Greek alphabet
Type	Alphabet
Spoken languages	Greek, with many modifications covering many languages
Time period	~800 BC to the present[1]
Parent systems	Proto-Canaanite alphabet  → Phoenician alphabet   → Greek alphabet
Child systems	Gothic Glagolitic Cyrillic Coptic Old Italic alphabet Latin alphabet
ISO 15924	Grek
Note: This page may contain IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode.

Greek alphabet
Αα Alpha	Νν Nu
Ββ Beta	Ξξ Xi
Γγ Gamma	Οο Omicron
Δδ Delta	Ππ Pi
Εε Epsilon	Ρρ Rho
Ζζ Zeta	Σσς Sigma
Ηη Eta	Ττ Tau
Θθ Theta	Υυ Upsilon
Ιι Iota	Φφ Phi
Κκ Kappa	Χχ Chi
Λλ Lambda	Ψψ Psi
Μμ Mu	Ωω Omega
Obsolete letters
Digamma	Qoppa
San	Sampi
Greek diacritics

The Greek alphabet (Greek: Ελληνικό αλφάβητο) is a set of twenty-four letters that has been used to write the Greek language since the late 9th or early 8th century BC. It was the first alphabet in the narrow sense, that is a writing system that uses a separate symbol for each vowel and consonant.^[2] It is the oldest alphabetic script in continuous use today. The letters were also used to represent Greek numerals, beginning in the 2nd century BC. ABCs redirects here. ... Centuries: 10th century BC - 9th century BC - 8th century BC Decades: 850s BC 840s BC 830s BC 820s BC 810s BC - 800s BC - 790s BC 780s BC 770s BC 760s BC 750s BC Events and Trends 804 BC - Hadad-nirari IV of Assyria conquers Damascus. ... The Proto-Canaanite alphabet is an abjad of twenty-plus acrophonic glyphs, which is found in Levantine texts of the Late Bronze Age (from ca. ... The Phoenician alphabet is a continuation of the Proto-Canaanite alphabet, by convention taken to begin with a cut-off date of 1050 BCE. It was used by the Phoenicians to write Phoenician, a Northern Semitic language. ...   The Gothic alphabet is an alphabetic writing system attributed by Philostorgius to Wulfila, used exclusively for writing the ancient Gothic language. ... The Glagolitic alphabet or Glagolitsa is the oldest known Slavic alphabet. ... The Cyrillic alphabet (pronounced also called azbuka, from the old name of the first two letters) is actually a family of alphabets, subsets of which are used by certain Slavic languages — Belarusian, Bulgarian, Macedonian, Russian, Rusyn, Serbian, and Ukrainian—as well as many other languages of the former Soviet Union... The Coptic alphabet is an alphabet used for writing the Coptic language. ... Note: This article contains special characters. ... Abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz redirects here. ... ISO 15924, Codes for the representation of names of scripts, defines two sets of codes for a number of writing systems (scripts). ... Image File history File links Greekalphabet. ... The Unicode Standard, Version 5. ... Image File history File links This is a lossless scalable vector image. ... Alpha (uppercase Α, lowercase α) is the first letter of the Greek alphabet. ... For other uses, see Nu. ... Beta (upper case Î’, lower case β) is the second letter of the Greek alphabet. ... Look up Ξ, ξ in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Gamma (uppercase Γ, lowercase γ) is the third letter of the Greek alphabet. ... Look up Ο, ο in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Look up Δ, δ in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... For other uses, see Pi (disambiguation) Pi (upper case Π, lower case Ï€ or Ï–) is the sixteenth letter of the Greek alphabet. ... Look up Ε, ε in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Look up Ρ, ρ in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Zeta or ZETA can refer to: // Zeta (letter), of the Greek alphabet Zeta functions, in mathematics Riemann zeta function Tropical Storm Zeta (2005), formed in December 2005 and lasted through January 2006 Z-pinch, in fusion power Zeta (Mexico), a magazine from Tijuana, Mexico Zeta River, in Montenegro Zeta plain... For other uses, see Sigma (disambiguation). ... Look up Η, η in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Look up Τ, Ï„ in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Look up Θ, θ in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Upsilon (upper case , lower case ) is the 20th letter of the Greek alphabet. ... This article is about Greek iota. ... Look up Φ, φ in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... For other uses, see Kappa (disambiguation). ... Look up Χ, χ in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Look up Λ, λ in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Look up Ψ, ψ in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Look up Îœ, μ in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Look up Ω, ω in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Digamma (upper case , lower case ) is an archaic letter of the Greek alphabet, used primarily as a Greek numeral. ... Qoppa Qoppa is an obsolete letter of the Greek alphabet and has a numeric value of 90. ... San (uppercase , lowercase ) was a letter of the Greek alphabet, appearing between Pi and Qoppa in alphabetical order, corresponding in position although not in name to the Phoenician tsade. ... Sampi (Upper case Ϡ, lower case ϡ) is an obsolete letter of the Greek alphabet and has a numeric value of 900. ... Greek ( IPA: or simply IPA: — Hellenic) has a documented history of 3,500 years, the longest of any single natural language in the Indo-European language family. ... (10th century BC - 9th century BC - 8th century BC - other centuries) (900s BC - 890s BC - 880s BC - 870s BC - 860s BC - 850s BC - 840s BC - 830s BC - 820s BC - 810s BC - 800s BC - other decades) (2nd millennium BC - 1st millennium BC - 1st millennium AD) Events Kingdom of Kush (900 BC... (2nd millennium BC - 1st millennium BC - 1st millennium) Ruins of the training grounds at Olympia, Greece. ... ABCs redirects here. ... Greek numerals are a system of representing numbers using letters of the Greek alphabet. ... (2nd millennium BC - 1st millennium BC - 1st millennium) The 2nd century BC started on January 1, 200 BC and ended on December 31, 101 BC. // Coin of Antiochus IV. Reverse shows Apollo seated on an omphalos. ...

