Ancient Greek is the form of Greek used during
the periods of time spanning c. the 9th – 6th
century BC, c. the 5th – 4th century BC,
and c. the 3rd century BC – 6th century
AD in ancient Greece and the ancient world.
It was predated in the 2nd millennium BC by
Mycenaean Greek. The language of the Hellenistic
phase is known as Koine or Biblical Greek,
while the language from the late period onward
features no considerable differences from
Medieval Greek. Koine is regarded as a separate
historical stage of its own, although in its
earlier form, it closely resembled the Classical.
Prior to the Koine period, Greek of the classic
and earlier periods included several regional
dialects.
Ancient Greek was the language of Homer and
of classical Athenian historians, playwrights,
and philosophers. It has contributed many
words to English vocabulary and has been a
standard subject of study in educational institutions
of the West since the Renaissance. This article
primarily contains information about the Epic
and Classical phases of the language.
Dialects
The origins, early form and development of
the Hellenic language family are not well
understood because of the lack of contemporaneous
evidence. There are several theories about
what Hellenic dialect groups that may have
existed between the divergence of early Greek-like
speech from the common Proto-Indo-European
language. They have the same general outline
but differ in some of the detail. The only
attested dialect from this period is Mycenaean,
but its relationship to the historical dialects
and the historical circumstances of the times
imply that the overall groups already existed
in some form.
The major dialect groups of the Ancient Greek
period can be assumed to have developed not
later than 1120 BC, at the time of the Dorian
invasion(s), and their first appearances as
precise alphabetic writing began in the 8th
century BC. The invasion would not be "Dorian"
unless the invaders had some cultural relationship
to the historical Dorians; moreover, the invasion
is known to have displaced population to the
later Attic-Ionic regions, who regarded themselves
as descendants of the population displaced
by or contending with the Dorians.
The Greeks of this period considered there
to be three major divisions of all the Greek
people—Dorians, Aeolians and Ionians, each
with their own defining and distinctive dialects.
Allowing for their oversight of Arcadian,
an obscure mountain dialect, and Cyprian,
far from the center of Greek scholarship,
this division of people and language is quite
similar to the results of modern archaeological-linguistic
investigation.
One standard formulation for the dialects
is:
West vs. non-west Greek is the strongest marked
and earliest division, with non-west in subsets
of Ionic-Attic and Aeolic vs. Arcado-Cyprian,
or Aeolic and Arcado-Cyprian vs. Ionic-Attic.
Often non-west is called East Greek.
The Arcado-Cyprian group apparently descended
more closely from the Mycenaean Greek of the
Bronze Age.
Boeotian had come under a strong Northwest
Greek influence, and can in some respects
be considered a transitional dialect. Thessalian
likewise had come under Northwest Greek influence,
though to a lesser degree.
Pamphylian, spoken in a small area on the
south-western coast of Asia Minor and little
preserved in inscriptions, may be either a
fifth major dialect group, or it is Mycenaean
Greek overlaid by Doric, with a non-Greek
native influence.
Ancient Macedonian was an Indo-European language
closely related to Greek, but its exact relationship
is unclear because of insufficient data: possibly
a dialect of Greek; a sibling language to
Greek; or a close cousin to Greek, and perhaps
related to some extent, to Thracian and Phrygian
languages. The Pella curse tablet is one of
many finds that support the idea that the
Ancient Macedonian language is closely related
to the Doric Greek dialect.
Most of the dialect sub-groups listed above
had further subdivisions, generally equivalent
to a city-state and its surrounding territory,
or to an island. Doric notably had several
intermediate divisions as well, into Island
Doric, Southern Peloponnesus Doric, and Northern
Peloponnesus Doric.
The Lesbian dialect was a member of the Aegean/Asiatic
Aeolic sub-group.
All the groups were represented by colonies
beyond Greece proper as well, and these colonies
generally developed local characteristics,
often under the influence of settlers or neighbors
speaking different Greek dialects.
The dialects outside the Ionic group are known
mainly from inscriptions, notable exceptions
being fragments of the works of the poetess
Sappho from the island of Lesbos and the poems
of the Boeotian poet, Pindar.
