Greek language texts can be divided into three very broad periods of history. Texts before 1453 C.E. (A.D) - the fall of the Byzantine Empire - are usually referred to as Ancient Greek, while texts since that date are called Modern Greek. But even "Modern" Greek had a broad system of accents, breathing marks, and complex character indicators, that has lasted into recent times. This system is referred to as Polytonic Greek.
Conversely, "simplified" Greek is called Monotonic Greek, which developed as Greek speakers realized that some accent marks could be eliminated without significantly affecting daily activity. Monotonic Greek, which has minimal accents, is the only form of Greek used officially in Greece since 1982.
Since most public domain texts we deal with are written in Polytonic Greek, we need to be able to understand at least some basics about it to reproduce it accurately.
Specific reproduction of texts, and how much of the accent system to retain, are covered under Language Guidelines and may be modified by Project Comments. Likewise, the method of entry is not the subject of this page.
When confronted with a word in Greek, you not only need to look at the character, but also at the various marks around it. The rules of what mark can appear where are complex, but the categories and shapes of these marks include:
BREATHING MARKS
[Roughly equivalent to sounding or not sounding an "h" in English]
Rough breathing - sounding an "h" - is indicated by a mark above a letter that looks like a small ( left parenthesis.
Smooth breathing - the lack of such a sound - is indicated by a mark that looks like a small ) right parenthesis.
ACCENT MARKS
There are three accents marks in Greek: acute, grave, and circumflex.
The Acute and Grave marks look like those marks in most other languages: "rising to the right" ´ for acute, and "lowering to the right" ` for grave.
The Circumflex accent does not usually look like the "Western" language circumflex (a "hat" ^ ). It is usually indicated by either the mark that is called a tilde ~ in the West, or else by an inverted breve, which doesn't display by itself on most computers unless you have a special font installed. A "regular" breve looks like this ˘ , so you can imagine that an inverted breve looks like an upside-down cup. Note that a "regular" breve can appear as a "length" mark (see below), so a regular breve is NOT an accent mark.
Accent Marks appear on top of lower case Greek letters, but for upper case letters, they can appear either on top or just to the left, depending on how a book was typeset or a manuscript written.
LENGTH MARKS
As in Latin and some other languages, Greek uses the Macron ¯ and Breve ˘ to distinguish Long and Short vowel sounds respectively when there is a possibility of confusion.
OTHER MARKS
The Diaeresis ¨ is used to indicate that two vowels together need to be pronounced separately.
The Iota Subscript is a small Greek letter Iota ι that appears under (or just to the right of a capital letter) under some conditions when an iota follows another vowel.
Finally, in ancient texts which have been recovered from manuscripts, a small dot or ring may be placed under a questionable letter, to indicate uncertainty in identifying the original.