Greek diacritics
The polytonische orthography is a system of accents and other letters complementary character that was developed for the ancient Greek language. The Greek term Polyton or polytonisch ( πολυτονικός ) literally means mehrtönig or sounding much (compare the polytonality ) and linguistic contexts of specific audio tone containing several. It was abolished in 1982 by the Greek Parliament.
Generally
The polytonische orthography supplements the letters by eight different diacritics called signs that indicate the ancient Greek pronunciation of the classical period. They can be grouped into three accents for the different pitches, two aspirates, a sign of the result of a crasis and two characters for the Greek language in the history of silent i- sound.
The acute and the Gravisakzent can stand on all vowels. The circumflex can be installed on all long vowels (except Epsilon and Omicron, which are always short). Aspirates can also stand on the Rho except on vocals. The iota subscript is limited to Alpha, Eta and Omega. On the Ypsilon beginning of a word is always a Spiritus Asper. Additionally, the various groups of the diacritics are combined with each other, so there is for example a large Eta with alcohol asper, Gravis and iota adscriptum: ᾛ.
Greek words can be stressed only on one of the last three syllables. The acute may designate the emphasis on each of these syllables; on the last syllable, he is transformed into a grave when another word follows; the caret can be set only on the last two syllables. Depending on the use of the accents are distinguished:
History
For the h -sound, it was originally in the Greek alphabet the letter Heta. In this form it was again transferred to the old Italian and the Latin alphabet and our present H from it. When this sound was silent in the Ionian, this letter was converted into a eta for the sound [ ɛ ː ]. In this form it was taken over in Athens, where the h -sound, however, still existed. Therefore, in part, the left half of the Eta was used for this sound. Later, this forms the spirit developed asper. The Spiritus lenis was reinvented as a graphic equivalent of " no [h ] ". Several centuries later, the accents were added. The iota subscript has formed from the silent iota.
Over time, the tone-lingual character of the Greek script disappeared. Thus, the accents lost their loud -forming significance. The h -sound trailed off in general. Nevertheless, these characters have been retained in modern Greek texts long. However, all diacritics were abolished and replaced by a single stress accent, the Tonos, in the course of spelling reform of 1982. The various spellings of the individual sounds ( ι, η, υ, ει, οι and υι for [i ], ο and ω for [ ɔ ], and αι and ε for [ ɛ ] ) were retained.
In an intermediate phase ( from the early 20th century until 1982) part of the grave was replaced by the acute, especially in handwritten texts in the official spelling until the sixties of the 20th century. The grave was not taught in primary schools, where instruction in Dimotiki took place. Greek typewriters from that time had no keys for the Gravis.
Despite the introduction of the monotonic orthography in 1982, there are publishers and individuals who write for aesthetic reasons or traditionalist continue polytonisch (eg the newspaper " Estia " ), often with the simplified system without Gravis ( see above).
Example of polytonische and monotonic orthography
Πάτερ ημών ο εν τοις ουρανοίς αγιασθήτω το όνομά σου · ελθέτω η βασιλεία σου · γεννηθήτω το θέλημά σου, ως εν ουρανώ και επί της γης · τον άρτον ημών τον επιούσιον δος ημίν σήμερον · και άφες ημίν τα οφειλήματα ημών, ως και ημείς αφίεμεν τοις οφειλέταις ημών · και μη εισενέγκης ημάς εις πειρασμόν, αλλά ρύσαι ημάς από του πονηρού. αμήν.
Πάτερ ἡμῶν ὁ ἐν τοῖς οὐρανοῖς ἁγιασθήτω τὸ ὄνομά σου · ἐλθέτω ἡ βασιλεία σου · γεννηθήτω τὸ θέλημά σου, ὡς ἐν οὐρανῷ καὶ ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς · τὸν ἄρτον ἡμῶν τὸν ἐπιούσιον δὸς ἡμῖν σήμερον · καὶ ἄφες ἡμῖν τὰ ὀφειλήματα ἡμῶν, ὡς καὶ ἡμεῖς ἀφίεμεν τοῖς ὀφειλέταις ἡμῶν · καὶ μὴ εἰσενέγκῃς ἡμᾶς εἰς πειρασμόν, ἀλλὰ ῥῦσαι ἡμᾶς ἀπὸ τοῦ πονηροῦ. ἀμήν.
Character table
A shaded box means that this character does not exist.