Loss of vowel quantity distinction The ancient distinction between long and short vowels was lost in popular speech at the beginning of the Koine period. "By the mid-second century [BC] however, the majority system had undergone important changes, most notably monophthongization, the loss of distinctive length, and the shift to a primary stress accent." From the 2nd century BC, spelling errors in non-literary Egyptian papyri suggest stress accent and loss of vowel length distinction. The widespread confusion between and in Attic inscriptions starting in the 2nd century AD was probably caused by a loss of vowel length distinction.
Transition to stress accent The means of accenting words changed from
pitch to
stress, meaning that the accented syllable had only one tone option (high) and was presumably louder or stronger. This shift directly corresponded with monophthongization and the loss of vowel timing distinctions, which destroyed the environment in which a pitch accent could be sustained. From the mid 2nd century BC, spelling errors all over the Mediterranean, including occasional graphic omissions of unaccented vowels, suggest a loss of vowel length distinction, which is commonly thought to result in the loss of tonal accent.
Diphthongs Spurious diphthongs Before a consonant, the diphthong had started to become monophthongal in Attic as early as the 6th century BC, and pronounced like , probably as . From the late 4th century BC in Attic, the
spurious diphthong (pseudo-diphthong) (now notating both etymological and etymological ) came to be pronounced like , probably as (with the
quality that the
digraph still has in modern Greek). Before a vowel, the diphthong did not follow the same evolution as pre-consonantal . One theory to explain this difference is that pre-vocalic may have kept a diphthongal value until the 4th century BC, the being progressively perceived as a glide from to the next vowel. From the late 4th century BC, the pre-vocalic diphthong came to be confused with , which implies that, unlike before a consonant, it retained the value , probably with a loss of openness distinction with ;
Short-first-element i diphthongs Diphthong was probably monophthongized at first as . This value is attested in Boeotian in the early 4th century BC with the Boeotian spelling of for . Confusion of with suggests that this transition had taken place by the mid 2nd century BC in Egyptian Greek. Further confusion between and is found in Palestine in the early 2nd century, and the confusion between and starting from c. 125 AD in Attic suggests that the monophthongization took place in the early 2nd century AD in learned Attic. Allen thinks the transition to (i.e. loss of openness distinction with ) to have taken place later; while Allen is not very explicit on this point, this theory seems based on the observation that while both and are confused with , is not confused with . However, not all scholars seem to agree. This is attested in Boeotian as early as the 3rd century BC with a spelling of for , but this was probably a dialectal trait. Still, diphthong must have kept a diphthongal value at least in learned language until Roman times, as it is transcribed as
oe in Latin. Further evidence of monophthongization is found from the early 1st century BC in Egyptian Greek, as well as in the early 2nd century AD in Palestine. (Look up note on evolution of for subsequent evolution.) Koine Greek initially seems to feature diphthong , which had been progressively monophthongized to (written for ) in Attic from the 6th century BC to the 4th century BC but retained in other Greek dialects. It was later monophthongized as or (depending on when the loss of vowel length distinction took place). The author of these lines has not found any reference on when this change took place, but this transition may be phonologically linked to, and at any rate is quite unlikely to have taken place after, the similar transition of to . (See discussion on below for subsequent evolution.)
Short-first-element u diphthongs Diphthongs and lost their ancient value of and
fortified to a fricative consonantal pronunciation of or , through the likely intermediate stages of and then Sporadic confusions of with , which attest a fricative pronunciation, are found as early as 3rd century BC Boeotia and in 2nd century BC Egypt. Further such confusions appear rarely in the papyri at the beginning of the 1st century AD. However, Gignac notes that before the Late Roman/Early Byzantine period spellings with are more common, which more likely represent the earlier transitional phases of or . Allen also believes that the fricative pronunciation was not generalized at once; for instance, Jewish catacombs inscriptions still show a diphthongal value in the 2nd–3rd century AD. Confusion of and with becomes increasingly common in late Roman and early Byzantine times, which suggests that it had been generalized by this time. Finally, indirect evidence comes from transcriptions into foreign languages, such as Coptic ϩⲓⲡⲡⲉϥ (
Hippef) for (2nd century AD),
Long-first-element i diphthongs Diphthong had started to become monophthongal in Attic at least as early as the 4th century BC as it was often written and probably pronounced . In Koine Greek, most were therefore subjected to the same evolution as original classical and came to be pronounced . However, in some inflexional endings (mostly 1st declension dative singular and
subjunctive 3 Sg.), the evolution was partially reverted from c. 200 BC, probably by analogy of forms of other cases/persons, to and was probably pronounced at first (look up note on evolution of for subsequent evolution). Other long-first-element diphthongs ( and ) became monophthongal by the 2nd century BC, as they were written and ; the former was probably pronounced , while the later may have been pronounced at first if openness distinction had not been lost yet, and was eventually pronounced at any rate (look up discussion of single vowels and below for details). From the 2nd century AD,
Atticism caused for a widespread reintroduction of the ancient spelling with the final , but in any case was not pronounced.