The Greek alphabet is descended from the Phoenician alphabet, and unrelated to Linear B and the Cypriot syllabary, earlier writing systems for Greek. It has given rise to many other alphabets used in Europe and the Middle East, including the Latin alphabet.^[2] In addition to being used for writing Modern Greek, its letters are today used as symbols in mathematics and science, particle names in physics, as names of stars, in the names of fraternities and sororities, in the naming of supernumerary tropical cyclones, and for other purposes. The Phoenician alphabet is a continuation of the Proto-Canaanite alphabet, by convention taken to begin with a cut-off date of 1050 BCE. It was used by the Phoenicians to write Phoenician, a Northern Semitic language. ... This article is about the ancient syllabary. ... The Cypriot syllabary is a syllabic script used in Iron Age Cyprus, from ca. ... For other uses, see Europe (disambiguation). ... A map showing countries commonly considered to be part of the Middle East The Middle East is a region comprising the lands around the southern and eastern parts of the Mediterranean Sea, a territory that extends from the eastern Mediterranean Sea to the Persian Gulf. ... Abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz redirects here. ... Main article: Greek language Modern Greek (Νέα Ελληνικά or Νεοελληνική, lit. ... Greek letters are used in mathematics, science, engineering, and other areas where mathematical notation is used as symbols for constants, special functions, and also conventionally for variables representing certain quantities. ... Thousands of particles explode from the collision point of two relativistic (100 GeV per nucleon) gold ions in the STAR detector of the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider. ... In ancient times, only the Sun and Moon, a few hundred stars and the most easily visible planets had names. ... The terms fraternity and sorority (from the Latin words and , meaning brother and sister respectively) may be used to describe many social and charitable organizations, for example the Lions Club, Epsilon Sigma Alpha, Rotary International, Optimist International, or the Shriners. ... Due to their long-term persistence, and the need for a unique identifier in issuing forecasts and warnings, tropical cyclones and subtropical cyclones are given names. ...

History

Main article: History of the Greek alphabet

The Greek alphabet emerged several centuries after the fall of the Mycenaean civilization and consequent abandonment of its Linear B script, an early Greek writing system. Linear B is descended from Linear A, which was developed by the Minoans, whose language was probably unrelated to Greek; consequently the Minoan syllabary did not provide an ideal medium for the transliteration of the sounds of the Greek language. The History of the Greek alphabet starts with the adoption of Phoenician letterforms and continues to the present day. ... Mycenaean Greece, the last phase of the Bronze Age in ancient Greece, is the historical setting of the epics of Homer and much other Greek mythology. ... This article is about the ancient syllabary. ... Linear A incised on tablets found in Akrotiri, Santorini. ... The Minoan civilization was a bronze age civilization which arose on the island of Crete. ...

The Greek alphabet we recognize today arose after the Greek Dark Ages — the period between the downfall of Mycenae (ca. 1200 BC) and the rise of Ancient Greece, which begins with the appearance of the epics of Homer, around 800 BC, and the institution of the Ancient Olympic Games in 776 BC. Its most notable change, as an adaptation of the Phoenician alphabet, is the introduction of vowel letters, without which Greek would be illegible.^[2] The Greek Dark Ages (ca. ... A clay tablet with writing in Linear B from Mycenae. ... (Redirected from 1200 BC) Centuries: 14th century BC - 13th century BC - 12th century BC Decades: 1250s BC 1240s BC 1230s BC 1220s BC 1210s BC - 1200s BC - 1190s BC 1180s BC 1170s BC 1160s BC 1150s BC Events and Trends 1204 BC - Theseus, legendary King of Athens is deposed after... The term ancient Greece refers to the periods of Greek history in Classical Antiquity, lasting ca. ... This article is about the Greek poet Homer and the works attributed to him. ... Centuries: 10th century BC - 9th century BC - 8th century BC Decades: 850s BC 840s BC 830s BC 820s BC 810s BC - 800s BC - 790s BC 780s BC 770s BC 760s BC 750s BC Events and Trends 804 BC - Hadad-nirari IV of Assyria conquers Damascus. ... Ruins of the training grounds at Olympia The Ancient Olympic Games, originally referred to as simply the Olympic Games (Greek: ; Olympiakoi Agones) were a series of athletic competitions held between various city-states of Ancient Greece. ... Centuries: 9th century BC - 8th century BC - 7th century BC Decades: 820s BC 810s BC 800s BC 790s BC 780s BC - 770s BC - 760s BC 750s BC 740s BC 730s BC 720s BC Events and Trends 778 BC - Agamestor, King of Athens dies after a reign of 17 years and... The Phoenician alphabet is a continuation of the Proto-Canaanite alphabet, by convention taken to begin with a cut-off date of 1050 BCE. It was used by the Phoenicians to write Phoenician, a Northern Semitic language. ...

