GREEK INFLECTION

Endings of the Noun and Verb

This highly compacted listing of the Inflectional Endings of
Greek has a dual purpose: it can be used to check and review
your sense of Greek grammar at the base level, and it can be
printed out to have beside your Greek text as your start to read.
It is elementary and does not cover irregular formations, many
of which have to be learned as you go along.

I am firmly opposed to transcribing Greek to Roman letters,
mainly because it is completely unnecessary. Ten and a half of
the letters are virtually identical to Roman characters (a B d z i k
and final s) while Pi is familiar from school math, Omega from
common use if not electrical circuitry, chi as X from Xmas for
Christ-mas, and probably Phi as symbol for a diameter. Thus
sixteen of the letters are clearly accessible, leaving only eight to
'learn'. Note also that the Capitals are used only with proper
names, and you can learn them as needed.

Of the Accents only the 'rough breathing' or 'h' will be needed,
since the others are voice pitches, which have been traditionally
been misunderstood as Stresses in prose, to be ignored in verse.
This is a confusion which you can avoid by forgetting about
them now while learning basic grammatical forms. Or you can
intone the rising 'acute', up-and-down 'circumflex', and base-level
low 'grave", with the understanding that reading verse you will
apply these pitches atop the long-short metrical cadence of the
lines. This is not recommended for a beginner, later there will be
time.

One of the problems which has confronted Greek studies on the
web is the use of the characters which require special programs
on your computer to read and write Greek. So it is common
practice to use Transcription and convert the Greek letters to
Roman characters. Since this paper is aimed at beginning
students of Greek, who are probably familiar with transcription
a la Perseus , I will use a modified system with '-e: ' for eta, '-o:'
for omega, X for chi to avoid wrong pronunciation, and but 'ph'

for phi rather than 'f', and 'th' for theta since there is no suitable
character. For iota subscript, the vowel is followed by a comma
e/g/ 'o:,' for omega + i-sub.

THE NOUN

Nominative 'subject'

Sing: -a Plur: -ai
Decl I: Feminine, a few names and patronymics, retaining
orginial -a efte -e -i -p, elsewhere see next: 'xo:ra xo:rai'

Sing: -e: Plur: -ai
Decl I: Feminine, changing original -a to etc -e: in singular,
but retaining the -a vowel in the plural. 'time: timai'

Sing: - os Plur: -oi
Decl II: M asculine nouons and male names. 'ippos 'ippoi
('innos)

Sing: on- Plur: -a
Decl II: The Nom. and Acc. forms are the same, both in Sing
and Plur, but other case forms are the same as the M asculines of
Dec. II. 'do:ron do:ra'

Sing: - ? Plur: - es
Decl III: Nom. sg. is often deceptive, the gen. sg. and nom.
pl. show the stem. Common nom.sg nouns end in -o:n Pl.
-ontes, or -is Pl. ides, and also -3 (=x)Pl. -akes. Since this is the
dictionary form, you will have to guess from the forms you find
in the text. 'daimo:n daimones'

Genitive 'possessive'

Sing: -as or -ns Plur: -o:n
Decl I: Feminines showing an original -a retained after the
letters -e -i or -p otherwise changing to Ionic dialect eta = -e: in
singular. xo:ras xo:ro:n'

Sing: -ou Hom. oio Plur: -o:n
Decl II: The Homeric -oio from *osyo is original form, Attic

contracts to -ou ' 'ippou Hom. 'ippoio 'ippo:n'

Sing: -os Plur: -o:n
Decl III: Thie Decl. has many stems formations lumped
together with variant stems, deceptive nominatives, but usually
the -os of the Genitive shows. Without this ending, we have the
'stem' 'daimonos daimono:n'

Dative 'to -- for'

Sing: -a, (= -a with subscript -i) or -n, (=eta with subscript -i,as
explained above) Plur: --ais Hom -aisi 'xo:ra, xo:rais
Decl I: Feminine, originally -ai with the iota written
underneath in Attic.