After the conquests of Alexander the Great
in the late 300's BC, a new international
dialect known as Koine or Common Greek developed,
largely based on Attic Greek, but with influence
from other dialects. This dialect slowly replaced
most of the older dialects, although Doric
dialect has survived to the present in the
form of the Tsakonian dialect of Modern Greek,
spoken in the region of modern Sparta. Doric
has also passed down its aorist terminations
into most verbs of Demotic Greek. By about
the 500's AD, the Koine had slowly metamorphosized
into Medieval Greek.
Sound changes
See Proto-Greek for a description of sound
changes from Proto-Indo-European up through
attested Ancient Greek.
Phonology
The pronunciation of Post-Classic Greek changed
considerably from Ancient Greek, although
the orthography still reflects features of
the older language. For a detailed description
on the phonology changes from Ancient to Hellenistic
periods of the Greek language, see the article
on Koine Greek.
The examples below are intended to represent
Attic Greek in the 5th century BC. Although
ancient pronunciation can never be reconstructed
with certainty, Greek in particular is very
well documented from this period, and there
is little disagreement among linguists as
to the general nature of the sounds that the
letters represented.
Phonemic inventory
Consonants
[ŋ] occurred as an allophone of used before
velars and as an allophone of before nasals.
was probably voiceless when word-initial
Vowels
raised to [uː], probably by the 4th century
BC.
Sound changes
Assimilation
In verb conjugation, one consonant often comes
up against the other. Various sandhi rules
apply.
Rules:
Most basic rule: When two sounds appear next
to each other, the first assimilates in voicing
and aspiration to the second.
This applies fully to stops. Fricatives assimilate
only in voicing, sonorants do not assimilate.
Before an , velars become [k], labials become
[p], and dentals disappear.
Before a , velars become [kʰ], labials become
[pʰ], and dentals become [s].
Before an , velars become [ɡ], nasal+velar
becomes [ɡ], labials become [m], dentals
become [s], other sonorants remain the same.
Compensatory lengthening
Certain vowels historically underwent compensatory
lengthening in certain contexts. sometimes
lengthened to [aː] or [ɛː], and and become
the closed values [eː] and [oː] and the
open ones [ɛː] and [ɔː] depending on time
period.
Vowel shift
The Proto-Greek long vowel was shifted to
[ɛː] in the Attic dialect, except after
/e i r/. In the Ionic dialect, it shifted
in all environments, but in Doric and Aeolic,
it did not shift at all.
Morphology
Greek, like all of the older Indo-European
languages, is highly inflected. It is highly
archaic in its preservation of Proto-Indo-European
forms. In Ancient Greek nouns have five cases,
three genders, and three numbers. Verbs have
four moods, three voices, as well as three
persons and various other forms. Verbs are
conjugated through seven combinations of tenses
and aspect: the present, future and imperfect
are imperfective in aspect; the aorist; a
present perfect, pluperfect and future perfect.
Most tenses display all four moods and three
voices, although there is no future subjunctive
or imperative. Also, there is no imperfect
subjunctive, optative or imperative. There
are infinitives and participles corresponding
to the finite combinations of tense, aspect
and voice.
Augment
The indicative of past tenses adds a prefix
, called the augment. This was probably originally
a separate word, meaning something like "then,"
added because tenses in PIE had primarily
aspectual meaning. The augment is added to
the indicative of the aorist, imperfect and
pluperfect, but not to any of the other forms
of the aorist.
There are two kinds of augment in Greek, syllabic
and quantitative. The syllabic augment is
added to stems beginning with consonants,
and simply prefixes e. The quantitative augment
is added to stems beginning with vowels, and
involves lengthening the vowel:
a, ā, e, ē → ē
i, ī → ī
o, ō → ō
u, ū → ū
ai → ēi
ei → ēi or ei
oi → ōi
au → ēu or au
eu → ēu or eu
ou → ou
Some verbs augment irregularly; the most common
variation is e → ei. The irregularity can
be explained diachronically by the loss of
s between vowels. In verbs with a prefix,
the augment is placed not at the start of
the word, but between the prefix and the original
verb. For example, προσ(-)βάλλω goes
to προσέβαλoν in the aorist.
Following Homer's practice, the augment is
sometimes not made in poetry, especially epic
poetry.