Vowel signs were originally not used in Semitic alphabets. Whereas in the earlier West Semitic family of scripts (Phoenician, Hebrew, Moabite etc.) a letter always stood for a consonant in association with an unspecified vowel or no vowel, the Greek alphabet divided the letters into two categories, consonants ("things that sound along") and vowels, where the consonant letters always had to be accompanied by vowels to create a pronounceable unit. Although the old Ugaritic alphabet did develop matres lectionis, i.e., use of consonant letters to denote vowels, they were never employed systematically. Phoenician was a language originally spoken in the coastal region of what is now Lebanon. ... The word Hebrew most likely means to cross over, referring to the Semitic people crossing over the Euphrates River. ... The Moabite language is an extinct Hebrew Canaanite dialect, spoken in Moab (modern-day northwestern Jordan) in the early first millennium BC. Most of our knowledge about Moabite comes from the Mesha Stele, as well as the El-Kerak Stela; this is sufficient to show that it was extremely similar... In articulatory phonetics, a consonant is a sound in spoken language that is characterized by a closure or stricture of the vocal tract sufficient to cause audible turbulence. ... Note: This page contains IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. ... The Ugaritic alphabet is a cuneiform version of the Levantine consonant alphabet (abjad), used from around 1300 BC for the Ugaritic language, an extinct Canaanite language discovered in Ugarit, Syria. ... Matres lectionis (singular form: mater lectionis) are an early manner of indicating vowels in the Hebrew alphabet. ...

