the 20th letter of the Greek alphabet. The symbol ϒ (U+03D2) is designated specifically for the curled form, used as a technical symbol.
• The letter Phi can occur in two equally frequent stylistic variants, either shaped as (a circle with a vertical stroke through it) or as (a curled shape open at the top). Phi (uppercase Φ, lowercase φ or ϕ) pronounced in modern Greek and as in English is the 21st letter of the Greek alphabet The symbol ϕ (U+03D5) is designated specifically for the closed form, used as a technical symbol. ^[3]

Obsolete letters

The following letters are not part of the standard Greek alphabet, but were in use in pre-classical times in certain dialects. The letters digamma, san, qoppa, and sampi were also used in Greek numerals. ʹ the numeral sign redirects here For the accent ´ see Acute accent.

Letter	Corresponding Phoenician letter	Name			Transliteration	Pronunciation	Numeric value
		English	Early Greek	Later Greek (polytonic)
Ϝ ϝ Ͷ ͷ (alternate)	Waw	Digamma	ϝαῦ	δίγαμμα	w	[w]	6
Ϻ ϻ	Tsade (position) Sin (name)	San	ϻάν	σάν	s	[s]	90
Ϟ ϟ Ϙ ϙ (alternate)	Qoph	Qoppa	ϙόππα	κόππα	q	[q]	90
Ͳ ͳ Ϡ ϡ (alternate)	Origin disputed, possibly Tsade	Sampi	δίσιγμα	σαμπῖ	ss	probably affricate, but exact value debated; [sː], [ks], [ts] are proposed	900

• Digamma disappeared from the alphabet because the sound it notated, the voiced labial-velar approximant [w], had disappeared from the Ionic dialect and most of the others. The Phoenician alphabet is a continuation of the Proto-Canaanite alphabet, by convention taken to originate around 1050 BC There are several methods for the romanization of Greek, especially depending whether the language written with Greek letters is Ancient Greek or Modern Greek and ʹ the numeral sign redirects here For the accent ´ see Acute accent. Waw ( also spelled vav or vau) (In Hebrew Vav) is the sixth letter of many Semitic alphabets, including Phoenician, Aramaic Digamma (uppercase Ϝ, lowercase ϝ) is an archaic letter of the Greek alphabet, used primarily as a Greek numeral. Tsade (also spelled Ṣādē or Tzadi or Sadhe or Tzaddik) is the eighteenth letter in many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician Shin (also spelled Šin or Sheen) is the twenty-first letter in many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician, Aramaic, Hebrew San (uppercase Ϻ lowercase ϻ was a letter of the Greek alphabet, appearing between Pi and Qoppa in alphabetical Qoph or Qop (In modern Hebrew Kuf, Arabic Qāf) is the nineteenth letter in many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician, Aramaic Qoppa or Koppa ( Ϙ) is a letter that was used in early forms of the Greek alphabet, derived from Phoenician Qoph. Tsade (also spelled Ṣādē or Tzadi or Sadhe or Tzaddik) is the eighteenth letter in many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician Sampi (Ϡ is an obsolete letter of the Greek alphabet and has a numeric value of 900 when used as a mathematical character. The voiced labiovelar (actually labialized velar) approximant is a type of Consonantal sound used in certain spoken Languages including Ionic Greek was a sub-dialect of the Attic-Ionic dialectal group of Ancient Greek (see Greek dialects) It remained in use as a numeric sign denoting the number six. In this function, it was later conflated in medieval Greek handwriting with the ligature sign stigma (ϛ), which had a similar shape in its lower case form.
• Sampi (also called disigma) notated a geminated affricate that later evolved to -σσ- (probably [sː]) in most dialects, and -ττ- (probably [tː]) in Attic. In Phonetics, gemination happens when a spoken Consonant is pronounced for an audibly longer period of time than a short Consonant. Affricate Consonants begin as stops (most often an alveolar, such as or) but release as a fricative (such as or or occasionally into Attic Greek is the Prestige dialect of Ancient Greece that was spoken in Attica, which includes Athens. Its exact value is heavily discussed, but [ts] is often proposed. Its modern name is derived from its shape: (ω)σαν πι = like (the letter) pi. ^[4]

The order of the letters up to Τ follows that in the Phoenician or Hebrew alphabet.

