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Introduction to Greek

Introduction to Greek

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Introduction to Greek, Second Edition is an introductory text to Classical Greek. It is designed for the first full year course and it concentrates on the basics in a way that allows the material to be covered easily in courses that meet three times a week over the course of two semesters. The focus of the text is on grammar with slightly altered readings drawn chiefly from the works of Xenophon and Herodotus.

This text concentrates on the acquisition of Ancient Greek through a focus on grammar, motivated in part by short, only slightly altered readings drawn chiefly from the works of Xenophon and Herodotus.
Shelmerdine’s book is extremely well laid-out with clear tables and large, easy-to-read text. Her table of contents is incredibly detailed, making it very easy to find each topic. Her chapter vocabularies are very helpfully divided into two parts: learning and reading, which come under the same heading but are distinguished in an easily recognizable way, since bold type highlights the vocabulary to be learned (words which will appear frequently throughout the book), while the reading/passive vocabulary is displayed in ordinary type. The learning vocabularies are quite short, especially in the later chapters, and do not place too heavy a burden on the beginning student who will want to spend most of his/her time on learning the new grammatical forms presented in each chapter.
—Kirsty Jenkins, Bryn Mawr Classical Review 2008.12.42

Cynthia W. Shelmerdine is the Robert M. Armstrong Professor of Classics, emerita, at the University of Texas. Her research interests include Aegean Bronze Age Archaeology and Mycenaean Greek. She is the author of Wilding’s Greek for Beginners with Focus as well as A Guide to the Palace of Nestor (Princeton 2001).

Preface

This book was born of my experience over the last three decades teaching ancient Greek to American university students, who bear little resemblance to the audience (British schoolboys with some knowledge of Latin) for which most older textbooks were intended. College students appreciate an acknowledgment of the fact that they are coming to Greek at an older age and with wider interests. They find a new paradigm, for example, easier to remember if they understand the linguistic pattern behind it. At the same time they need some review of English grammar, and many have never taken Latin. Newer morphology- based textbooks address these needs, some in great detail. Another characteristic, however, of the students for whom it is intended is that they want results: they want to absorb the grammar and to start reading Greek, real Greek, as soon as possible. Retention rates suggest that many students are unwilling to invest two or even more semesters in a language if at the end of that time they will still be learning syntax, rather than reading the authors who inspired them to learn the language in the first place. To this end, I have tried to provide useful linguistic background, but also to focus on the basics and keep the book fairly short. The readings, drawn chiefly from Xenophon and Herodotus, are as close to the original as feasible, and increasingly so in later chapters. They seem to me to provide better practice and preparation than the invented passages of reading-based textbooks. The epigraphs which appear at the beginning of some chapters illustrate a point of grammar covered in that chapter. They are there for teacher and students to enjoy together if they wish; the vocabulary is not included in the glossary.

The starting point for the first edition was L.A. Wilding’s Greek for Beginners (2nd edition, Faber and Faber Limited 1959), one of the best of the older texts. Wilding’s selection of readings, practice sentences and vocabulary were appealing features. His assumption that Greek students already knew Latin was a drawback, however, and he provided little in the way of forms or grammatical explanations, referring students instead to a primer of Greek grammar. I created a full textbook based on Wilding’s sentences and readings, including paradigms, explanations of morphology and syntax, chapter vocabularies, and so on. I also added material not in the original, like athematic verbs and conditions, and moved some syntactical sections earlier in the book. Grammar was explained with reference to English, not Latin.

The second edition carries these changes still further. The most significant modifications are the following:

  • The order of presentation has been further revised; for example, the perfect and pluperfect tenses and the numbers are deferred to near the end of the book, and athematic verbs have moved from the last chapter to chapter 23.
  • Some material omitted from the first edition has been added (e.g. the potential optative, accusative of respect, alternative verb forms).
  • Some longer chapters have been split into two.
  • Chapter vocabularies now distinguish between words in bold (to be learned, and recurring in future chapters) and words in regular type (appearing in the current chapter, but rarely if at all in future exercises, and never in English- to-Greek sentences).
  • Explanations have been revised and in some cases expanded. Increased use of bullets and outline format will, I hope, make information easier to find.
  • Syntactical presentations emphasize how to recognize a construction rather than how to form it. That is, they proceed from the perspective of a reader who is working through a Greek sentence, learning to use key words to predict what will follow and to recognize constructions. (The presentation of contrary-to-fact conditions in Ch. 12.6 exemplifies this approach.) Tables of reading expectations are provided for more complex constructions; these are repeated in Appendix 5. Those who like the traditional construction summaries, more useful when working from English to Greek than in reading, will find them in Appendix 6.
  • Exercises of various types are included, especially in earlier chapters, though the focus is still on Greek-to-English and English-to-Greek sentences.
  • Principal parts are emphasized more, and more consistently.
  • The focus is on Attic spelling (ττ for σσ), and Attic forms current in the 5th cy. BCE. Thus, for example, some extant but later principal parts are omitted.