The first vowel letters were Α (alpha), Ε (epsilon), Ι (iota), Ο (omicron), and Υ (upsilon), modifications of Semitic glottal, pharyngeal, or glide consonants that were mostly superfluous in Greek: /ʔ/ ('aleph), /h/ (he), /j/ (yodh), /ʕ/ (ʿayin), and /w/ (waw), respectively. In eastern Greek, which lacked aspiration entirely, the letter Η (eta), from the Semitic glottal consonant /ħ/ (heth) was also used for the long vowel /εː/, and eventually the letter Ω (omega) was introduced for a long /ɔː/. The Ugaritic alphabet is a cuneiform abjad, used from around 1300 BC for the Ugaritic language, an extinct Canaanite language discovered in Ugarit, Syria. ... The Phoenician alphabet is a continuation of the Proto-Canaanite alphabet, by convention taken to begin with a cut-off date of 1050 BCE. It was used by the Phoenicians to write Phoenician, a Northern Semitic language. ... The Paleo-Hebrew alphabet is an offshoot of the Phoenician alphabet used to write the Hebrew language from about the 10th century BCE until it began to fall out of use in the 5th century BCE with the adoption of the Aramaic alphabet as a writing system for Hebrew and... The Samaritan alphabet is a direct descendant of the paleo-Hebrew variety of the Phoenician alphabet, the more commonly known Hebrew alphabet having been adapted from the Aramaic alphabet under the Persian Empire. ... Bilingual inscription (Greek and Aramaic) by the Indian emperor Ashoka the Great, 3rd century BC. The Aramaic alphabet is an abjad alphabet designed for writing the Aramaic language. ... Variation of BrāhmÄ« with dates. ... The Brahmic family is a family of abugidas (writing systems) used in South Asia, Southeast Asia, Tibet, Mongolia, Manchuria, descended from the BrāhmÄ« script of Mauryan India. ... This article or section is in need of attention from an expert on the subject. ... This article or section uses Khmer characters which may be rendered as boxes or other nonsensical symbols. ... Javanese script is the script that Javanese is originally written in (not to be confused with Javascript, which is a programming language). ... Note: This article contains special characters. ... 11th century book in Syriac Serto. ... The Nabatean alphabet is a consonantal alphabet (abjad) that was used by the Nabateans in the 2nd century BC. Important inscriptions are found in Petra. ... The Arabic alphabet is the script used for writing languages such as Arabic, Persian, Urdu, and others. ... The Pahlavi script was used broadly in the Sasanid Persian Empire to write down Middle Persian for secular, as well as religious purposes. ... The Avestan alphabet was created in the 3rd century AD for writing the hymns of Zarathustra (a. ... Note: This article contains special characters. ... Abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz redirects here. ... Rune redirects here. ...   The Gothic alphabet is an alphabetic writing system attributed by Philostorgius to Wulfila, used exclusively for writing the ancient Gothic language. ... The Glagolitic alphabet or Glagolitsa is the oldest known Slavic alphabet. ... The Cyrillic alphabet (pronounced also called azbuka, from the old name of the first two letters) is actually a family of alphabets, subsets of which are used by certain Slavic languages — Belarusian, Bulgarian, Macedonian, Russian, Rusyn, Serbian, and Ukrainian—as well as many other languages of the former Soviet Union... Paleohispanic scripts Light green (along the Mediterranean coast) is the Iberian language, dark grey (mainly southern Portugal) is the Tartessian language, dark blue (central Spain) is the Celtiberian language, light blue (mainly northern Portugal) is the Lusitanian language, and dark green (Eastern Pyrenees) is the Aquitanian language. ... The ancient South Arabian alphabet (also known as musnad) branched from the Proto-Sinaitic alphabet in ca. ... Note: This article contains special characters. ... The Meroitic script is an alphabet of Egyptian (Hieroglyphic) origin used in Kingdom of Meroë. Some scholars, e. ... Note: This article contains special characters. ... Jamo redirects here. ... Note: This page or section contains IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. ... Zhuyin fuhao (Traditional Chinese: ; Simplified Chinese: ; Hanyu Pinyin: ; Tongyong Pinyin: ; Wade-Giles: Chu-yin fu-hao), or Symbols for Annotating Sounds, often abbreviated as Zhuyin, or known as Bopomofo (ㄅㄆㄇㄈ) after the first four letters of this Chinese phonemic alphabet (bo po mo fo), is the national phonetic system of the... Nearly all the segmental scripts (alphabets, but see below for more precise terminology) used around the globe were apparently derived from the Proto-Sinaitic alphabet. ... A Specimen of typeset fonts and languages, by William Caslon, letter founder; from the 1728 Cyclopaedia. ... Alpha (uppercase Α, lowercase α) is the first letter of the Greek alphabet. ... Look up Ε, ε in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... This article is about Greek iota. ... Look up Ο, ο in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Upsilon (upper case , lower case ) is the 20th letter of the Greek alphabet. ... In articulatory phonetics, a consonant is a sound in spoken language that is characterized by a closure or stricture of the vocal tract sufficient to cause audible turbulence. ... is the reconstructed name of the first letter of the Proto-Canaanite alphabet, continued in descended Semitic alphabets as Phoenician , Syriac , Hebrew Aleph , and Arabic . Aleph originally represented the glottal stop (IPA ), usually transliterated as , a symbol based on the Greek spiritus lenis , for example in the transliteration of the... He is the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets, including Phoenician , Aramaic, Hebrew , Syriac and Arabic . Its sound value is a voiceless glottal fricative (). The Phoenician letter gave rise to the Greek Epsilon, Etruscan , Latin E and Cyrillic Ye. ... Yodh (also spelled Yud or Yod) is the tenth letter of many Semitic alphabets, including Phoenician, Aramaic, Hebrew , Syriac and Arabic (in abjadi order, 28th in modern order). ... or Ayin is the sixteenth letter in many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician, Aramaic, Hebrew and Arabic (in abjadi order). ...   Vav or waw is the sixth letter of many Semitic alphabets, including Phoenician, Hebrew, Aramaic, and Arabic in abjadi order; it is the twenty-seventh in modern Arabic order. ... Look up Η, η in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... For the letter Heth in the Hebrew and Phoenician alphabets, see Heth (letter). ... In linguistics, vowel length is the perceived duration of a vowel sound. ... Look up Ω, ω in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ...

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. These consonants made up for the lack of comparable aspirates in Phoenician. In western Greek, Χ was used for /ks/ and Ψ for /kʰ/ — hence the value of the Latin letter X, derived from the western Greek alphabet. The origin of these letters is disputed. Look up Φ, φ in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Look up Χ, χ in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Look up Ψ, ψ in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... In phonetics, aspiration is the strong burst of air that accompanies either the release or, in the case of preaspiration, the closure of some obstruents. ... It has been suggested that Cumae alphabet be merged into this article or section. ...