Diacritics

Main article: Greek diacritics

In the polytonic orthography traditionally used for ancient Greek, vowels can carry diacritics, namely accents and breathings. A diacritic ( also called a diacritic or diacritical mark, point, or sign, is a small sign added to a letter to alter pronunciation The accents are the acute accent (´), the grave accent (`), and the circumflex accent (῀). History An early precursor of the acute accent was the apex, used in Latin inscriptions to mark long vowels. Pitch The grave accent was first used in the polytonic orthography of Ancient Greek, where it occurred only on the last syllable of a word in cases where the Pitch The circumflex accent was first used in the polytonic orthography of Ancient Greek, where it occurred (subject to certain rules on the accented syllable In Ancient Greek, these accents marked different forms of the pitch accent on a vowel. Pitch accent is a linguistic term of convenience for a variety of restricted tone systems that use variations in pitch to give prominence to a Syllable By the end of the Roman period, pitch accent had evolved into a stress accent, and in later Greek all of these accents marked the stressed vowel. In Linguistics, stress is the relative emphasis that may be given to certain Syllables in a word The breathings are the rough breathing (῾), marking an /h/ sound at the beginning of a word, and the smooth breathing (᾽), marking the absence of an /h/ sound at the beginning of a word. The spiritus asper ( Latin for "rough breathing" δασὺ πνεῦμα dasỳ pneûma or daseîa) is a diacritical mark used in The letter rho (ρ), although not a vowel, always carries a rough breathing when it begins a word. Another diacritic used in Greek is the diaeresis, indicating a hiatus. Diaeresis or trema See also Diaeresis History Historically the diaeresis mark or trema is far older than the umlaut mark Hiatus (Latin "yawning" (haɪˈeɪtəs in Linguistics is the separate pronunciation of two adjacent Vowels sometimes with an intervening Glottal stop

In 1982, the old spelling system, known as polytonic, was simplified to become the monotonic system, which is now official in Greece. The accents have been reduced to one, the tonos, and the breathings were abolished.

Ligatures

Main article: Greek ligatures

Scribes made use of a number of ligatures to save space and time, in Greek as in other languages. See also History of the Greek alphabet Greek ligatures are graphic combinations of the letters of the Greek alphabet that were used in medieval handwritten A scribe (or scrivener) is a person who writes books or documents by hand as a profession Early Greek typefaces such as Claude Garamond's Les Grecs du Roi included a large number of ligatures, but modern typography uses none of them, except occasionally the Ȣ ligature for ου — resembling a V above an O; some modern alphabets based on the Latin alphabet use this as a letter, Ou. Claude Garamond (c1480–1561 was a Parisian Publisher. He was one of the leading Type designers of his time and several contemporary Typefaces In printed 17th-century English works, there sometimes occurs a ligature of Ο with ς (a small sigma inside a capital omicron) for a terminal ος. Other ligatures include ϗ for καί, (equivalent to an ampersand) and stigma Ϛ for στ, also used as noted above to replace digamma as a numeral. The kai symbol ( Greek: uppercase Ϗ, lowercase ϗ; Coptic: ⳤ) formed from Kappa (κ with an extra lower stroke Και ("and" is a conjunction in Greek (sometimes abbreviated k) Coptic and under the form kaj Esperanto. An ampersand ( &) also commonly called an " 'and' sign," is a Logogram representing the conjunction "and" Stigma (uppercase Ϛ, lowercase ϛ) is a ligature of the Greek letters sigma and tau, sometimes used in modern times

Digraphs and diphthongs

Further information: Greek orthography

A digraph is a pair of letters used to write one sound or a combination of sounds that does not correspond to the written letters in sequence. The Orthography of the Greek language ultimately has its roots in the adoption of the Greek alphabet in the 9th century BC. A digraph, bigraph, or digram is a pair of characters used to write one Phoneme (distinct sound or a sequence of phonemes that does not correspond The orthography of Greek includes several digraphs, including various pairs of vowel letters that used to be pronounced as diphthongs but have been shortened to monophthongs in pronunciation. In Phonetics, a diphthong (also gliding vowel) (from Greek grc δίφθογγος "diphthongos" literally "with two sounds" or "with A monophthong ( Greek μονόφθογγος "monophthongos" = single note) is a "pure" Vowel sound one whose articulation at Many of these are characteristic developments of modern Greek, but some were already present in Classical Greek. None of them is regarded as a letter of the alphabet.

