Picture of Greg Brush
Re: courses
by Greg Brush - Tuesday, 8 November 2005, 12:28 PM
  Not really, although strictly speaking, it depends on what you're referring to by "ancient greek".

This term is often used indiscriminately to cover anything written in several major Greek dialects during the more than 500 year span from the originally oral Homeric epics of about 800BC, thru the Classical (Attic) Greek of the "Golden Age" of Athenian literature (c500BC) to post-Alexander (Hellenistic) treatises in science and philosophy (c250BC). There are ongoing changes over this period, both in pronunciation and grammar, and these changes continue even more rapidly after the conquests of Alexander.

Biblical Greek is written in the so-called koine (κοινή = common) Greek of about 100AD, which evolved from the merger of the major Greek dialects after Alexander's conquests of the Greek and non-Greek worlds. It represents a transitional stage between the Greek of the ancient world and the Modern Greek of our time. It is somewhat easier to learn than Classical Attic because of various grammatical simplifications, and much easier than the epic language of Homer almost a thousand years earlier.

Regards,
Greg Brush