The letter Ϻ (san) was used at variance with Σ (sigma), and by classical times the latter won out, san disappearing from the alphabet. The letters Ϝ (wau, later called digamma) and Ϙ (qoppa) also fell into disuse. The former was only needed for the western dialects and the latter was never truly needed at all. These lived on in the Ionic numeral system, however, which consisted of writing a series of letters with precise numerical values. Ϡ (sampi), apparently is a rare local glyph form from Ionia, was introduced at latter times to stand for 900. Thousands were written using a mark at the upper left ('A for 1000, etc). San (uppercase , lowercase ) was a letter of the Greek alphabet, appearing between Pi and Qoppa in alphabetical order, corresponding in position although not in name to the Phoenician tsade. ... For other uses, see Sigma (disambiguation). ... Digamma (upper case , lower case ) is an archaic letter of the Greek alphabet, used primarily as a Greek numeral. ... Qoppa Qoppa is an obsolete letter of the Greek alphabet and has a numeric value of 90. ... Greek numerals are a system of representing numbers using letters of the Greek alphabet. ... Sampi (Upper case Ϡ, lower case ϡ) is an obsolete letter of the Greek alphabet and has a numeric value of 900. ... variant glyphs representing the character a (allographs of a) in the Zapfino typeface. ...

Because Greek minuscules arose at a much later date, no historic minuscule actually exists for san. Minuscule forms for the other letters were only used as numbers. For the number 6, modern Greeks use an old ligature called stigma (Ϛ, ϛ) instead of digamma, or ΣΤ/στ if this is not available. For 90 the modern Z-shaped qoppa forms were used: Ϟ, ϟ. (Note that some web browser/font combinations will show the other qoppa here.) Minuscule, or lower case, is the smaller form (case) of letters (in the Roman alphabet: a, b, c, ...). Originally alphabets were written entirely in majuscule (capital) letters which were spaced between well-defined upper and lower bounds. ... In writing and typography, a ligature occurs where two or more letterforms are written or printed as a unit. ... Stigma is a ligature of the Greek letters sigma and tau, sometimes used nowadays to represent the Greek numeral 6. ...

Originally there were several variants of the Greek alphabet, most importantly western (Chalcidian) and eastern (Ionic) Greek. The former gave rise to the Old Italic alphabet and thence to the Latin alphabet, while the latter is the basis of the present Greek alphabet. Athens originally used the Attic script for official documents such as laws and the works of Homer: this contained only the letters from alpha to upsilon, and used the letter eta for the sound "h" instead of the long "e". In 403 BC Athens adopted the Ionic script as its standard, and shortly thereafter the other versions disappeared. It has been suggested that Cumae alphabet be merged into this article or section. ... Note: This article contains special characters. ... Abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz redirects here. ... This article is about the capital of Greece. ... Centuries: 6th century BC - 5th century BC - 4th century BC Decades: 450s BC 440s BC 430s BC 420s BC 410s BC - 400s BC - 390s BC 380s BC 370s BC 360s BC 350s BC Years: 408 BC 407 BC 406 BC 405 BC 404 BC - 403 BC - 402 BC 401 BC...

By then Greek was written left to right, but originally it had been written right to left (with asymmetrical characters flipped), and in-between written either way — or, most likely, in the so-called boustrophedon style, where successive lines alternate direction. Boustrophedon is an ancient way of writing manuscripts and other inscriptions in which, rather than going from left to right as in modern English, or right to left as in Arabic, alternate lines must be read in opposite directions. ...

Early Greek alphabet on pottery in the National Archaeological Museum of Athens

In the Hellenistic period, Aristophanes of Byzantium introduced the process of accenting Greek letters for easier pronunciation. During the Middle Ages, the Greek scripts underwent changes paralleling those of the Latin alphabet: while the old forms were retained as a monumental script, uncial and eventually minuscule hands came to dominate. The letter σ is even written ς at the ends of words, paralleling the use of the Latin long and short s. Image File history File linksMetadata Download high resolution version (1600x1398, 225 KB) Summary Alphabet grec peint sur la panse dune coupe attique à figures noires. ... Image File history File linksMetadata Download high resolution version (1600x1398, 225 KB) Summary Alphabet grec peint sur la panse dune coupe attique à figures noires. ... Façade of the National Archaeological museum of Athens. ... The term Hellenistic (derived from HéllÄ“n, the Greeks traditional self-described ethnic name) was established by the German historian Johann Gustav Droysen to refer to the spreading of Greek culture over the non-Greek people that were conquered by Alexander the Great. ... Aristophanes of Byzantium, Gr. ... Example of a letter with a diacritic A diacritic or diacritical mark, also called an accent, is a small sign added to a letter to alter pronunciation or to distinguish between similar words. ... The Middle Ages formed the middle period in a traditional schematic division of European history into three ages: the classical civilization of Antiquity, the Middle Ages, and modern times, beginning with the Renaissance. ... An italicized long s used in the word Congress in the United States Bill of Rights. ...

