I told you in the previous post that I would send you a link to my work on chapter 7 of Greek to GCSE, and I never did. Well, this is me sending you the link. You can find my answers here.
Let me know what you think in the comments.
I’ve also re-thought the change in my pronunciation. I will stay with the Erasmian pronunciation that I’ve always used, but with just two changes: (1) omicron (ο) will be pronounced like [oː] [just like omega (ω)]; and, (2) upsilon (υ) will be pronounced like the German [ü]. I don’t like how there’s no difference in modern Greek between iota (ι), eta (η), upsilon (υ) and the omicron-iota diphthong (οι). It just seems absurd to use the modern pronunciation for ancient Greek, in which things like ὑμεῖς and ἡμεῖς would sound the same and cause absolute confusion. These words are not spelled this way in modern Greek. Confusing forms have become distinguished, and the problem doesn’t exist as it would if we used modern pronunciation for ancient reading.
I think the most important thing is consistency. I noticed in my pronunciation in the video that I sometimes used [ɑː] instead of [oː] for omicron. Hearing that today sounds very strange, so I’ve already made that shift consistent.
Ἰάσων τοῦ Ἰωάννου
Let me know what you think in the comments.
I’ve also re-thought the change in my pronunciation. I will stay with the Erasmian pronunciation that I’ve always used, but with just two changes: (1) omicron (ο) will be pronounced like [oː] [just like omega (ω)]; and, (2) upsilon (υ) will be pronounced like the German [ü]. I don’t like how there’s no difference in modern Greek between iota (ι), eta (η), upsilon (υ) and the omicron-iota diphthong (οι). It just seems absurd to use the modern pronunciation for ancient Greek, in which things like ὑμεῖς and ἡμεῖς would sound the same and cause absolute confusion. These words are not spelled this way in modern Greek. Confusing forms have become distinguished, and the problem doesn’t exist as it would if we used modern pronunciation for ancient reading.
I think the most important thing is consistency. I noticed in my pronunciation in the video that I sometimes used [ɑː] instead of [oː] for omicron. Hearing that today sounds very strange, so I’ve already made that shift consistent.
Ἰάσων τοῦ Ἰωάννου
Hi Jason, if the goal is to maintain difference in sounds for difference in forms, then why amalgamate ο and ω? With regard to υ and ü, I guess that means you can now distinguish υ from ου.
ReplyDeleteAre you now sounding the rough breathing? I have the impression that οὐκ and οὐχ are distinguished fairly consistently in the New Testament, but I may be wrong. I saw Randall Buth's evidence for the loss of the distinction in the papyri.
My reason for asking is that I am wondering whether to change from Erasmian. The thing I like about Modern is that I feel a Greek like, say, Spiros Zodhiates, will have a better feel for intonation for the sentence as a whole. A good reader of English makes the meaning much clearer be putting stress on the correct words, and by use of pauses. I can try doing this in Greek, but I suspect that it just sounds like an Englishman.
Andrew
Yes, Andrew. You assume correctly. I now make a distinction between, say, λύω and λούω. I don't find any confusion results when ο and ω are pronounced the same. Unlike υ and η, for example. (It is absurd to pronounce ἡμῖν and ὑμῖν the same.) I have continued to use the breathing distinction (smooth and rough), though this tends to drop out for me like the ה in Hebrew.
ReplyDeleteI know that it's kinda irrational, but I have made my decisions based more on how I feel about things. I agree with Buth's justifications for the Koiné pronunciation, but I just want to maintain as much difference between the sounds as I can. I don't find confusion resulting from the ο and ω identity, while much confusion results from making ε and αι sound the same (as in λύεσθε [indicative mid/pass] and λύεσθαι [infinitive mid/pass]). I just don't want to combine those sounds - and so I will maintain the Erasmian distinction essentially only in the diphthongs, and I really don't like how φεύξομαι comes out when ευ is pronounced as ev/ef.
Does that make sense?