Hellenic Languages

The Hellenic language family is somewhat unusual, in that its principal member is Greek. Most classifications consider it to be the only language in the family, but some consider it to also contain a few other varieties that are different enough to be differentiated as separate languages (though this is always with varying degrees of controversy).

The Hellenic languages might have been most closely related to ancient Macedonian (either an ancient Greek dialect or a separate related language) and Phrygian, but neither are documented well enough to permit realistic comparison. Among modern languages, Greek is often argued to have the closest genetic ties with Armenian and Indo-Iranian languages.

Ancient Greek Dialects

In the Hellenistic period, the dialect now known as Koine Greek became the lingua franca across Greek-speaking regions and overtook almost all other dialects; it arose first within the armies of Alexander the Great. Before its development, a number of now-defunct dialects were pervasive across the region, though there is some dispute as to how they are classified geographically and/or temporally.

Mycenean

The earliest known dialect was Mycenean Greek, which occupied the southern and eastern parts of Greece and is attested from Linear B tablets of ~1500-1100 BCE. Most of the written evidence comes from the palace complex at Knossos in Central Crete, and Pylos (in the southwest Peloponnese), but some additional proofs have been discovered at Mycenae (in Argolis), Tiryns (in Argolis), Thebes (in Boeotia), and Chania (in Western Crete).

Mycenean was written in Linear B script, an adaptation to an earlier Cretan script (Linear A, which was developed for an undeciphered pre-Indo-European language of Crete, called Minoan). Because it was adapted from a script written to represent a wholly different language, many sounds in the Mycenean phonemic inventory were not represented in Linear B. In particular, it only represents open syllables (where the syllable ends in a vowel), and Mycenean Greek freely used closed syllables (ending with consonants). For example, the consonants l, m, n, r, s are omitted at the end of a syllable or before another consonant. 𐀞𐀲, pa-ta is panta (all); 𐀏𐀒, ka-ko is khalkos (copper).

Phonology of Mycenean Greek
Type		Bilabial	Dental	Palatal	Velar		Glottal
					central	labialized
Nasal		m	n
Stop	voiceless	p	t	ts*	k	kʷ
	voiced	b	d	dz*	ɡ	ɡʷ
	aspirated	pʰ	tʰ		kʰ	kʰʷ
Fricative			s				h
Approximant				j		w
Trill			r
Lateral			l

In later ancient Greek varieties, labialized velar consonants (/kʷ, ɡʷ, kʰʷ/) were replaced with labials /b, p, pʰ/, dentals /d, t, tʰ/, or velars /ɡ k kʰ/, depending on the context and the dialect. For example, 𐀦𐀄𐀒𐀫, qo-u-ko-ro is gʷoukoloi (classical βουκόλοι boukóloi, cowherds). There were at least five vowels /a, e, i, o, u/, which could be both short and long.

Nouns likely decline for 7 cases: nominative, genitive, accusative, dative, vocative, instrumental and locative; 3 genders: masculine, feminine, neuter; and 3 numbers: singular, dual, plural. The last two cases had merged with other cases by the era of Classical Greek. In Koine Greek, only nominative, accusative, genitive and vocative remain as separate cases with their own morphological markings. Adjectives agree with nouns in case, gender, and number.

Verbs probably conjugate for 3 tenses: past, present, future; 3 aspects: perfect, perfective, imperfective; 3 numbers: singular, dual, plural; 4 moods: indicative, imperative, subjunctive, optative; 3 voices: active, middle, passive; 3 persons: first, second, third; infinitives, and verbal adjectives.