Lesson 1.3 · Getting started
Diphthongs and digraphs
Letter pairs that make a single sound, as English writes sh and ch.
A few sounds are written with two letters, exactly as English writes sh or ch. Each pair below is a single sound, and each is always spelled that same way.
Three consonant pairs
| Written | Sounds like | In a word |
|---|---|---|
th | th in thin | theos (God) |
ch | hard, as in Scottish loch | christos (Christ) |
ps | ps in lapse | psuchas (soul) |
Vowel pairs
When two vowels sit side by side they usually glide together into one sound. Nothing is hidden — you say both letters, quickly:
| Written | Sounds like | Written | Sounds like | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
ai | aisle | au | cow | |
ei | eight | eu | feud | |
oi | oil | ou | soup | |
ui | we |
So kai (and) rhymes with eye,
tou (of the) is too, and huios
(son) starts hwee-.
An h at the start
Some words begin with an h, and it is pronounced, just
as in English house: huios (son),
hoti (because), hagios (holy),
hōras (hour). Words that don't have it don't take it.
Where the stress goes
Stress the last syllable of the stem — the part of the word before
the grammar markers. So a·GA·pas,
LO·gos, an·THRŌ·pos. It never changes the
meaning of a word, so if you get it wrong nothing breaks; it is
there to help you read aloud.
In the Greek — single letters and breathing marks
th, ch and ps are the
single Greek letters θ, χ and ψ, and x is ξ. Written
with two of our letters, they still count as one letter of the
original.
The h is Greek's "rough breathing" — a small mark
like an apostrophe over the first vowel of a word (ὑιός, ὅτι,
ἅγιος) rather than a letter of its own. Here it is simply
written as the letter it sounds like.
Greek also writes accents (ά ᾶ ὰ) on almost every word. They were added centuries after the New Testament was written, and they almost never change which word is meant, so they are not written here. Lesson 9.4 lists the two places where that costs you something.
Practice
Read each aloud, then check the sound you expected:
ouranoseirēnashagios
Show the answers
- oo-ra-NOS — sky, heaven. The
ouis one sound, oo. - ei-RĒ-nas — peace.
eias in eight, and the bar makes a long e. - HA-gi-os — holy. The
his pronounced; thegis hard.