Greek alphabet symbolic meaning. How to write Greek letters What names of Greek letters do you know?

in its oldest form was an exact copy of the Phoenician: the Greeks retained the same sequence of letters in the alphabet as the Phoenicians, and even the names of the letters were denoted by distorted Semitic words.

The Semitic direction of writing was also preserved in ancient Greek inscriptions: characters were written from right to left.
And only in the 4th century BC. The Greeks switched to writing from left to right.

This is how the Greeks wrote and read. This is called “bull turn” (a letter similar to the move of plowing bulls).

Almost all of them originate from the Greek alphabet. all European alphabets. In the West, the alphabet spread through the Greek colonies located in the southern part of the Apennine Peninsula.

The alphabet was borrowed from the Greeks by the Romans, and from them it spread throughout all the countries of Western Europe. At the end of the 4th - beginning of the 5th centuries. the alphabet influenced the emergence of the Armenian alphabet. In the VI century. The Georgian alphabet arose - partly from the Greek with the addition of a few letters.

The Greeks used a new material for writing - it was parchment made from animal skins. It was more durable than papyrus. The use of leather for writing began from very early times in Egypt, Greece, and Asia Minor, where it became most widespread.

According to legend in city ​​of Pergamon in the 1st century BC a new way of obtaining material for writing was invented from animal skins.

The oldest pieces of parchment with surviving fragments of texts date back to the 1st century BC, but they began to use it only from the 2nd century. n. e. For making parchment They used the skins of sheep, goats, donkeys, and calves. The skins were soaked in lime water, the wool was scraped off, stretched onto a frame, dried, smoothed with pumice and treated with chalk.

It was durable, had a smooth and light surface. It could be written on both sides. Parchment was painted yellow, blue, black, purple and was used for luxurious manuscripts. Purple was written in gold or silver.

For a thousand years, the book made from parchment dominated in Europe, while paper made its victorious path in Asian countries. Thanks to parchment, a significant number of manuscripts from the early Middle Ages have been preserved.

In Greece, they were used for writing ceras- wooden planks coated with wax. They wrote with a stick - style. “Rotate style”, i.e. to erase what was written meant to remove the beauty of language. This is where the expression “literary style” comes from.

Wax tablets They were used mainly for taking notes and writing letters, but sometimes literary and scientific texts were written on them. Several planks were fastened together using a strap or cord pulled through one side. This is how the book turned out.

This method of writing became widespread in Rome. Later it penetrated into the countries of medieval Europe. In Paris back in the 13th century. There were workshops for making wax tablets.

They recited, accompanying themselves on the cithara. Singers were held in high esteem. The Greek rulers loved to surround themselves with the most prominent poets and scientists.

The center of Greek culture was the Athenian slave-owning republic with its capital, where the greatest Greek tragedians, Sophocles and Euripides, lived. Comedy author Aristophanes. Famous philosophers Socrates. In the Republic of Athens, as in other Greek city-states, public education stood at a significant level: the children of all citizens were educated in schools.

There were also high schools in Athens, where young men studied science under the guidance of philosophical teachers. The most famous were: the school of Plato and the school of Aristotle. Plato's teaching was abstract. Aristotle's teaching was based primarily on the observation of natural phenomena. He gave his lectures while walking with his students.

Some of Aristotle's views and discoveries still amaze scientists. Apparently, some of the writings that have survived to this day under the name of Aristotle are recordings of his lectures. One of the highest manifestations of Hellenic creativity was theatrical art. During the heyday of Athenian culture, poets created wonderful comedies and tragedies, many of which have come down to us in later copies. However, Greek culture was put at the service only of free citizens, slaves remained on the sidelines. If there were educated people among the slaves, this was a rare exception.

The book of that time was papyrus scroll. delivered from Egypt. The text on the scroll was written in narrow columns, the direction of the lines was parallel to the length of the scroll. When reading, the papyrus ribbon was gradually rolled from one side to the other so that two columns were simultaneously in view, and the rest of the scroll was rolled up.

? Try rolling up a paper scroll and writing on it like papyrus. Is it convenient?

Due to the fact that papyrus scrolls did not tolerate moisture, which had a destructive effect on them, no authentic books of that time were preserved. And only Egyptian and Greek scrolls were preserved for two to three millennia in completely dry Egyptian sand. Most known scrolls survive in fragments, but sometimes these fragments are significant.

Greek alphabet will be useful when getting to know the site.