Letter names

Each of the Phoenician letter names was a word that began with the sound represented by that letter; thus 'aleph, the word for “ox”, was adopted for the glottal stop /ʔ/, bet, or “house”, for the /b/ sound, and so on. When the letters were adopted by the Greeks, most of the Phoenician names were maintained or modified slightly to fit Greek phonology; thus, 'aleph, bet, gimel became alpha, beta, gamma. These borrowed names had no meaning in Greek except as labels for the letters. However, a few signs that were added or modified later by the Greeks do in fact have names with a meaning. For example, o mikron and o mega mean “small o” and “big o”. Similarly, e psilon and u psilon mean “plain e” and “plain u”, respectively. is the reconstructed name of the first letter of the Proto-Canaanite alphabet, continued in descended Semitic alphabets as Phoenician , Syriac , Hebrew , , and Arabic . Aleph originally expressed the glottal stop (IPA ), usually transliterated as , a symbol based on the Greek spiritus lenis , for example in the transliteration of the letter... Bet or Beth is the second letter of the Phoenician alphabet, the Hebrew alphabet, and the Aramaic alphabet. ...

Main letters

Below is a table listing the modern Greek letters, as well as their forms when romanized. The table also provides the equivalent Phoenician letter from which each Greek letter is derived. Pronunciations transcribed using the International Phonetic Alphabet. Languages can be romanized in a variety of ways, as shown here with Mandarin Chinese In linguistics, romanization (or Latinization, also spelled romanisation or Latinisation) is the representation of a word or language with the Roman (Latin) alphabet, or a system for doing so, where the original word or language... The Phoenician alphabet is a continuation of the Proto-Canaanite alphabet, by convention taken to begin with a cut-off date of 1050 BCE. It was used by the Phoenicians to write Phoenician, a Northern Semitic language. ... Articles with similar titles include the NATO phonetic alphabet, which has also informally been called the “International Phonetic Alphabet”. For information on how to read IPA transcriptions of English words, see IPA chart for English. ...

Also note that the classical pronunciation given below is the reconstructed pronunciation of Attic in the late 5th and early 4th century (BC). Some of the letters had different pronunciations in pre-classical times or in non-Attic dialects. For details, see History of the Greek alphabet and Ancient Greek phonology. For details on post-classical Ancient Greek pronunciation, see Koine Greek phonology. The History of the Greek alphabet starts with the adoption of Phoenician letterforms and continues to the present day. ... Ancient Greek phonology is the study of the phonology, or pronunciation, of Ancient Greek. ... Koine Greek is phonologically a transition period: at the start of the period, the language was virtually identical to Classical Ancient Greek, whereas in the end the language had phonologically a lot more in common with Modern Greek than Ancient Greek. ...

Letter	Corresponding Phoenician letter	Name				Transliteration1		Pronunciation		Numeric value
		English	Ancient Greek	Medieval Greek (polytonic)	Modern Greek	Ancient Greek	Modern Greek	Classical Ancient Greek	Modern Greek
Α α	Aleph	Alpha	ἄλφα		άλφα	a		[a] [aː]	[a]	1
Β β	Beth	Beta	βῆτα		βήτα	b	v	[b]	[v]	2
Γ γ	Gimel	Gamma	γάμμα		γάμμα γάμα	g	gh, g, y	[g]	[ɣ], [ʝ]	3
Δ δ	Daleth	Delta	δέλτα		δέλτα	d	d, dh	[d]	[ð]	4
Ε ε	He	Epsilon	εἶ	ἒ ψιλόν	έψιλον	e		[e]		5
Ζ ζ	Zayin	Zeta	ζήτα		ζήτα	z		[zd] (or [dz]) later [zː]	[z]	7
Η η	Heth	Eta	ἦτα		ήτα	e, ē	i	[ɛː]	[i]	8
Θ θ	Teth	Theta	θῆτα		θήτα	th		[tʰ]	[θ]	9
Ι ι	Yodh	Iota	ἰῶτα		ιώτα γιώτα	i		[i] [iː]	[i], [ʝ]	10
Κ κ	Kaph	Kappa	κάππα		κάππα κάπα	k		[k]	[k], [c]	20
Λ λ	Lamedh	Lambda	λάβδα	λάμβδα	λάμδα λάμβδα	l		[l]		30
Μ μ	Mem	Mu	μῦ		μι μυ	m		[m]		40
Ν ν	Nun	Nu	νῦ		νι νυ	n		[n]		50
Ξ ξ	Samekh	Xi	ξεῖ	ξῖ	ξι	x	x, ks	[ks]		60
Ο ο	'Ayin	Omicron	οὖ	ὂ μικρόν	όμικρον	o		[o]		70
Π π	Pe	Pi	πεῖ	πῖ	πι	p		[p]		80
Ρ ρ	Resh	Rho	ῥῶ		ρω	r (ῥ: rh)	r	[r], [r̥]	[r]	100
Σ σ ς	Sin	Sigma	σῖγμα		σίγμα	s		[s]		200
Τ τ	Taw	Tau	ταῦ		ταυ	t		[t]		300
Υ υ	Waw	Upsilon	ὗ	ὓ ψιλόν	ύψιλον	u, y	y, v, f	[y] [yː] (earlier [ʉ] [ʉː])	[i]	400
Φ φ	origin disputed (see text)	Phi	φεῖ	φῖ	φι	ph	f	[pʰ]	[f]	500
Χ χ		Chi	χεῖ	χῖ	χι	ch	ch, kh	[kʰ]	[x], [ç]	600
Ψ ψ		Psi	ψεῖ	ψῖ	ψι	ps		[ps]		700
Ω ω	'Ayin	Omega	ὦ	ὦ μέγα	ωμέγα	o, ō	o	[ɔː]	[o]	800