During the Byzantine period, it became customary to write the silent iota in digraphs as an iota subscript (ᾳ, ῃ, ῳ). Medieval Greek (Μεσαιωνική Ελληνική is a linguistic term that describes the fourth period in the history of the Greek language. In an alphabetic writing system, a silent letter is a letter that in a particular word does not correspond to any sound in the word's Pronunciation. Iota subscript ( Ancient Greek:) in Greek Polytonic orthography is a way of writing the letter Iota as a small vertical stroke beneath a vowel

Use of the Greek alphabet for other languages

The primary use of the Greek alphabet has always been to write the Greek language. However, at various times and in various places, it has also been used to write other languages. ^[5]

Early examples

• Most of the alphabets of Asia Minor, in use c. Various Alphabetic writing systems were in use in Iron Age Anatolia to record Anatolian dialects and the Phrygian language. 800-300 BC to write languages like Lydian and Phrygian, were the early Greek alphabet with only slight modifications — as were the original Old Italic alphabets. Lydian was an Indo-European language spoken in the region of Lydia in western Anatolia (present-day Turkey) The Phrygian language was the Indo-European language of the Phrygians a people from Thrace who later migrated to Asia Minor. Old Italic refers to several now extinct Alphabet systems used on the Italian Peninsula in ancient times for various Indo-European (predominantly Italic
• Some Paleo-Balkan languages, including Thracian. The Paleo-Balkan languages were the Indo-European languages that were spoken in the Balkans in Ancient times. The Thracian language was the Indo-European language spoken in ancient times by the Thracians in South-Eastern Europe For other neighboring languages or dialects, such as Ancient Macedonian, isolated words are preserved in Greek texts, but no continuous texts are preserved. For the unrelated modern Slavic language see Macedonian language.
• Some Narbonese Gaulish inscriptions in southern France use the Greek alphabet (c. Gaulish or Gallic is the name given to the Celtic language that was spoken in Gaul before the Vulgar Latin of the late Roman Empire became 300 BC).
• The Hebrew text of the Bible was written in Greek letters in Origen's Hexapla. Etymology According to the Online Etymology Dictionary, the word bible is from Latin biblia, traced from the same word through Medieval Latin and Late Latin Origen ( Greek: Ōrigénēs, or Origen Adamantius, ca 185–ca Hexapla (Ἑξαπλά Gr for "sixfold" is the term for an edition of the Bible in six versions
• An 8th century Arabic fragment preserves a text in the Greek alphabet. Arabic (ar الْعَرَبيّة (informally ar عَرَبيْ) in terms of the number of speakers is the largest living member of the Semitic language
• An Old Ossetic inscription of the 10-12c CE found in Arxyz, the oldest known attestation of an Ossetic language. Ossetic or Ossetian (Ирон ӕвзаг Iron ævzag or Иронау Ironau) also sometimes called Ossete, is an Iranian Arkhyz ( Russian: Архыз is a mountainous region in the vicinity of the eponymous Aul sitting at an altitude of 1450 meters in the valley of the Bolshoi

With additional letters

Several alphabets consist of the Greek alphabet supplemented with a few additional letters:

