Welcome to the Greek course for English speakers! Greek is an independent branch of the
Indo-European language family. It has the longest documented history of any existing IndoEuropean language. From antiquity to present the language has presented many important
changes resulting in its current form. Modern Greek (the language of our course) is spoken
by 13 million people, it is the official language of Greece and one of the official languages of
the Republic of Cyprus and the European Union.
The main scope of this section is to familiarize the learner with the Greek alphabet.
The word ''alphabet'' comes from the first two letters of the Greek Alphabet, alpha and beta
( and ). The Greek Alphabet has 24 letters, which are the same with Classical Greek.
However, their pronunciation is completely different.
The alphabet
Name
earest pronunciation
Alpha
A like Ant
Veeta
V like Vase
Gama
like Woman
Delta
like THe
Epsilon
E like Element
Zeeta
Z like Zoo
-*
Eeta
EE like sEE
Theeta
TH like THing
-*
Iota
EE like sEE
Name
earest pronunciation
Kapa
K like Cow
Lambda
L like Lemon
Mee
M like Mother
Nee
N like North
Ksee
X like foX
-*
Omicron
O like Organ
Pee
P like Pet
Rho
R like Rhapsody
-/*
Sigma
S like Sit
Taf
T like Table
-*
Ypsilon
EE like sEE
Fee
F like PHilosopher
Chee
H like Hurry
Psee
PS like liPStick
-*
Omega
O like Organ
The pronunciations and their examples up are the nearest (not the exact)
pronunciations to Modern Greek. Many letters have many different sounds depending
on the letter that follows.
Sigma has two different types in the lower case. When it is at the beginning of a
word or inside the word it is written as '''', but when it is at the end of a word it is
written as ''''.
Double vowels
= sounds like E-
= sounds like -, -, -
= sounds just like -, -, -
= sounds just like -, -, - or like ee-ee
= sounds like av or af
= sounds like ev or ef
Accents
Modern Greek has only ONE accent ,that is used above the accented vowels, and it looks
like this: ,, , , , , . The accent ALWAYS goes in one of the three last syllables.
Accents help you give emphasis to the right syllable. E.g. (veevLEEo), ''''
(meeLO) etc.
Capital letters can take accents ONLY in the first letter (if that syllable is accented),
even though it is not necessary. E.g / (Ohee), but (eSEE)
Diphthongs
= sounds like b
= sounds like d
= sounds like g
= sound like ng
= sounds like ts
= sounds like tz
Marks
. = full stop
, = comma
! = exclamatory mark
; = question mark
Basics 1
Definite Articles
Definite articles in Greek are equivalent to the English word ''the'', however, in Greek, they
vary depending on the gender and number of the word that follows.
Greek like Polish, Russian, and many other languages uses 3 genders to describe nouns.
While English though, has the for every gender and number, Greek has six possible
articles.
Number and Gender in Nominative
Article
Example
Singural masculine
= the man
Plural masculine
= the men
Singular feminine
= the woman
Plural feminine
= the women
Singular neuter
= the child
Plural neuter
= the children
Modern Greek has four cases in each number (Nominative, Genitive, Accusative, Vocative).
The suffix shows the changes.
Example Masculine
Example Feminine
Nominative singular
= the man
= the woman
Genitive singular
= of the man
= of the woman
Accusative singular
= the man
= the woman
Vocative singular
= man
= woman
Nominative Plural
= the men
= the women
Genitive plural
= of the men
= of the women
Accusative Plural
= the men
= the women
Vocative Plural
=men
=women
Example Neuter 1
Example Neuter 2
Nominative singular
= the child
= the book
Genitive singular
= of the child
= of the book
Accusative singular
= the child
= the book
Vocative singular
= child
= book
Nominative Plural
= the children
= the books
Genitive plural
= of the children
= of the books
Accusative Plural
= the children
= the books
Vocative Plural
= children
= books
ASTERISKS
The word can also be written as . This can happen in all types of this
word, just by replacing the letter with the .