I was wondering if someone can shed some light on the mysterious upsilon. Am looking at the Mastronarde Intro to Attic Greek, and he talks about the various u sounds, but it also has a y aspect as in Οδυσσέας. Mr M. mentions the diphthong ui with the iota sometimes omitted.. but anyhow, I know I have to navigate between the various ancient and modern usages, and greatly appreciate any help.
I don’t have Mastronarde, but it’s hardly mysterious. Between two consonants or beginning a word followed by a consonant, it’s the vowel. In the combination υι it’s the diphthong though treated effectively as consonant, “we.” More of a true diphthong in ευ. M. focuses on Attic and so think of it in terms of Attic pronunciation.
TY.
I think by the vowel you refer to the i, or y sound as I think μῦθοι isn’t muthoi..
The modern pronunciation is like Spanish i, and in many English words derived from Greek we pronounce it i as in hit. However, the ancient pronunciation probably wasn’t i. It was probably like French u, English boot, or English put. This depends on what period and dialect you’re talking about.
It does indeed sound strange to modern speakers of English and Greek!
Ευριπίδης
Evripídis
indeed! thx, and will move to the learning Greek board
The “v” and “f” stuff for upsilon is a modern Greek thing:
https://latin.stackexchange.com/questions/15819/evidence-about-pronunciation-of-%ce%b5%cf%85-and-%ce%b1%cf%85-in-homeric-greek
aiyah!!!
the boot sound will take work.
φυσιο fysio.
my brother (did biology at oxford) said phusis and it upset my mind
Here’s something to get your head around. In ancient Greek vowels are either long or short. The quantitative distinction is fundamental, built into every word in the language. For example the υ in μῦθος is long, while the υ in Οδυσσεια is short.
But as in any language, pronunciation changes over time. In modern Greek αὐτό is pronounced aftó, for instance, but in ancient Greek αυ is a diphthong, something like English ow.
If you’re interested in the pronunciation of ancient Greek, there’s an excellent and thoroughgoing book on it by W. Sidney Allen: “Vox Graeca”—written in English, conveniently for us! You may be able to access a copy in the UCB library.
As a student I attended a course of lectures by Prof. Allen. He memorably demonstrated the original sound of φ (an aspirated pi) by holding a slip of paper in front of his mouth and loudly saying what I heard as “pee.”
bcrowell εγραψε(wrote):
It does indeed sound strange to modern speakers of English and Greek!
Only if you were taught wrong, with the horrid Erasmian accent, or some variation thereof. It was, and is so bad, in fact, that Erasmus himself soon abandoned it.
As there is evidence from inscriptions that iotacism was starting to take hold even in Plato’s time, there should be no reason why we cannot use the /i/ pronunciation for Attic if we want. Especially since many modern-day Greeks themselves today do exactly that when reciting from or reading aloud classical texts. Check out the recordings of Attic authors like Plato on Librivox and you’ll hear what I mean.
Like interlinears, I consider Erasmian pronunciation the spawn of Satan (thanks to Barry H. for the metaphor). 
But, having said all that, any spoken ancient Greek is better than none. 
As you can see from persequor’s post above, people can get very worked up about how to pronounce classical Greek. Myself, I’d say you can pronounce it any way you want—or not pronounce it at all, even. What we have is written texts (none of which uses εγραψα as 3rd person, as persequor does).
But if you want to know how Greek was pronounced in classical times, W.S. Allen (see my post) will steer you straight.
Professor Joachim Stenzel who taught a course in Homeric Greek at SJSU back in the 70’s would have agreed completely with this view. He even said it was ok to use the English pronunciations of the names of the characters in the Iliad.
He had a few interesting tales to tell of the teaching methods employed in Germany in the 20’s. For instance when reading Homer the students were instructed to pound on their desk tops to emphasize the ictus in each foot of the verse.
mwh is correct in saying that εγραψα is not 3rd person. That is εγραψε (aorist). My mistake, now corrected in my post.
As I mentioned, any spoken ancient Greek is better than none. While I don’t say that using the language communicatively is necessary for learning, it certainly can help. I didn’t start learning Greek that way. It was strictly grammar-translation. A little over 10 years ago, however, I began adding speaking and listening to Greek to my approaches. It helps me a great deal. If you decide to do so, using an accent that the Greeks themselves use seems better. Not only is does it have some claim to authenticity, but it honors Greek culture and traditions.
Just my two drachmas,
Persequor
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My beginning Greek professor did the same demonstration, but had us hold our hands in front of our mouths so we could feel the difference.
awesome thanks everyone. I will follow up on the suggestions. I’m on parallel tracts with ancient and modern and am sensitive to people and institutions expending so much energy studying the language and history of the Greeks, who are very much still alive (I have great respect for both).
I got a sense when I was there that they had to learn it in school, the way we had to learn abt the civil war etc, which can dampen people’s enthusiasm. But the ancient ways are there to see, in the faces and culture of the people, and the beauty of the geography. it makes it easy to see how it all came about.
I can really identify with Freya Stark; I would much rather sit by some ancient ruins in a forest somewhere that haven’t been overrun by tourists, and wouldn’t want to change a thing.