• The Bactrian alphabet adds the letter Sho and was used to write the Bactrian language under the Kushan Empire (AD 65-250). Sho (Ϸ was a letter added to the Greek alphabet in order to write the Bactrian language. The Bactrian language is an extinct Eastern Iranian language which was spoken in the Central Asian region of Bactria. The Kushan Empire (c 1st &ndash 3rd centuries) was a Bactrian state that at its cultural zenith Circa 105 &ndash 250 ^[6]
• The Coptic alphabet adds eight letters derived from Demotic. The Coptic alphabet is the script used for writing the Coptic language. Demotic (from δημοτικός dēmotikós, "popular" refers to either the Ancient Egyptian script derived from northern forms of Hieratic It is still used today, mostly in Egypt, to write the Coptic language. Coptic or Coptic Egyptian ( MetRemenkīmi) is the final stage of the Egyptian language, a northern Afro-Asiatic language spoken in Egypt Letters usually retain an uncial form different from the forms used for Greek today (compare with the forms of the Latin letters used in Gaelic script). Uncial is a Majuscule script commonly used from the 3rd to 8th centuries AD by Latin and Greek Scribes From the 8th century to the The term Gaelic script, a translation of the Irish phrase cló Gaelach ( pronounced /kɫ̪oː ˈgeːɫ̪əx/ refers to a family of insular
• The Old Nubian language of Makuria (modern Sudan) adds three Coptic letters, two letters derived from Meroitic script, and a digraph of two Greek gammas used for ng. Old Nubian is an ancient variety of the Nubian languages, spoken until about the 15th century AD Makuria (مقرة al-Mukurra or al-Muqurra) was a kingdom located in what is today Northern Sudan and Southern Egypt. The Meroitic script is an Alphabetic script originally derived from Egyptian hieroglyphs used to write the Meroitic language of the Kingdom of Meroë /

In more modern times

• Coptic (see above).
• Turkish spoken by Orthodox Christians (Karamanlides) was often written in Greek script, and called Karamanlidika. Turkish ( tr Türkçe IPA) is a language spoken by over 63 million people worldwide making it the most commonly spoken of the Turkic languages. The Eastern Orthodox Church is the second largest single Christian Communion in the world The Karamanlides ( Greek: Καραμανλήδες; Turkish: Karamanlılar) or simply Karamanlis, are a Greek Orthodox The Karamanlides ( Greek: Καραμανλήδες; Turkish: Karamanlılar) or simply Karamanlis, are a Greek Orthodox
• Tosk Albanian was often written using the Greek alphabet, starting in about 1500 (Elsie, 1991). Tosk is the southern dialect of the Albanian language. The line of demarcation between Tosk and Gheg (the northern dialect is the Shkumbin River. Albanian (sq ''Gjuha shqipe'' ˈɟuha ˈʃcipɛ is an Indo-European language spoken by nearly 6 million peoplewhile others claim that it derives from Daco - The printing press at Moschopolis published several Albanian texts in Greek script during the 18th century. History Although located in a rather isolated place in the mountains of southern Albania the city rose to become the most important center of the Aromanians It was only in 1908 that the Monastir conference standardized a Latin orthography for both Tosk and Gheg. Bitola (Битола; known also by several alternative names) is a city in the southwestern part of the Republic of Macedonia. The modern Albanian alphabet is based on the Latin alphabet, and consists of 36 letters History The modern Latin-based Albanian Gheg (or Geg) is one of the two major dialects of the Albanian language. The Greek-based Arvanitic alphabet is now only used in Greece. The Arvanitic alphabet uses the Greek script to write the Arvanitic language, similar to other older Albanian alphabets which also used the Greek script
• Various South Slavic dialects, similar to the modern Bulgarian language and Macedonian language languages, have been written in Greek script. South Slavic languages comprise one of the three geographical groups of Slavic languages (besides West and East Slavic) The modern South Slavic languages now use modified Cyrillic alphabets. The Cyrillic alphabet (səˈrɪlɪk also called azbuka, from the old name of the first two letters is actually a family of Alphabets, subsets of which are used by ^[7]
• Aromanian (Vlach) has been written in Greek characters. Aromanian ( limba armãneascã, armãneshce or armãneashti) also known as Macedo-Romanian, Arumanian or Vlach in most There is not yet a standardized orthography for Aromanian, but it appears that one based on the Romanian orthography will be adopted. Romanian or Daco-Romanian ( dated: Rumanian or Roumanian; self designation limba română, ˈlimba roˈmɨnə is a Romance
• Gagauz, a Turkic language of the northeast Balkans. The Gagauz language ( Gagauz dili) is a Turkic language, spoken by the Gagauz people, and the official language of Gagauzia, Republic The Turkic languages constitute a Language family of some thirty languages spoken by Turkic peoples across a vast area from Eastern Europe and the
• Surguch, a Turkic language spoken by a small group of Orthodox Christians in northern Greece. The Turkic languages constitute a Language family of some thirty languages spoken by Turkic peoples across a vast area from Eastern Europe and the The Eastern Orthodox Church is the second largest single Christian Communion in the world
• Urum or Greek Tatar. Urum is a Turkic language spoken by several thousand people who inhabit a few villages in the Southeastern Ukraine and in Diaspora communities world