    • These and other changes will, I hope, make the textbook more effective and easier to use. Many of them either echo or derive from comments by those who have reviewed the first edition and/or used it themselves. While I have not adopted every suggestion offered, I offer heartfelt thanks to all who have helped in this way and by catching errata to improve the book. They include my colleagues at The University of Texas at Austin Lesley Dean-Jones, Ben Henry, Tom Hubbard and Jack Kroll, colleagues elsewhere Simon Burris, Barbara Clayton, Brent Froberg, Jim Marks, Jeanne Neumann, Kirk Ormand, Gilbert Rose and Susan Shelmerdine, as well as the anonymous reviewers for Focus Publishing. U.T. graduate students Bart Natoli and Luis Salas assisted with proofreading. Finally, I would like to express once again my debt to many students whom I have taught with this book in earlier drafts and in the first edition. They are the best test of what works well and how to improve what does not; and they have given me the pleasure of shared discoveries which is one of the most rewarding aspects of teaching.

    Cynthia W. Shelmerdine
    New Year’s Day 2008

    This is a complete new edition of Cynthia Shelmerdine’s introductory Classical Greek text. Designed for the first full year course, this text concentrates on the basics in a way that allows the material to be covered easily in courses that meet three times a week over the course of two semesters. The focus of the text is on grammar, motivated in part by short, only slightly altered readings drawn chiefly from the works of Xenophon and Herodotus.

    Cynthia W. Shelmerdine is Robert M. Armstrong Centennial Professor of Classics at The University of Texas at Austin. Her research interests include Aegean Bronze Age Archaeology and Mycenaean Greek.

