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- "ύψιλον και ύμνος"
37 Comments
It's impossible to tell from listening whether you want the letter (υ), or the name (υψιλον), so both should be marked correct, like Sie (formal address) and sie (3rd person plural) in German, for example. I've also reported this, since I encounter this problem every time I have to refresh this lesson and it's getting very annoying.
Thank you! I came to see if I were the only one having this problem. I have to keep reminding myself that getting mad at non-sentient code isn't going to get me closer to speaking Greek :)
You're quite right, all the more so that for other letters both answers are accepted, the letter itself or its name. It's still not fixed.
is there a way to tell if a word is spelled with η,υ,or ι? or do you just have to memorize it for each word?
For grammatical endings, you can usually tell from grammar (e.g. something sounding like "i" at the end of a word will usually be -η if feminine singular, -ι if neuter singular, and -οι if masculine plural).
But in the word stem itself, you pretty much have to memorise whether it's η υ ι οι ει*. A bit like "ee" vs. "ea" in English.
Sometimes knowing English helps, e.g. κοιμητήριο "cemetery" can't have iotas in the first three syllables because English uses -e- in those syllables rather than -i-.
The same with ε/αι and ο/ω, which you also have to memorise, in general.
Sometimes even both are possible in loanwords, e.g. τρένο/τραίνο for "train".
* Theoretically, the sound "i" can also be spelled υι, but there are only a couple of words with that sound spelled that way in modern Greek, none of them particularly common unless you're talking about harpies or adoption.
But κοιμητήριο does have an iota in the first syllable. The English “cemetery” has come through the Latin transliteration of the Greek, where the first syllable becomes “coe-”, which in Mediaeval becomes “ce-”. So knowing just English doesn’t really help.
But κοιμητήριο does have an iota in the first syllable.
It has omicron-iota. That's a separate "vowel" from just iota.
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cemetery (14 c.)< Old Fr. cimetiere (12c.)< Medieval La cemeterium, Late Latin coemeterium < Gr. κοιμητήριο< κοιμάμαι/ to sleep
For some reason, υ is usually represented as a "y". Probably because they're related.
- 171
Υ, υ, was still in the Byzantine era pronounced like [ü], the u in French lune or the ü in German über. The old name of the letter was its sound Υ. The Byzantines gave it the name Ύ-ψιλον (ψιλός small, not broad) to differ it from the diphtong οι which then also was pronounced [ü]. Nowadays both are pronouced ee.
It was also the Byzantines who introduced small Greek letters α, β, ... and the small Y became υ.
The ύ in ύψιλον and ύμνος are pronounced differently is there a reason for this?
Nope, υ, has the ee sound. the U sound is in the modern reconstructed pronunciation.
A special kind of song. Especially for a song that represents a country ("national anthem"), e.g. the İstiklâl Marşı in Turkey ("Korkma, sönmez bu şafaklarda ...") or the Star-Spangled Banner in the United States ("Oh say can you see...").
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Just another comment about the listening exercise. Τhe answer "υ και ύμνος" is still not accepted.
Then why offer two legitimate options - υ and ύψιλον? Remove one and the problem is solved, at least when using the word bank.
It asked me to listen and type in greek. I typed "υ και ύμνοσ" Duolingo marked it as wrong Duoingo wanted me to type "ύψιλον και ύμνος"
I don´t get it!!
- 1390
Yeah, nobody else gets it, either, efl! One of DL's biggest "little" glitches is it's set up to accept just a single answer on listening exercises. That's okay, when every word in the exercise has no sound-alikes. But (especially in the infamous alphabet-intro chapter), the landscape is still littered with homophones, driving new learners crazy, as they have been for years. Maybe someday, they'll get fixed/removed. Meanwhile, just try to focus on all the good stuff DL can actually help with, thanks to the hard work of the volunteer moderators.... Best wishes, Paul
That's a really good way of looking at it.
I talked to the Greek mods and contributors when I tried the Greek course a year or two ago. They are kind of stuck with this for now. It won't change until the staff programmers revamp the system.
This is a very annoying way to get started. I've known the Greek alphabet for 50 years and want to further my knowledge of grammar and enrich my vocabulary, but I can't past these alphabet tests whose questions make no sense and are therefore not valid assessments of alphabet mastery!
I can't understand, the letter "Υ/υ" sounds like a "u"? A "i"? What is sound of υ?
sounds like ee. eepsilon.
However it canges when followed by another letter
like in this case here: Αυτό. υ now sounds like an f. Aftó.
- 171
The Greek letter Υ, υ is pronounced ee except for the diphtong ΑΥ, αυ which is pronounced af before soundless Greek letters: ναυτιλία (naftileea) = navigation, ναύτης (nafftis) = sailor, καυστικός (kafstikoss) = caustic, burning and av before Gr letters with sound: ναύαρχος (navvarhos)= admiral, μαύρος (mavvros) = black
It used to be a u, and still is if preceeded by an omicron. These days, it is a y (ee sound). If preceded by an alpha, it is an f, but written as a u for some reason.
Am i the only one bothered by the fact that this exercise is 'Y and anthem'?? It's not even trying to make sense ...
- 607
Still not fixed really annoying. This is the first unit. Such inconsistency will undoubtedly put new users off.
How can it give me questions where I have to write in Greek when I am using a keyboard, is there a way to get a Greek keyboard on the screen?