Derived alphabets

The Greek alphabet gave rise to various others:^[2]

• The Latin alphabet, an offshoot of the archaic western form of the Greek alphabet;
• The Gothic alphabet, devised in Late Antiquity to write the Gothic language;
• The Glagolitic alphabet, devised in the Middle Ages for writing Slavic languages;
• The Cyrillic alphabet, which replaced the Glagolitic alphabet shortly afterwards;

It is also considered a possible ancestor of the Armenian alphabet, and had an influence on the development of the Georgian alphabet. The Cumae alphabet, was a western variant of the early Greek alphabet, used between the 8th to 5th centuries BC This article is about the 4th century alphabet of the Gothic bible Late Antiquity (c 300-600 is a Periodization used by historians to describe the transitional centuries from Classical Antiquity to the Middle Ages, in Gothic is an extinct Germanic language that was spoken by the Goths. The Glagolitic alphabet or Glagolitsa is the oldest known Slavic Alphabet. The Slavic languages (also called Slavonic languages) a group of closely related Languages of the Slavic peoples and a subgroup of Indo-European languages The Cyrillic alphabet (səˈrɪlɪk also called azbuka, from the old name of the first two letters is actually a family of Alphabets, subsets of which are used by The Armenian alphabet is an Alphabet that has been used to write the Armenian language since the year 405 or 406. The Georgian alphabet (ქართული დამწერლობა is the writing system currently used to write the Georgian language and other South Caucasian

Greek encodings

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, also known as Greek, is an 8-bit Character encoding, part of the ISO 8859 standard In Computing, Unicode is an Industry standard allowing Computers to consistently represent and manipulate text expressed in most of the world's ISO 8859-7 supports only the monotonic orthography; Unicode supports the polytonic orthography.

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. Epigraphy (ἐπιγραφολογία from Greek ἐπιγραφή — "inscription" is the study of inscriptions or epigraphs engraved With the use of combining characters, Unicode also supports Greek philology and dialectology and various other specialized requirements. In Digital typography, combining characters are characters that are intended to modify other characters See Comparative linguistics for the narrower field of "comparative philology" Dialectology (from Greek grc διάλεκτος dialektos, "talk dialect" and grc -λογία -logia) is a sub-field of Historical However, most current text rendering engines do not support combining characters well, so, though alpha with macron and acute can be represented as U+03B1 U+0304 U+0301, this rarely renders well: ᾱ́. A macron, from Greek el μακρόv ( makrón) meaning "long" is a Diacritic ¯ placed over or under a Vowel which was originally History An early precursor of the acute accent was the apex, used in Latin inscriptions to mark long vowels. ^[8]

There are 2 main blocks of Greek characters in Unicode. In Computing, Unicode is an Industry standard allowing Computers to consistently represent and manipulate text expressed in most of the world's 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. ISO 8859-7, also known as Greek, is an 8-bit Character encoding, part of the ISO 8859 standard There are also some archaic letters and Greek-based technical symbols.

This block also supports the Coptic alphabet. The Coptic alphabet is the script used for writing the Coptic language. 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.

To write polytonic Greek, one may use combining diacritical marks or the precomposed characters in the "Greek Extended" block (U+1F00 to U+1FFF). In Digital typography, combining characters are characters that are intended to modify other characters

Greek and Coptic

Greek Extended (precomposed polytonic Greek)

Combining and letter-free diacritics

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

See also

• Ancient Greek phonology
• Arvanitic alphabet
• Attic numerals, a system of acrophonic representing numbers using letters of the Greek alphabet
• Cumae alphabet
• English pronunciation of Greek letters
• Greek Font Society
• Greek letters used in mathematics, science, and engineering
• Greeklish
• Greek numerals, a system of sequential representing numbers using letters of the Greek alphabet
• List of Greek words with English derivatives
• List of XML and HTML character entity references
• Phoenician alphabet
• Romanization of Greek
• Category:Hellenic scripts