    Preface     xiiiCHAPTER 1   11. The Greek alphabet   12. Consonant groups   23. Vowel groups (diphthongs)   24. Accents   35. Breathings   46. Punctuation and capital letters   4CHAPTER 2   71. Verb formation: principal parts   72. The present active indicative of thematic verbs (1st principal part)   83. Verb accents   94. The negative ο?   105. Common conjunctions   10Chapter 2 Vocabulary    11CHAPTER 3   131. Noun formation   132. The definite article   133. Feminine nouns of the 1st declension   144. Noun and adjective accents   155. Accents of 1st declension nouns   156. Prepositions   167. The future active indicative of thematic verbs (2nd principal part)   17Chapter 3 Vocabulary    18CHAPTER 4   191. The paradigm of the definite article   192. Masculine nouns of the 1st declension   193. The imperfect active indicative of thematic verbs (1st principal part)   204. Some uses of the definite article   215. Verbs taking genitive or dative   21Chapter 4 Vocabulary   22CHAPTER 5   231. Masculine and feminine nouns of the 2nd declension   232. The aorist active indicative of thematic verbs (3rd principal part)   233. Aspect in the indicative   244. Word order   255. The possessive genitive   26Chapter 5 Vocabulary   27CHAPTER 6   291. Neuter nouns of the 2nd declension   292. Some uses of the dative   303. The present active infinitive of thematic verbs   304. The complementary infinitive   315. Reading expectations   316. The negatives ο? and μ?   31Chapter 6 Vocabulary   32CHAPTER 7   331. 1st and 2nd declension adjectives   332. Attributive adjectives   343. Predicate adjectives and nouns   344. Enclitics   355. The present indicative and infinitive of ε?μ?, ‘be’   366. The dative of possession   37Chapter 7 Vocabulary   38CHAPTER 8   391. 3rd declension nouns   392. 3rd declension nouns: stems in -κ, -τ   403. The present active imperative, 2nd person, of thematic verbs and ε?μ?   404. Connection   415. μ?ν and δ?   42READING: Underground Dwellings   44Chapter 8 Vocabulary   44CHAPTER 9   451. 3rd declension nouns: stems in -τ, -δ, -θ   452. α?τ?ς, intensive use   463. α?τ?ς as personal pronoun   464. α?τ?ς, attributive use   475. Elision   486. ο??ς τ? ε?μι   49READING: Cyrus Is Helped by Camels   49Chapter 9 Vocabulary   50CHAPTER 10   511. 3rd declension nouns: stems in -ντ, -κτ   51
    2. The future and imperfect indicative of ε?μ?, ‘be’   523. The relative pronoun   52READING: The Battle of Thermopylae   54Chapter 10 Vocabulary   55CHAPTER 11   571. 3rd declension nouns: stems in -ρ   572. Syllabic and temporal augments   583. Augments of compound verbs   584. Principal parts of palatal stem thematic verbs   605. The strong aorist active indicative of thematic verbs (3rd principal part)   61READING: Xerxes Whips the Sea   63Chapter 11 Vocabulary   64CHAPTER 12   651. 3rd declension nouns: stems in -ν   652. More uses of the article   663. Compounds of ε?μ?, ‘be’   664. Conditions   675. Simple conditions   686. Contrary-to-fact conditions   68READING: Admetus and Alcestis   70Chapter 12 Vocabulary   71CHAPTER 13   731. 3rd declension nouns: stems in -σ   732. Principal parts of dental stem thematic verbs   743. The future and aorist active infinitives of thematic verbs   754. Infinitive aspect   765. The infinitive as a verbal noun; the articular infinitive   76READING: The Wooden Wall   78Chapter 13 Vocabulary   79CHAPTER 14   811. 3rd declension nouns: stems in -ι, -υ   812. Principal parts of labial stem verbs   823. νομ?ζω and φημ?    834. Indirect statement   845. The infinitive in indirect statement   84READING: The Ten Thousand Reach the Sea   87Chapter 14 Vocabulary   88CHAPTER 15   891. 3rd declension nouns: stems in diphthongs   892. The present and imperfect passive indicative of thematic verbs (1st principal part)   903. The genitive of personal agent   914. Irregular 3rd declension nouns   925. The aorist passive indicative of thematic verbs (6th principal part)   926. The future passive indicative of thematic verbs (6th principal part)   93READING: The Cunning of Artemisia   95Chapter 15 Vocabulary   96Review of Principal Parts   97CHAPTER 16   991. μ?γας, πολ?ς and adjectives of the τ?λας type   992. Regular comparison of adjectives   1003. Comparison with ? and the genitive of comparison   1014. Some uses of the genitive   1025. Some uses of the dative   102READING: How The Egyptians Avoided Gnats   104Chapter 16 Vocabulary   104CHAPTER 17   1051. The middle voice: meaning   1052. The middle voice: formation   1063. Review of middle future forms   1074. Some uses of the accusative   1085. Time expressions   110READING: Victory In Bad Weather   111Chapter 17 Vocabulary   112CHAPTER 18   1131. Active imperatives of thematic verbs    1132. Imperatives of ε?μ?, ‘be’   1143. Future and aorist middle and passive infinitives of thematic verbs    1144. The future infinitive of ε?μ?, ‘be’   1155. Personal pronouns, 1st and 2nd persons   1166. Possessive adjectives, 1st and 2nd persons   116READING: Double Dealings of Themistocles   118Chapter 18 Vocabulary   119CHAPTER 19   1211. Contract verbs   1212. Contract verbs in -εω   1213. Impersonal δε?   1224. Contract verbs in -αω   1235. Contract verbs in -οω   1256. Contract nouns and adjectives   126READING: Xerxes and the Helmsman   127Chapter 19 Vocabulary   128CHAPTER 20   1291. Adjectives of the σ?φρων and ?ληθ?ς types   1292. Adjectives of the ?δ?ς type   1303. The adjective π?