Firstly, it is Greek, and the myths on the site are ancient Greek, the names of gods and heroes were accordingly written in Greek crocodile, which cannot be deciphered with a glance and without a hint. Secondly, our site is astronomical, dedicated to constellations, and in astronomy, the so-called Bayer notation, based on the Greek alphabet, is traditionally used to designate stars.

So I ask you to love and favor me.

The Greek alphabet is only illegible at first glance - in fact, it is similar to the Russian one, the letters are similar to the Cyrillic alphabet, and in addition, it is shorter. The modern Greek alphabet has only 24 letters.

Greek alphabet

Letter	Name	Pronunciation	Notes
Α α	alpha	[A]
Β β	beta	[V]
Γ γ	gamma	[G]	fricative as in Ukrainian
Δ δ	delta		voiced like in English the"
Ε ε	epsilon	[e]	"s-simple"
Ζ ζ	zeta	[h]
Η η	this	[And]
Θθ	theta		deaf like in English think"
Ι ι	iota	[And]
Κ κ	kappa	[To]
Λ λ	lambda	[l]
Μ μ	mu	[m]
Ν ν	nude	[n]
Ξξ	xi	[ks]
Ο ο	omicron	[O]	"oh-small"
Π π	pi	[P]
Ρ ρ	ro	[R]
Σ σ ς	sigma	[With]	writing ς at the end of a word
Τ τ	tau	[T]
Υ υ	upsilon	[And]	"i-prime"
Φ φ	fi	[f]
Χ χ	hee	[X]
Ψψ	psi	[ps]
Ω ω	omega	[O]	"oh-big"

Naturally, in modern Greek there are reading rules, all sorts of digrams and diphthongs, etc.

A few words about the correspondence between Greek and other alphabets.

The Latin alphabet is familiar to us. The letters of the Latin alphabet mostly correspond to the Greek ones. I present the Latin alphabet with some comments. The Cyrillic alphabet is directly constructed from the Greek alphabet. There are many variants of the Cyrillic alphabet for different Slavic languages. Naturally, I present the Russian alphabet with some necessary pre-reform additions.

Greek alphabet and Cyrillic alphabet

Letter	Latin	Notes	Cyrillic	Notes
Α α	A a		A a
Β β	B b		B b, B c	both letters from Β β
Γ γ		no Latin equivalent	G g
	C c	no Greek equivalent
Δ δ	D d		D d
Ε ε	E e		E e, e e	Her
	F f	the ancient Greek equivalent is lost
			F	no Greek equivalent (Coptic?)
Ζ ζ		moved to the end of the Latin alphabet - Z z	Z z
Η η	H h	gr. vowel, lat. consonant	And and
Θ θ		no Latin equivalent		Θθ, fita, moved to the end of the Cyrillic alphabet
Ι ι	I i		I i	in Russian abolished by the reform of 1918
	Jj	no Greek equivalent: from I i	Thy	no Greek equivalent: from And and
Κ κ	K k		K k
Λ λ	Ll		L l
Μ μ	Mm		Mm
Ν ν	Nn		N n
Ξ ξ		no Latin equivalent		no Cyrillic equivalent
Ο ο	O o		Oh oh
Π π	P p		P p
Ρ ρ	R r		R r
Σ σ ς	Ss		With with
Τ τ	T t		T t
			Θθ	fita from Θθ above; in Russian abolished by the reform of 1918
	U u		U y	not Υ υ! no Greek equivalent
Υ υ	: digraph O and Izhitsy	Vv gr. vowel, lat. consonant	Ѵ ѵ	(also Y y)
	Izhitsa; in Russian abolished by the reform of 1918	W w
Φ φ		no Latin equivalent	no Greek equivalent: from V v
Χ χ	F f	X x	significantly different pronunciation
Ψ ψ		no Latin equivalent		no Cyrillic equivalent
Ω ω		no Latin equivalent		no Cyrillic equivalent
	X x	Y y
	from Υ υ	Z z
			corresponds to the Greek Ζ ζ	Ts ts, Ch h, Sh sh, Shch, b ъ, Y y, b ь, E e, Yu yu, I am

no Greek equivalents

It should be noted here that in Greece at school children are taught to write in block letters, i.e. without connecting letters together. Then there are a couple of lessons (somewhere in the third or fourth grade) when they are shown written letters, so-called calligraphy, but almost no one switches to it and continues to write in printed letters, without connecting the letters to each other. Moreover, when they teach foreign languages ​​at school - English, German, etc., they also write in print, without connecting the letters.

