Greek Pronunciation

There is also an extremely useful site provided by Donald Mastronarde at UC Berkeley, where you can learn about Greek pronunciation and listen to sample audio recordings to help you practice the basic sounds:

Ancient Greek Tutorials, by Donald J. Mastronarde

For specific pronunciation recommendations and tips here at this website, see my remarks about Croy 1.2 Remarks on Pronunciation, along with the general observations below. Remember: the pronucniation of ancient Greek (including Biblical Greek) is not an exact science, so here are some important factors to keep in mind:

• variation. ancient Greek was spoken over a large geographical area for hundreds and hundreds of years; the pronunciation of Greek varied widely over space and over time
• dialects. there were many different dialects of ancient Greek, with an enormous variety of pronunciation from dialect to dialect
• non-standard pronunciation. there were many foreigners who spoke Greek, and they no doubt spoke it with an "accent" (perhaps no worse than the accent you will end up using!)
• indirect evidence only. our evidence for the pronunciation of Greek is all indirect evidence, so that even today there are many details of Greek pronunciation about which scholars disagree
• tonal system. the tonal aspect of Greek pronunciation is completely lost to us - so even if we can attempt to reconstruct some aspects of ancient Greek pronunciation, that reconstruction will always be radically incomplete

So keeping in mind that we are not really sure just what ancient Greek sounded like, you need to decide how you are going to pronounce it. You cannot learn Greek without reading it out loud all the time! Exactly how you choose to pronounce the Greek is really not that important, so long as you choose something you feel comfortable with and that encourages you to be consistent. Here are some recommendations for developing your own style of pronunciation:

• Be loud and passionate! Nobody knows for sure how ancient Greek was pronounced - but that should not make you shy about pronouncing it! The most important this is to be loud and passionate about your pronunciation! There is no point in reading out loud if you are going to be hesitant about it. And since there is no "right or wrong" way of pronouncing the Greek, there is no reason to hesitate. Be loud and go for it!
• Say everything out loud all the time! Quantity is definitely more important than quality. There is almost no virtue at all in studying a language silently. To learn a language you need to make noise... so make a lot of noise when you are studying Greek! Okay, if you have a roommate, maybe you will have to make noise quietly. But still: you need to make noise. ALL THE TIME.
• Emphasize the word stress. Greek used a pitch system and they probably did not use word stress the same way that English does. But since you are an English speaker, word stress is a big part of how you remember words and word patterns. So make you put a strong stress on the accented syllable in each word. It does not matter if it has a circumflex or an acute or a grave accent - just make sure you stress the accented syllable!
• Pronounce the iota subscript. Please believe me: the iota subscript is your friend! You need to pronounce it just like any other iota. The iota subscript will help you recognize dative forms of the nouns along with many important verb forms. By pronouncing the iota subscript, you will learn these forms! If you do not pronounce the iota subscript, you will never learn these forms. So: pronounce the iota subscript! Think about this like training wheels on your Greek bicycle. You are a beginner and you need those training wheels! Once you have gotten your sense of Greek balance (and learned the dative forms!), then you can stop pronouncing the iota subscript if you want.

Varieties of speakers. You will be exposed to a variety of speakers here in this class. A large portion of the online audio was prepared by Marilyn Phemister, who has a very consistent style of reading (she has put the entire New Testament in Greek online in audio format - what an awesome public service!). You will hear that Phemister does not, as a rule, pronounce the iota subscript, and her approach to the aspirated consonants varies. You will also hear audio recorded by me, which is a much more exaggerated kind of pronunciation (I believe that intonation is really important for understanding the meaning!) - and you will note that I do pronounce the iota subscript. Then you will also get to listen to audio recitations by other students in class, so that you will get to hear lots more ways of pronouncing the ancient Greek. I hope that you will enjoy it. I am really looking forward to hearing everybody's recitations in class.

And now that you have this overview of Greek and its pronunciation, you can start learning the Alphabet, and practicing your pronuncation along the way.