ς   1314. The liquid future (2nd principal part   1315. The liquid aorist (3rd principal part   1326. Review of liquid future and aorist forms   132READING: Polycrates and the Ring 1: Advice from Amasis   134Chapter 20 Vocabulary   135CHAPTER 21   1371. Participles   1372. The present active participle in -ων (1st principal part)   1374. The circumstantial participle   1395. Further notes on participles   1406. The future active participle (2nd principal part)   1417. The aorist active participle (3rd principal part)   141READING: Polycrates and the Ring 2: Destiny Is Destiny   143Chapter 21 Vocabulary   144CHAPTER 22   1451. Present middle / passive participles (1st principal part)   1452. Future and aorist middle participles (2nd and 3rd principal parts)   1473. Aorist and future passive participles (6th principal part)   1474. The genitive absolute    1485. Further comparison of adjectives in -τερος, -τατος   149READING: The Ingenuity of Cyrus   150Chapter 22 Vocabulary   151CHAPTER 23   1531. Athematic (-μι) verbs   1532. Athematic (-μι) verbs, 1st principal part   1533. Athematic (-μι) verbs, 3rd principal part   1564. Further comparison of adjectives in -(?)ων, -(ι)στος   1585. Declension of comparatives in -(?)ων   159READING: Crocodiles   160Chapter 23 Vocabulary   161 CHAPTER 24   1631. Reflexive pronouns   1632. Direct and indirect reflexives   1643. The reciprocal pronoun   1644. Questions   1655. Demonstrative pronouns / adjectives   1666. τοιο?τος, τοσο?τος   167READING: A Strange Rescue   168Chapter 24 Vocabulary   169CHAPTER 25   1711. The subjunctive mood   1712. The subjunctive of thematic and athematic (-μι) verbs   1713. Exhortations   1734. The deliberative subjunctive   1735. Prohibitions   1746. γ?γνομαι   174READING: Aristagoras and His Map   175Chapter 25 Vocabulary   176CHAPTER 26   1771. The optative mood   1772. The optative of regular thematic verbs   1773. The optative of contract verbs   1784. The optative of athematic (-μι) verbs   1795. The potential optative   1806. Wishes   180READING: Marathon 1: Vain Appeal to Sparta   182READING: Marathon 2: The Battle    182Chapter 26 Vocabulary   183CHAPTER 27   1851. Sequence of moods   1852. Purpose (final) clauses   1853. The future participle to express purpose   1864. ο?δα   1875. Irregular strong aorists   1896. Supplementary participles in indirect statement   1907. Indirect statement with ?τι or ?ς   190READING: An Argument about Command 1: Gelon’s Offer   192Chapter 27 Vocabulary   193CHAPTER 28   1951. Future and general conditions   1952. Conditions with the subjunctive   1963. Conditions with the optative   1974. Directional suffixes   198READING: An Argument about Command 2: The Greek Response   199Chapter 28 Vocabulary   200CHAPTER 29   2011. Adverbs   2012. ?χω + adverb   2013. μ?λα, μ?λλον, μ?λιστα   2024. The interrogative pronoun / adjective   2035. The indefinite pronoun / adjective   2036. Interrogative and indefinite adverbs   204READING: Born To Be King 1: A High-Handed Child   205Chapter 29 Vocabulary   206CHAPTER 30   2071. The indefinite relative pronoun / adjective   2072. Correlative pronouns / adjectives   2083. Correlative adverbs   2084. Conditional relative and temporal clauses   209READING: Born To Be King 2: King Hereafter   211 Chapter 30 Vocabulary   211CHAPTER 31   2131. The perfect system   2132. The perfect and pluperfect active indicative of regular verbs (4th principal part)   2133. The perfect and pluperfect middle / passive indicative of regular verbs (5th principal part)   2144. The dative of personal agent   2155. The perfect infinitive (4th and 5th principal parts)   2166. Result (consecutive) clauses   217READING: Pylos and Sphacteria 1: An Ill Wind   218 Chapter 31 Vocabulary   219CHAPTER 32   2211. The 2nd (strong) perfect active   2212. Reduplication   2223. The perfect middle / passive of consonant stem verbs   2234. The perfect active participle   2245. The perfect middle / passive participle   2256. Supplementary participles not in indirect statement   226READING: Pylos and Sphacteria 2: Stalemate   228Chapter 32 Vocabulary   229CHAPTER 33   2311. The perfect subjunctive and optative   2312. Numbers   2323. Declension of numbers   2334. The negative pronouns / adjectives ο?δε?ς and μηδε?ς   2335. Clauses of fearing   2346. Indirect questions   236READING: Pylos and Sphacteria 3: A Boast Fulfilled   237Chapter 33 Vocabulary   238CHAPTER 34   2391. ε?μι, ‘go’   2392. ?ημι   2413. Temporal clauses with ?ως, μ?χρι and ?στε   2434. Temporal clauses with πρ?ν   244READING: Socrates’ Defense Speech   246Chapter 34 Vocabulary   246Greek–English Glossary   247English–Greek Glossary   257Appendix 1: Principal Parts   265Appendix 2: Uses of Cases   269Appendix 3: Prepositions   270Appendix 4: Summary of Forms   271Nouns    271Adjectives   276Participles   279Pronouns   281Numbers   284Regular Thematic Verbs   285Contract Thematic Verbs   293Athematic Verbs: δε?κνυμι, τ?θημι, ?στημι, δ?δωμι   296Irregular Athematic Verbs: ?ημι, ε?μ?, ε?μι, φημ?, ο?δα   303Appendix 5: Reading Expectations   307Appendix 6: Construction Summaries   309Appendix 7: Regular Verb Tense Markers and Endings by Tense   311Appendix 8: Regular Verb Tense Markers and Endings by Mood   313Index    315
    Introduction to Greek is for students taking an introductory course in ancient Greek taught at the college or university level.

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