Sing: --o:, (omega with iota subscript) Plur: -ois Hom -oisi
Decl II: M asculine and Neuters ' 'ippo:, 'ippois '

Sing: --i Plur: -si Hom -ssi Decl III: M any stems classses in
this group, but these endings predominate 'daimoni daimosi '

Accusative 'direct object'

Sing: -an -e:n (as above defined) Plur: -as
Decl I: Feminine with a typical nasal accusative 'xo:ran
xo:ras'

Sing: -on Plur: -ous
Decl II: M asculine nouns and personal names of men etc. '
'ippon 'ippous'

Sing: -a Plur: -as
Decl III: Unlike the nasal accuisative of Decl I and II, this
has a nasal converted to a nasalized vowel, then to the vowel -a,
which becomes standard in this class. "daimona daimonas

Sing: -os Plur: -a
Decl III: In this class are neuters with a Sing in -s, Plur in -a,
and contracted Genitives in -ous (for -oos). Nom and Acc. are
always the same form.

THE VERB

Present Active

Sing: -o: Plur: -omen
Type luo: First Person

Sing: -eis Plur: -ete
Type luo: Second Person

Sing: -ei Plur: -ousi
Type luo: Third Person

Imperfect Active

Sing: -on Plur: -omen
Type luo: With the 'augment -e' in Attic, optional in
Homeric. First Person.

Sing: -es Plur: -ete
Type luo: With the 'augment -e' in Attic, optional in
Homeric. S econd Person

Sing: -e Plur: -on
Type luo: With the 'augment -e' in Attic, optional in
Homeric. Third Person

Future Active

Sing: -so: Plur: -somen
Type luo: First Person.

Sing: -seis Plur: -sete
Type luo: Second Person.

Sing: -sei Plur: -sousi
Type luo: Third Person

Aorist Active

Sing: -sa Plur: -samen
Type luo: First Person

Sing: -sas Plur: -sate

Type luo: Second Person

Sing: -se Plur: -san
Type luo: Third Person

Perfect Active (reduplicated first syllable)

Sing: -ka Plur: -kamen
Type luo: 'leluka First Person

Sing: -kas Plur: -kate
Type luo: 'lelukas' S econd Person

Sing: -ke Plur: -kasi
Type luo: 'leluke' Third Person

There exists a Pluperfect Active, which is an augmentsed Perfect
with special endings, but rarely used so not neceesary to note
here.

Present Mediopassive

Sing: -mai Plur: -metha
Type luo: 'leinomai' First Person

Sing: -n, (eta with subscript i) Plur: -esthe
Type luo:. Note German editions print -si for this Second
person. Second Person

Sing: -etai Plur: -ontai
Type luo: Third Person.

Imperfect Mediopassive

Sing: -me:n Plur: -metha
Type luo:. Note Attice has the augment, optional in Homer.
First Person

Sing: -ou, contr from -oo Plur: -sthe
Type luo: Second Person

Sing: -eto Plur: -onto
Type l luo: Third Person

Future Mediopassive

Sing: -somai Plur: -sometha
Type l luo: First Person

Sing: -sei or sn, Plur: -sesthe
Type l luo: Second Person

Sing: -setai Plur: -sontai
Type l luo: Third Person

Perfect Mediopassive (with reduplicated First

syllable)

Sing: -mai Plur: -
Type l luo: 'lelumai ' First Person

Sing: -sai Plur: -metha
Type l luo: 'lelusai' Second Person

Sing: -tai Plur: -ntai
Type l luo: 'lelutai' Third Person

Aorist True Passive

Sing: -the:n Plur: -the:men
Type Type l luo: 'e-luthe:n' First Person

Sing: -the:s Plur: -the:te
Type Type l luo: 'e-luthns' Second Person

Sing: -the: Plur: -the:san
Type Type l luo: 'e-luthe:' Third Person

There is also a true Future Passive based on the Aorist stem,
with forms 'luthe:somai etc.'which will be found in Attic prose.
This is a combination of mediopassive endings with the true
aorist passive forms.