1. For details and different transliteration systems see Romanization of Greek.

The Phoenician alphabet is a continuation of the Proto-Canaanite alphabet, by convention taken to begin with a cut-off date of 1050 BCE. It was used by the Phoenicians to write Phoenician, a Northern Semitic language. ... This table lists several transcription schemes from the Greek alphabet to the Latin alphabet. ... Greek numerals are a system of representing numbers using letters of the Greek alphabet. ... Phoenician Aleph. ... is the reconstructed name of the first letter of the Proto-Canaanite alphabet, continued in descended Semitic alphabets as Phoenician , Syriac , Hebrew , , and Arabic . Aleph originally expressed the glottal stop (IPA ), usually transliterated as , a symbol based on the Greek spiritus lenis , for example in the transliteration of the letter... Alpha (uppercase Α, lowercase α) is the first letter of the Greek alphabet. ... Phoenician Beth. ...   Beth or Bet is the second letter of many Semetic alphabets, including Phoenician, Hebrew, and Aramaic. ... Beta (upper case Î’, lower case β) is the second letter of the Greek alphabet. ... Phoenician Gimel. ... Gimel is the third letter of many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician, Aramaic, Hebrew , Syriac and Arabic (in abjadi order; 5th in higai order). ... Gamma (upper case Γ, lower case γ) is the 3rd letter of the Greek alphabet. ... Phoenician Daleth. ...   Dalet or Daleth is the fourth letter of many Semitic alphabets, including Phoenician, Hebrew, and Aramaic. ... Look up Δ, δ in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Phoenician He. ... He is the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets, including Phoenician , Aramaic, Hebrew , Syriac and Arabic . Its sound value is a voiceless glottal fricative (). The Phoenician letter gave rise to the Greek Epsilon, Etruscan , Latin E and Cyrillic Ye. ... Look up Ε, ε in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Phoenician Zayin. ... Zayin or Zain is the seventh letter of many Semitic alphabets, including Phoenician, Hebrew, and Aramaic. ... Zeta (upper case Ζ, lower case ζ) is the sixth letter of the Greek alphabet. ... Zeta (upper case Ζ, lower case ζ) is the sixth letter of the Greek alphabet. ... Phoenician Heth. ... or (also spelled Khet, Kheth, Chet, Cheth, Het, or Heth) is the reconstructed name of the eighth letter of the Proto-Canaanite alphabet, continued in descended Semitic alphabets as Phoenician , Syriac , Hebrew (also ) , Arabic (in abjadi order), and Berber . Heth originally represented a voiceless fricative, either pharyngeal , or velar (the... Look up Η, η in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Phoenician Teth. ... (also Teth, Tet) is the ninth letter of many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician, Aramaic, Hebrew , Syriac and Arabic (in abjadi order, 16th in modern order). ... Theta (upper case Θ, lower case θ) is the 8th letter of the Greek alphabet. ... Phoenician Yodh. ... Yodh (also spelled Yud or Yod) is the tenth letter of many Semitic alphabets, including Phoenician, Aramaic, Hebrew , Syriac and Arabic (in abjadi order, 28th in modern order). ... Iota (upper case Ι, lower case ι) is the 9th letter of the Greek alphabet. ... Phoenician Kaph. ... Kaph (also spelled Kap or Kaf) is the eleventh letter of many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician, Aramaic, Hebrew , Arabic alphabet , Persian alphabet . ... For other uses, see Kappa. ... Phoenician Lamedh. ... Lamed or Lamedh is the twelfth letter in many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician, Aramaic, Hebrew and Arabic alphabet . Its sound value is IPA: . The Phoenician letter gave rise to the Greek Lambda (Λ), Latin L, and Cyrillic El (Л). // Lamedh is believed to have come from a pictogram of an ox goad... The lambda is a unit of measure of volume (symbol λ) equal to one microlitre (1 μL) or one cubic millimetre (1 mm³). ... Phoenician Mem. ... Mem is the thirteenth letter of the Phoenician and Hebrew alphabets. ... Look up Îœ, μ in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Phoenician Nun. ... → [Nun] is the 14th letter of many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician, Aramaic, Hebrew and Arabic alphabet (in abjadi order). ... For other uses, see Nu. ... Phoenician Samekh. ... Samekh or Simketh is the fifteenth letter in many Semitic alphabets, including Phoenician, Hebrew, and Aramaic, representing . ... Xi (upper case Ξ, lower case ξ) is the 14th letter of the Greek alphabet. ... Phoenician Ayin. ... or Ayin is the sixteenth letter in many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician, Aramaic, Hebrew and Arabic (in abjadi order). ... Look up Ο, ο in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Phoenician Pe. ... Pe is the seventeenth letter in many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician, Aramaic, Hebrew and Arabic alphabet (in abjadi order). ... For other uses, see Pi (disambiguation) Pi (upper case Π, lower case Ï€ or Ï–) is the sixteenth letter of the Greek alphabet. ... Phoenician Res. ... Resh is the twentieth letter of the Phoenician and Hebrew alphabets. ... Look up Ρ, ρ in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Phoenician Sin. ... Shin (also spelled Å in or Sheen) is the twenty-first letter in many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician, Aramaic, Hebrew and Arabic (in abjadi order, 12th in modern order). ... Sigma (upper case Σ, lower case σ, alternative ς) is the 18th letter of the Greek alphabet. ... Phoenician Taw. ... Taw or Tav is the twenty-second and last letter in many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician, Aramaic, Hebrew and Arabic alphabet . Its original value is an voiceless alveolar plosive, IPA , The Phoenician letter gave rise to the Greek Tau (Τ), Latin T, and the equivalent in the Cyrillic alphabet. ... Tau (upper case Τ, lower case τ) is the 19th letter of the Greek alphabet. ... Phoenician Waw. ...   Vav or waw is the sixth letter of many Semitic alphabets, including Phoenician, Hebrew, Aramaic, and Arabic in abjadi order; it is the twenty-seventh in modern Arabic order. ... Upsilon (upper case Υ, lower case υ) is the 20th letter of the Greek alphabet. ... Look up Φ, φ in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Look up Χ, χ in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Look up Ψ, ψ in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Phoenician Ayin. ... or Ayin is the sixteenth letter in many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician, Aramaic, Hebrew and Arabic (in abjadi order). ... Look up Ω, ω in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... There are several methods for the romanization of Greek, especially depending whether the language written with Greek letters is Ancient Greek or Modern Greek and whether a phonetic transcription or a graphemic transliteration is intended. ...

