Lesson 2: Exceptions and adds

Ancient Greek has many exceptions and special rules, already starting at the alphabet. I'll try to explain most of them.

The Wauw (looks like an F)
The Greek alphabet used to have a wauw, which we would pronounce as w (like in wave or which) You might have seen that I had to use a normal w in the Exercise 1 Question at the end of lesson 1 ( Haven't seen it? Click here). The reason you haven't learned the wauw is that the Ancient Greek we learn nowadays, didn't use the wauw anymore. You will therefore not see the wauw ever again on these wiki's.

The Sigma (SS)
You might have noticed that there are two versions of the sigma. Normally the sigma looks like this: SS, but when the sigma is at the end of a word, it will look like this: SE.



Vowels
Short vowels are: EPS and OMI
Long vowels are: ETA and OME
Either short or long can be: AA, II and UU.

Diphthongs
The diphthongs in Greek are formed with:
An IIOMETTAA (iota) behind a short vowel (IIOMETTAA-adscriptum): AAII - EPSII - OMIII - UUII
An IIOMETTAA (iota) under a long vowel (IIOMETTAA-subscriptum): (This is an AA (alpha), OME (omega) or ETA (eta) with an II (iota) underneath it) >>Image coming soon.
An UU (upsilon) behind a short vowel: AAUU - EPSUU - ETAUU - OMIUU



Punctuation marks
Although some punctuation marks are the same, there are some other who are different from those in the Western alphabet.
Left = Greek/Right = Western
. = .
, = ,
; = ?
(a dot in the air) = ; or :
There isn't an exclamation mark in Ancient Greek.

Spiritus
A vowel or diphthong at the beginning of a word always has a spiritus lenis (expl. AL) or a spiritus asper (expl. ALA). You don't pronounce the spiritus lenis, but the spiritus asper will sound like an h.
Example: EPSILGGOME (=me/I) is pronounced as ego, while ETAAMMEPSIISE (=us/we) is pronounced as hemeis.
Officially, the ro (RR) also has a spiritus asper when it's the first character, but I won't do that in my lessons.
Whenever a word starts with a diphthong, the spiritus will be placed on the second character
(expl. OMIULDDEPSNN (nothing))

Accents
The Ancient Greek used to have three sorts of accents (acutus, gravis and circumflexus). I will not speak about them for they are often ignored nowadays and they don't often add something to the meaning of a word.

This wil be it for now ^_^


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