I learned to write Greek while still living in Russia, and wrote in written letters. When the Greeks saw me write, they were surprised. "Oh!!! Calligraphy!!" - they exclaimed. And, I must say, not every Greek could understand my handwriting. And I couldn’t understand why they were surprised.

Why am I saying all this? You can learn to write in the written letters that I gave above, or you can do something like it is written in the photo below. This is what the vast majority of Greeks write. The choice is yours.

And this is a sample of the handwriting of one of my students, who writes in written letters, and also took a photo from the Internet of one invitation that was written in calligraphy. Wow! Only twenty-four letters? Are some sounds not indicated? That's exactly what it is. There are sounds common to other languages ​​that are not found in Greek. Such sounds are all post-alveolar affricates (as in the word “ w ov” (only softer), [Z] as in the word “ and uk”, as in the word “ h erta”, and as in the English word “ j ob”). So what do Greeks do when they want to pronounce foreign words with these sounds? If the sound cannot be pronounced correctly, then it is simply transformed into the corresponding alveolar sound: [s], [Z] [z], , .What about other common sounds like [b], [d], [ g], etc.? It seems they are not in the alphabet either! Are they also not included in the list of sounds of the language? No! They exist in the form language. There are simply no separate letters to represent them. When the Greeks want to write down sounds, they write them in combinations of two letters: [b] is written as the combination μπ (mi + pi), [d] as ντ (ni + tau), and [g] as γκ (gamma + kappa), or as γγ (double gamma). Why all these difficulties? Remember, as stated in the introduction to this article, the sounds [b], [d], and [g] existed in classical Greek. Later, perhaps some time after the New Testament was written in so-called Greek koine(single), these three sounds shifted in pronunciation and began to sound like “soft” sounds ([v], , and). A phonological void appeared. Words in which there was a combination of “mp” and “nt” began to be pronounced as and, respectively. Therefore, “explosive” sounds were reintroduced, but letter combinations began to be used to denote them. There is one more sound that is not in the alphabet: “and ng ma,” pronounced like the English word “ki ng" This sound is very rare in Greek, and when it appears (as in the words “άγχος”: anxiety; “έλεγχος”: check), it is indicated by the combination gamma + chi, where gamma is pronounced ingma. For your convenience, below is a table of pronunciation of letter combinations (2 letters) that make new sounds not included in the Greek alphabet:

cluster	Pronunciation in Modern Greek
ΜΠ μπ	[ b], as in the word “ b yt”, at the beginning of words or in borrowed words; or: [mb], as in the word “to mb at.”
ΝΤ ντ	[ d], as in the word “ d at”, at the beginning of words or in borrowed words; or: [nd], as in “fo nd”.
ΓΚ γκ ΓΓ γγ	[ g], as in the word “ G orod”, at the beginning of words or in borrowed words; or: [g], as in the word “ri ng" Please note: formγγ never occurs at the beginning of words, so is always pronounced [g], as in the word “ri ng”.
ΓΧ γχ ΓΞ γξ	Beforeχ (chi) letter(ri ng) . Beforeξ (xi) letterγ (gamma) is pronounced “ingma”:(ri ng) . Please note: combinationγξ is rare; it appears only in unusual words such asλυγξ (lynx).

It is quite possible that the following pairs do not produce original sounds, but are perceived by native Greek speakers as “one”:

What about vowels? Are there any similarities with vowels in Russian, or with vowels in other languages? Vowels in Greek are not difficult. The vowels in Greek are similar to the vowels in Italian, Spanish ( Russian approx. translation) or Japanese: [a], [e], [i], [o], and [u]. Currently, the alphabet has three letters for the sound [I] (eta, iota and upsilon), which are pronounced the same, and two letters for the sound [o] (omicron and omega), which are also pronounced the same. For the sound [u], the combination of letters ου (omicron + upsilon) is used. So, pronouncing vowels is easy. Is there anything else special about vowel sounds? Not in pronunciation, but in spelling. There are three "diphthongs" that are no longer diphthongs, but have become digraphs. (A diphthong is a long sound consisting of two elements, each of which has a different quality, as in the words: “r aw nd”, or“b Ouch”; A digraph is two letters that are read together as one letter, for example in English th in a word " th ink”, or ph in the word “gra” ph ".) Below are Greek digraphs consisting of vowels.

Hello, my name is Ksenia, I have been living in Greece for several years now and teaching Greek via Skype at a website company.
You can read my teacher profile.

