Ancient Greek Alphabet

Information on Ancient Greece Alphabets

The Greek alphabet has been in use from 750 BC to today. It is interesting to note that the Greeks were the first Europeans to write with an alphabet. Previous writing systems had been either syllabic or pictographic. The alphabet over 2500 years old was not a Greek invention. It developed from the Phoenician alphabet.

The Greeks had trade relations with the
Phoenicians. Herodotus, the 5th century Greek historian called the Greek letters "phoinikeia grammata" meaning Phoenician letters.

But the alphabet is also called Cadmeia (Καδμήια) because the Greeks believed that Cadmus brought the letters from Phoenicia to Ancient Thebes. However, they modified the Phoenician script. Addition of vowels was a uniquely Greek as Greek alphabet was the first alphabet to include vowels.

The Greek alphabets of alpha and beta are familiar to Indian students. The first three letters in the Greek alphabet are ABG. Early Greek alphabet had many variants, each suited to a local dialect. Between 1500 and 1200 BC, Mycenaeans, an early tribe of Greeks, has adapted the Minoan syllabary but it was not suitable to write the Greek. The Greek alphabet had given rise to many other alphabets in the Europe and the Middle East.

The Greek alphabet began making its appearance after the Dark Ages. The first vowel letters were Α (alpha), Ε (epsilon), Ι (iota), Ο (omicron), and Υ (upsilon). 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.

The Greek alphabet is a set of twenty-four letters and it notes each vowel and consonant with a separate symbol. The Greek alphabet was originally written from right to the left though it was written from left to right later.

The Greek alphabet has two main branches. They were the Ionic and the Chalcidian. The Ionic or eastern, form was adopted by Athens and became what we know today as the classical Greek alphabet. The Chalcidian or, western form, gave rise to the Etruscan alphabet that forms the basis of the Latin or Roman alphabet that we use today.

Today, Greek alphabets are used in sciences, mathematics and physics. The Greek
alphabet gave rise to many other alphabets including the Latin, the Gothic and the Cyrillic.

The Greek writing is another vast topic which may include the works of the greatest intellectuals and philosophers of ancient Greek including Aristotle and Plato. Only Greek alphabet is dealt under this topic.

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