Bibliography

• Graves, Robert (1955—Cmb/Rep edition 1993). Ancient Greek phonology is the study of the Phonology, or Pronunciation, of Ancient Greek. The Arvanitic alphabet uses the Greek script to write the Arvanitic language, similar to other older Albanian alphabets which also used the Greek script Attic numerals were used by the ancient Greeks, possibly from the 7th century BC The Cumae alphabet, was a western variant of the early Greek alphabet, used between the 8th to 5th centuries BC This table gives the common English pronunciation of Greek letters using the International Phonetic Alphabet (see Helppronunciation. The Greek Font Society (Εταιρεία Ελληνικών Τυπογραφικών Στοιχείων is a non-profit organization in Greece, founded in 1992, devoted Greek letters are used in Mathematics, Science, Engineering, and other areas where mathematical notation is used as symbols for Constants Greeklish, a Portmanteau of the words Greek and English, also known as Grenglish, Latinoellinika / Λατινοελληνικά ʹ the numeral sign redirects here For the accent ´ see Acute accent. This is a list of Greek words with derivatives in English (and other modern languages In SGML, HTML and XML documents the logical constructs known as character data and attribute values consist of sequences of characters The Phoenician alphabet is a continuation of the Proto-Canaanite alphabet, by convention taken to originate around 1050 BC There are several methods for the romanization of Greek, especially depending whether the language written with Greek letters is Ancient Greek or Modern Greek and The Greek Myths. Penguin (Non-Classics). ISBN 0-14-017199-1.  
• Elsie, Robert (1991). "Albanian Literature in Greek Script: the Eighteenth and Early Nineteenth-Century Orthodox Tradition in Albanian Writing" (PDF 0. 0 bytes). Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies 15 (20).  
• Humez, Alexander; Nicholas Humez (1981). Alpha to omega: the life & times of the Greek alphabet. Godine. ISBN 0-87923-377-X.   — A popular history, more about Greek roots in English than about the alphabet itself.
• Jeffery, Lilian Hamilton (1961). The local scripts of archaic Greece: a study of the origin of the Greek alphabet and its development from the eighth to the fifth centuries B. C. . Oxford. ISBN 0-19-814061-4.  
• Macrakis, Michael S. (ed. ) (1996). Greek letters: from tablets to pixels: proceedings of a conference sponsored by the Greek Font Society. Oak Knoll. ISBN 1-884718-27-2.   — Includes papers on history, typography, and character coding by Hermann Zapf, Matthew Carter, Nicolas Barker, John A. Hermann Zapf (born November 8, 1918) is a German Typeface designer who lives in Darmstadt, Germany Matthew Carter (born in London England in 1937 is a typeface designer. Lane, Kyle McCarter, Jerôme Peignot, Pierre MacKay, Silvio Levy, et al.
• Hansen and Quinn (1992 - especially noted for an excellent discussion on traditional accents and breathings, as well as verbal formation). Greek - An Intensive Course, Second Revised Edition. Fordham University Press.  
• Powell, Barry B. (1991). Homer and the Origin of the Greek Alphabet.   — discusses dating, early inscriptions, and ties to origin of texts of Homer. ISBN:052158907X
• Macrakis, Stavros M. (1996). Character codes for Greek: Problems and modern solutions.   — Includes discussion of the Greek alphabet used for languages other than Greek.
• C. J. Ruijgh (1998) Sur la date de la création de l’alphabet grec. Mnemosyne, 51, 658–687

Notes

External links

• Unicode 5.1 Greek range
• Examples of Greek handwriting
• Greek Unicode Issues
• Unicode FAQ - Greek Language and Script
• Unicode 5.1 alphabetic test for Greek Unicode range
• Unicode 5.1 numeric test for Greek Unicode range
• Unicode 5.1 test for all Greek-related Unicode ranges

Typography

• Collection of free fonts: greekfontsociety.gr
• (Greek) Collection of free truetype polytonic fonts: enoriaka.gr