Long-first-element u diphthongs When augmented from in verbs, diphthong had been altered to from the 4th century BC. Other long-first-element diphthongs (, and ) had become monophthongal from the 1st century BC, as they were written as , and ; the first was probably pronounced , while the two later may have been pronounced and at first if openness distinction had not been lost yet ( and otherwise), and were eventually pronounced and at any rate (look up discussions of single vowels and and single vowel below for details).
Single vowel quality Apart from , simple vowels have better preserved their ancient pronunciation than diphthongs. As noted above, at the start of the Koine Greek period, pseudo-diphthong before consonant had a value of , whereas pseudo-diphthong had a value of ; these vowel qualities have remained unchanged through Modern Greek. Diphthong before vowel had been generally monophthongized to a value of and confused with , thus sharing later developments of . The quality of vowels , , and have remained unchanged through Modern Greek, as , , and . Vowels and started to be regularly confused in Attic inscriptions starting in the 2nd century AD, which may indicate that the quality distinction was lost around this time. However, this may as well indicate the loss of length distinction, with an earlier or simultaneous loss of quality distinction. Indeed, the fact that some less systematic confusion is found in Attic inscriptions from the 4th century BC may alternatively point to a loss of openness distinction in the 4th century BC, and the systematization of the confusion in the 2nd century AD would then have been caused by the loss of length distinction. C. 150 AD, Attic inscriptions started confusing and , indicating the appearance of a or (depending on when the loss of vowel length distinction took place) pronunciation that is still in usage in standard Modern Greek; however, it seems that some locutors retained the pronunciation for some time, as Attic inscriptions continued to in parallel confuse and , and transcriptions into Gothic and, to some extent, Old Armenian transcribe as e. Additionally, it is noted that while interchange of and does occur in the Ptolemaic and Roman period, these only occur in restrictive phonetic conditions or may otherwise be explained due to grammatical developments. Moreover,
itacism still shows exceptions in Asia Minor Greek, especially
Pontic Greek, where partially merges with instead of with . Koine Greek adopted for vowel the pronunciation of Ionic-Attic. Confusion of with appears in Egyptian papyri from the 2nd century BC and 2nd century AD, suggesting a pronunciation of , but this occurs only in restricted phonetic conditions or may be a regional trait (since Coptic did not have .) Transcriptions into Gothic and, to some extent, Armenian suggest that still retained a pronunciation, and the transition to in mainstream Greek is thought to have taken place at the end of the 1st millennium.
Loss of aspiration The aspirate breathing (
aspiration, referring here to the phoneme , which is usually marked by the
rough breathing sign), which was already lost in the
Ionic idioms of
Asia Minor and the
Aeolic of
Lesbos (
psilosis), later stopped being pronounced in Koine Greek. Incorrect or hypercorrect markings of assimilatory aspiration (i.e. un-aspirated plosive becomes aspirated before initial aspiration) in Egyptian papyri suggest that this loss was already under way in Egyptian Greek in the late 1st century BC. Transcriptions into foreign languages and consonant changes before aspirate testify that this transition must not have been generalized before the 2nd century AD, but transcriptions into Gothic show that it was at least well under way in the 4th century AD.