In my teaching practice, I have encountered many times the fact that students have difficulty learning the Greek alphabet. Perhaps a similar problem, when Greek letters do not want to be remembered and are persistently confused with Latin (English), is familiar to you. The experience of overcoming this obstacle provided the material for this article. I hope that my tips will help you in learning the Greek alphabet.

So how do you remember the Greek alphabet?

First of all, know that you are not alone, and under no circumstances should you be upset, much less despair! Difficulties with memorizing the alphabet are a temporary phenomenon, the letters will soon stop being confused, you just need to practice a little. Some of us learn new material faster, others slower. Show a little patience and diligence, and after a while reading Greek will not be difficult for you!

While working on the Greek alphabet, use all kinds of video and audio materials, for example, this one:

;

Or these, with examples of words:
a) ΦΩΝΗΤΙΚO ΑΛΦΑΒΗΤO ME ΠΑΡΑΔΕΙΓΜΑΤΑ

;

;

Now, for clarity, let's divide the letters into the following groups:

The first group are letters that do not cause difficulties. Most of these letters are:

Second group- b Letters that are often confused with letters of the Latin alphabet:

To overcome this confusion, it is necessary to spend some time reading Greek.

Third group- strange, unusual letters for us:

	Russian name	Sound in Russian transcription

These squiggles either merge with other letters or get confused with each other, you need training to memorize!

Attention! Pay special attention to letters that convey sounds that do not exist in the Russian language!

Let's look at the alphabet in full again:

As you can see, many of the letters and sounds of the Greek alphabet are familiar to you; all you have to do is practice a little.

If the Greek alphabet still does not lend itself to memorization with your serious logical approach, try to remember your childhood. A positive attitude and good mood are the key to success!

Tip #1: Work on the songs

Here are some nursery rhymes about the Greek alphabet:

a) ΕΝΑ ΓΡΑΜΜΑ ΜΙΑ ΙΣΤΟΡΙΑ | Το Τραγούδι της Αλφαβήτου

b) “Το τραγούδι της Αλφαβήτας” with subtitles

c) ΕΛΛΗΝΙΚΟ ΑΛΦΑΒΗΤΟ

d) Μια τρελή τρελή Αλφαβήτα

The songs must not only be listened to, but sung or even learned by heart!

If children's songs are not particularly interesting to you, here is a lyrical and philosophical song about the alphabet (video with subtitles):

Lyrics:

Άλφα, βήτα, γάμα, δέλτα
σκόνη γίνεται κι η πέτρα - becomes dust and stone
έψιλον, ζήτα, ήττα, θήτα
μοιάζει η νίκη με την ήττα - victory is like defeat

Βι, γα, δε, ζι, θι
κα, λα, μι, νι, ξι
πι, ρο, σίγμα, ταυ
φι, χι, ψι

Γιώτα, κάπα, λάμδα, μι
πόσο αξίζει μια στιγμή - how valuable is one moment
νι, ξι, όμικρον, πι, ρο
φεύγω μα σε καρτερώ - I’m leaving, but I’m waiting for you

Σίγμα, ταυ, ύψιλον, φι
μοναξιά στην κορυφή - loneliness at the top
με το χι, το ψι, το ωμέγα
μια παλικαριά `ναι ή φεύγα - courage or flight

Tip #2:

For better memorization, print out the Greek alphabet in pictures and attach the sheets in a visible place in your apartment. At the very beginning of studying, you can assign transcription to letters, but keep in mind that not all sounds of the Greek alphabet can be expressed in Russian letters. So, to convey the sounds δ and θ you will need to use a transcription of the interdental sounds of the English language.

Tip #3:

Try to “revive” the letters. Think about what the most difficult letters of the Greek alphabet look like for you, and draw a comic picture for each letter. Ideas can be taken from a series of Greek cartoons about the letters of the alphabet: even if at this stage of learning you do not understand all the text of the cartoon, you will definitely remember the flying and singing letter!

(picture from cartoon)

Cartoon about the letter Z (Zita)

Cartoon about the letters ξ and ψ (Xi and Psi)

Tip #4:

Use programs to learn the alphabet.

A good resource for learning the alphabet.

Tip #5:

And finally, you can use the textbook assignments:

a) write each letter several times;

b) write down the letters of the Greek alphabet under dictation in order and randomly.

The alphabet and pronunciation rules have been learned, it’s time to move on to reading. We will write about how to practice reading in the next article.

Υ.Γ. How did you memorize the Greek alphabet and how long did it take you? Tell us in the comments about your personal experience and write your opinion about the article!