[B-Greek] Misc Thoughts about Greek
Kevin Riley
klriley at alphalink.com.au
Tue Jun 20 19:53:43 EDT 2006
-------Original Message-------
From: Amos Bender
Date: 06/21/06 04:50:41
MISCELLANEOUS THOUGHTS ABOUT GREEK.
As I observe various Greek words and their various spellings, I really
wonder if the various spellings of words were always pronounced differently.
Or if readers in old times simply knew that although this word in this
setting is spelled as this that yet it can or should be pronounced the same
as if spelled in it's other way. One example involves the H-Eta quite often
being exchanged for the E-Epsilon at the beginning of words. This involves
at least the words "EULOGHSEN" and "EUPISKON". Their obviously are other
Greek words wherein other letters for some reason likewise are used quite
interchangeably.
******************************
Ahh, I just realised what you mean above - the change isn't random. Where
you add the epsilon augment to a verb [e.g imperfect, aorist] the first
letter, if it is a vowel, is changed because the epsilon is absorbed by the
following vowel. You then get E+E -> H, E+A -> H, E+O -> W. But E+EU does
not always change to HU, but sometimes remains EU.
Kevin Riley
More information about the B-Greek
mailing list