Consonants Among consonants, , , , , and all shifted over the course of the Koine period, but there is disagreement regarding timing of sound changes, and likely varied by dialect. The consonant , which had probably a value of in Classical Attic (though some scholars have argued in favor of a value of , and the value probably varied according to dialects – see
Zeta (letter) for further discussion), acquired the sound that it still has in Modern Greek, seemingly with a geminate pronunciation at least between vowels. Attic inscriptions suggest that this pronunciation was already common by the end of the 4th century BC. Horrocks agrees with Gignac on finding evidence that
geminate consonants tended to simplify beginning from the 3rd century BC, as seen in their arbitrary use in less literate writing. However, degemination was not carried out universally, as seen where the South Italian, south-eastern and some Asia Minor dialects preserve double consonants. The consonants , and , which were initially pronounced as
aspirates , and , developed into fricatives , and . There is evidence for fricative in Laconian in the 5th century BC, but this is unlikely to have influenced Koine Greek, which is largely based on Ionic-Attic. According to Allen, the first clear evidence for fricative and in Koine Greek dates from the 1st century AD in Latin Pompeian inscriptions, which transcribe and with
f:
Dafne is found for and
lasfe for . Jewish catacombs from the 2nd century in Rome show
afrodisia written for . Evidence from Anatolia showing interchanges between and in Anatolian names also suggest a fricative pronunciation , such as , and . Late Roman interchanges between and , similar to the ancient Laconian spellings, show evidence of a fricative . Yet, evidence suggests an aspirate pronunciation for in Palestine in the early 2nd century, and the same Jewish catacomb inscriptions of the 2nd–3rd century AD suggest a pronunciation of for , for and for , which would testify that the transition of to a fricative was not yet general at this time, and suggests that the transition of to a fricative may have happened before the transition of and . There may also be evidence for fricative in 2nd century AD Attic, in the form of omission of the second element in the diphthongs (which were pronounced ) before .
Armenian transcriptions transcribe as until the 10th century AD, so it seems that was pronounced as aspirate by at least some speakers until then. More evidence for fricative former aspirated stops comes from the Late Roman period. The 4th century
Gothic Bible by
Ulfilas transcribes and with
Gothic f and
þ. Kantor also finds strong evidence for a fricative in the 4th century
Codex Vaticanus Bible, which transcribes the Hebrew letters and as and , with the sequence apparently used to represent the sound , which would only make sense if were pronounced . In 5th century Egyptian papyri, there are also a handful of instances of transcribed as Latin
f:
egrafe for ,
foibammonos for ,
Epifaniu for . There is disagreement as to when consonants , and , which were originally pronounced , , , acquired the value of , , and that they have in Modern Greek. There is evidence of fricative as far back as the 4th century BC, in the form of omissions before a back vowel. In the papyri from the 2nd century BC is sometimes omitted or inserted before a front vowel, which indicates a palatal allophone or . However, to Allen these do not seem to have been a standard pronunciation. Some scholars have argued that the replacement of old Greek with in certain late classical dialects indicates a fricative pronunciation. Ancient grammarians describe the plosive nature of these letters, is transcribed as
b, not
v, in Latin, and
Cicero still seems to identify with Latin b. Gignac finds evidence from non-literary papyri suggesting a fricative pronunciation in some contexts (mostly intervocalic) from about the 1st century AD, in the form of the use of to transcribe Latin (which was
also undergoing a fortition process from semi-vowel /w/ to fricative /β/.) However, Allen is again sceptical that this pronunciation was generalized yet. Increasingly common confusion of and with and in late Roman and early Byzantine times suggests that the fricative pronunciation of was common if not general by this time. Yet, it is not before the 10th century AD that transcriptions of as fricative
v or as voiced velar
ł (pronounced ) are found in Armenian, which suggests that the transition was not general before the end of the 1st millennium; however, previous transcriptions may have been learned transcriptions.
Georgian loans in the 9th and 10th centuries similarly show inconsistency in transcribing and as a stop or fricative; is consistently rendered as ბ
b rather than ვ
v, while may be written with an adapted symbol ღ for fricative or with ჟ (approximating in palatal position), but also with stop გ
g. There is probable evidence for a peculiarly early shift of > in 6th century BC Elean, seen in the writing of for . Gignac interprets similar spellings in the Egyptian papyri beginning in the 1st century AD as the spirant pronunciation for δ in the Koine, but before the 4th century AD these only occur before . However, not all scholars agree that there is a reasonable phonetic basis for the earlier fricativization of δ before ι. The weakness of final , frequently before a stop consonant, is attested in Egypt in both Hellenistic and Roman times, seen directly in graphic omission and
hypercorrect insertion, though its complete loss would not be carried through until the medieval period and excluding the South-Italian, south-eastern and Asia Minor dialects. The development of voiced allophones , , of voiceless stops , , and after nasals is also evidenced in Pamphylia as early as the 4th century BC and in the Egyptian papyri (mostly Roman period) in the interchange with , , and in post-nasal positions (where these letters retained their ancient plosive values, as noted above.) Hence , , would later be used for , , , via assimilation to the second element. In Egypt this development is seen as an influence of the Coptic substrate. But at the same time, this change has now become standard in Modern Greek, and so it appears to have occurred in other areas as well. ==See also==