The augment sometimes substitutes for reduplication;
see below.
Reduplication
Almost all forms of the perfect, pluperfect
and future perfect reduplicate the initial
syllable of the verb stem. There are three
types of reduplication:
Syllabic reduplication: Most verbs beginning
with a single consonant, or a cluster of a
stop with a sonorant, add a syllable consisting
of the initial consonant followed by e. An
aspirated consonant, however, reduplicates
in its unaspirated equivalent: Grassmann's
law.
Augment: Verbs beginning with a vowel, as
well as those beginning with a cluster other
than those indicated previously reduplicate
in the same fashion as the augment. This remains
in all forms of the perfect, not just the
indicative.
Attic reduplication: Some verbs beginning
with an a, e or o, followed by a sonorant,
reduplicate by adding a syllable consisting
of the initial vowel and following consonant,
and lengthening the following vowel. Hence
er → erēr, an → anēn, ol → olōl,
ed → edēd. This is not actually specific
to Attic Greek, despite its name; but it was
generalized in Attic. This originally involved
reduplicating a cluster consisting of a laryngeal
and sonorant; hence h₃l → h₃leh₃l
→ olōl with normal Greek development of
laryngeals.
Irregular duplication can be understood diachronically.
For example, lambanō has the perfect stem
eilēpha because it was originally slambanō,
with perfect seslēpha, becoming eilēpha
through compensatory lengthening.
Reduplication is also visible in the present
tense stems of certain verbs. These stems
add a syllable consisting of the root's initial
consonant followed by i. A nasal stop appears
after the reduplication in some verbs.
Writing system
Ancient Greek was written in the Greek alphabet,
with some variation among dialects. Early
texts are written in boustrophedon style,
but left-to-right became standard during the
classic period. Modern editions of Ancient
Greek texts are usually written with accents
and breathing marks, interword spacing, modern
punctuation, and sometimes mixed case, but
these were all introduced later.
Example text
The beginning of Homer's Iliad exemplifies
the Archaic period of Ancient Greek:
The beginning of Apology by Plato exemplifies
Attic Greek from the Classical period of Ancient
Greek:
Ὅτι μὲν ὑμεῖς, ὦ ἄνδρες
Άθηναῖοι, πεπόνθατε ὑπὸ
τῶν ἐμῶν κατηγόρων, οὐκ
οἶδα: ἐγὼ δ' οὖν καὶ αὐτὸς
ὑπ' αὐτῶν ὀλίγου ἐμαυτοῦ
ἐπελαθόμην, οὕτω πιθανῶς
ἔλεγον. Καίτοι ἀληθές
γε ὡς ἔπος εἰπεῖν οὐδὲν
εἰρήκασιν.
Transliterated into the Latin alphabet using
a modern version of the Erasmian scheme:
Hóti mèn humeîs, ô ándres Athēnaîoi,
pepónthate hupò tôn emôn katēgórōn,
ouk oîda: egṑ d' oûn kaì autòs hup'
autōn olígou emautoû epelathómēn, hoútō
pithanôs élegon. Kaítoi alēthés ge hōs
épos eipeîn oudèn eirḗkasin.
Using the IPA:
hóti men hyméː̀s, ɔ́ː̀ ándres atʰɛːnáì̯i̯oi,
pepóntʰate hypo tɔ́ː̀n emɔ́ː̀n katɛːɡórɔːn,
uːk óì̯da; eɡɔː dúː̀n kai̯ au̯tos
hyp au̯tɔ́ː̀n olíɡuː emau̯túː̀
epelatʰómɛːn, huː́tɔː pitʰanɔ́ː̀s
éleɡon. kaí̯toi̯ alɛːtʰéz ɡe hɔːs
épos eːpéː̀n uːden eːrɛː́kasin.
Translated into English:
What you, men of Athens, have learned from
my accusers, I do not know: but I, for my
part, nearly forgot who I was thanks to them,
since they spoke so persuasively. And yet,
of the truth, they have spoken, one might
say, nothing at all.