Variant forms

Some letters can occur in variant shapes, mostly inherited from medieval minuscule handwriting. While their use in normal typography of Greek is purely a matter of font styles, some such variants have been given separate encodings in Unicode. The History of the Greek alphabet starts with the adoption of Phoenician letterforms and continues to the present day. ... The Unicode Standard, Version 5. ...

• The symbol ϐ ("curled beta") is a cursive variant form of beta (β).
• The letter epsilon can occur in two equally frequent stylistic variants, either shaped ('lunate epsilon', like a semicircle with a stroke) or (similar to a reversed number 3). The symbol ϵ (U+03F5) is designated specifically for the lunate form, used as a technical symbol.
• The symbol ϑ ("script theta") is a cursive form of theta (θ), frequent in handwriting, and used with a specialised meaning as a technical symbol.
• The symbol ϰ ("kappa symbol") is a cursive form of kappa (κ), used as a technical symbol.
• The symbol ϖ ("omega-shaped pi") is an archaic script form of pi (π), also used as a technical symbol.
• The letter rho (ρ) can occur in different stylistic variants, with the descending tail either going straight down or curled to the right. The symbol ϱ (U+03F1) is designated specifically for the curled form, used as a technical symbol.
• The letter sigma, in standard orthography, has two variants: ς, used only at the ends of words, and σ, used elsewhere. The form ϲ ("lunate sigma", resembling a Latin c) is a medieval stylistic variant that can be used in both environments without the final/non-final distinction.
• The capital letter upsilon (Υ) can occur in different stylistic variants, with the upper strokes either straight like a Latin Y, or slightly curled. The symbol ϒ (U+03D2) is designated specifically for the curled form, used as a technical symbol.
• The letter Phi can occur in two equally frequent stylistic variants, either shaped as (a circle with a vertical stroke through it) or as (a curled shape open at the top). The symbol ϕ (U+03D5) is designated specifically for the closed form, used as a technical symbol.^[3]

Look up beta, Beta in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Look up Ε, ε in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Look up Θ, θ in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... For other uses, see Kappa (disambiguation). ... When a circles diameter is 1, its circumference is π. Pi or π is the ratio of a circles circumference to its diameter in Euclidean geometry, approximately 3. ... Rho (upper case Ρ, lower case ρ) is a letter of the Greek alphabet. ... For other uses, see Sigma (disambiguation). ... Look up C, c in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Upsilon (upper case , lower case ) is the 20th letter of the Greek alphabet. ... Look up Φ, φ in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ...

Obsolete letters

The following letters are not part of the standard Greek alphabet, but were in use in pre-classical times in certain dialects. The letters digamma, san, qoppa, and sampi were also used in Greek numerals. Greek numerals are a system of representing numbers using letters of the Greek alphabet. ...