The Active Infinitives

There are four active infinitives of a luo-type verb:

Present Inf.: luein

Future Inf.: lusein

Aorist Inf.: lusai (luo)

or the Aorist Inf.: lipein (leipo)

Perfect Inf.: lelukenai

The Mediopassive Infinitives

The Passive infinitives are also just four:

Present Inf: luesthai

Future Inf.: luesethai

Perfect Inf.: lelusthai

True Aorist Inf: luthenai

Future Aorist Inf: luthesasthai

Fut. Perf Pass. Inf: lelusthasthai

Of these Infinitives the ones you see most often will be the
Present and Aorist in the active forms, and the Present
mediopassive as well as the Aorist Passive. Future are easy to
recognize with their inserted sigma.

The Participles

The Greek participles generally follow the formation of the
Tenses to which the belong, so only a few which are basic need
be listed here:

Present Participle is a Decl III noun type, with a Nom Sg.
in -o:n, Gen. -ontos, Nom Pl. ontes. The Future Ppl is based on
this with inserted sigma, e.g. luso:n beside the Pres. luo:n, easily
recognized and regular.

Aorist Participle will be of the luo type, with sigmatic
inflection: Nom sg. lusas, Gen. lusantos, Nom Pl lusantes. But
verbs of the reducing leipo type with have the same ending as

the Present, e.g. leipein as a Present Inf contrasts with Aorist
Inf. lipein.

There is a Perfect Active Ppl. which retains the reduplication of
the Perfect system, but uses a special ending: Nom Sg -o:s, Fem.
-uia, Neut os, and the Genitive shows the dental stem: -otos,
Dative -oti etc. This is easily recognized by the reduplication
and the noun endings, and it often is used with a present-type
meaning.

The M ediopassive participles use the endings M asc.-menos,
Fem mene, Neut menon attached to whatever stem the verb has
at that point, and these are clearly distinctive and easy to
remember. But the True Aorist Passive (which curiously bears
active endings e.y. eluthen) has endings which look active but
carry passive meaning, e.g. N Sg. lutheis, Gen. luthentos with a
dental -t- which will carry through the declension. Nota bene!

The IRREALIS: Subjunctive and Optative

After one has mastered the general ranks of the Active and
M ediopassive forms, one could be stunned by the learning that
all these various forms in their proper tenses have to be
duplicated twice, in the Subjunctive and Optative 'M oods'. That
means pages and pages of forms which lie ahead, but there are
things to say first which will restore a little confidence.

First, many of these 'grammarbook' forms are hardly ever used,
some in fact can not be found in any ancient text. Overzealous
grammarians have tried to make everything regular and patent,
and the rigor of Classical teaching in the l9th century use these
pages as a punishment if not a test to weed out the lazy
students from the ranks of the assiduous. But for reading Greek
one does not memorize forms now, we know more about
language learning and teaching and the function of the brain as a
super-computer which under proper conditions can file
word-data in ten thousands instantly. Accessing one's
mind-power is the way to learning a new language, but teaching
methods in the Classical languages has not kept up to date.
Learning your grammar from the text you read will be much a
more useful path to a Reading Knowledge, and for this you have
to decide how much to learning BEFORE starting to read. If you
try to learn it all first, you will not be in a proper attitude to
read ancient Greek. Verbum sapientibus!

Now back to the Subjunctive and Optative.

If you know your regular (Indicative) forms fairly well, you can
recognize a Subjunctive when you see a vowel in the terminal
inflection which is inexplicable lengthened. A lengthened vowel
(eta or o-mega) is sign of the Subjunctive and indicates a first
degree of Irreality, a suspicious cast of the eye on a situation
which is not positively factual. For example if you find
'luo:men'' beside the Present Act. Indic. 'luomen', you will
understand that to be a subjunctive. (In the case of 'luo:' 1 Sg
Pres, you cannot see a difference which is why I cites the
plural.) This works for all the tenses, look over the tables and
you will see this works as a simple recognition Rule.

Now for the Optative, which is in a general sense a Secondary
Subjunctive often pointing back to a previous time or a less clear
reality, you can apply a similar rule of recognition. If you find
an unexpected -ei -ai or -oi, you have an Optative. For example
beside the Present 'luei' you may see the form 'luoi' --- an
Optative. You might be surprised at 'luoimi' with a different
ending beside 'luo:', but the other endings of the list are normal.
The main thing is to know the Indicative forms, then the
variants will stand out clearly.

William Harris
Prof. Em. M iddlebury College
www.middlebury.edu/~harris