Modern use
The study of Ancient Greek in European countries
in addition to Latin occupied an important
place in the syllabus from the Renaissance
until the beginning of the 20th century. Ancient
Greek is still taught as a compulsory or optional
subject especially at traditional or elite
schools throughout Europe, such as public
schools and grammar schools in the United
Kingdom. It is compulsory in the Liceo classico
in Italy, in the gymnasium in the Netherlands,
in some classes in Austria, in Croatia in
klasicna gimnazija and it is optional in the
Humanistisches Gymnasium in Germany. In 2006/07,
15,000 pupils studied Ancient Greek in Germany
according to the Federal Statistical Office
of Germany, and 280,000 pupils studied it
in Italy. It is a compulsory subject alongside
Latin in the Humanities branch of Spanish
Bachillerato. Ancient Greek is also taught
at most major universities worldwide, often
combined with Latin as part of Classics. It
will also be taught in state primary schools
in the UK, to boost children’s language
skills, and will be offered as a foreign language
to pupils in all primary schools from 2014
as part of a major drive to boost education
standards, together with Latin, Mandarin,
French, German, Spanish, and Italian. Ancient
Greek is also taught as a compulsory subject
in Gymnasia and Lykia in Greece.
Ancient Greek is often used in the coinage
of modern technical terms in the European
languages: see English words of Greek origin.
Modern authors rarely write in Ancient Greek,
though Jan Křesadlo wrote some poetry and
prose in the language, and some volumes of
Asterix have been written in Attic Greek and
Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone has
been translated into Ancient Greek. Alfred
Rahlfs included a preface, a short history
of the Septuagint text, and other front matter
translated into Ancient Greek in his 1935
edition of the Septuagint; Robert Hanhart
also included the introductory remarks to
the 2006 revised Rahlfs–Hanhart edition
in the language as well.
Ancient Greek is also used by organizations
and individuals, mainly Greek, who wish to
denote their respect, admiration or preference
for the use of this language. This use is
sometimes considered graphical, nationalistic
or funny. In any case, the fact that modern
Greeks can still wholly or partly understand
texts written in non-archaic forms of ancient
Greek shows the affinity of modern Greek language
to its ancestral predecessor.
An isolated community near Trabzon, Turkey,
an area where Pontic Greek is spoken, has
been found to speak a variety of Greek that
has parallels, both structurally and in its
vocabulary, to Ancient Greek not present in
other varieties. As few as 5,000 people speak
the dialect but linguists believe that it
is the closest living language to Ancient
Greek.
Latinized forms of Ancient Greek roots are
used in many of the scientific names of species
and in scientific terminology.
See also
Exploring the Ancient Greek Language and Culture
Greek alphabet
Greek declension
Greek diacritics
Mycenaean Greek language
Koine Greek
Medieval Greek
Modern Greek
Greek language
List of Greek phrases
List of Greek words with English derivatives
Koine Greek Spoken
References
Further reading
P. Chantraine, Dictionnaire étymologique
de la langue grecque, Klincksieck, Paris.
Athenaze A series of textbooks on Ancient
Greek published for school use
Hansen, Hardy and Quinn, Gerald M. Greek:
An Intensive Course, Fordham University Press
Easterling, P & Handley, C. Greek Scripts:
An illustrated introduction. London: Society
for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies, 2001.
ISBN 0-902984-17-9
External links
Online Greek resources Dictionaries, grammar,
virtual libraries, fonts, etc.
Alpheios Combines LSJ, Autenrieth, Smyth's
grammar and inflection tables in a browser
add-on for use on any web site.
Ancient Greek basic lexicon at the Global
Lexicostatistical Database
Ancient Greek Swadesh list of basic vocabulary
words
Grammar learning
A more extensive grammar of the Ancient Greek
language written by J. Rietveld
Recitation of classics books
Perseus Greek dictionaries
Greek-Language.com – Information on the
history of the Greek language, application
of modern Linguistics to the study of Greek,
and tools for learning Greek
Free Lessons in Ancient Greek, Bilingual Libraries,
Forum
A critical survey of websites devoted to Ancient
Greek
Ancient Greek Tutorials – Berkeley Language
Center of the University of California
A Digital Tutorial For Ancient Greek Based
on White's First Greek Book
New Testament Greek
Acropolis World News – A summary of the
latest world news in Ancient Greek, Juan Coderch,
University of St Andrews
Classical texts
Perseus – Greek and Roman Materials
Ancient Greek Texts
