A code for writing accented Greek in English
I wrote the whole of my translation of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone into ancient Greek using Beta. The printers then developed a simple program to turn it into Greek characters. Despite initial confusion between chi and xi by the programmer, and problems with Greek semi-colon and question mark, it worked brilliantly!
Click here to obtain an annotated (.pdf) version of the Complete Beta Code Manual.
Beta Code | Greek (lower and upper case) |
A | alpha |
---|---|
B | beta |
C | xi |
D | delta |
E | epsilon |
F | phi |
G | gamma |
H | eta |
I | iota |
K | kappa |
L | lambda |
M | mu |
N | nu |
O | omicron |
P | pi |
Q | theta |
R | rho |
S | sigma (medial and final) |
T | tau |
U | upsilon |
V | digamma |
W | omega |
X | chi |
Y | psi |
Z | zeta |
| | iota subscript |
' | apostrophe |
* | upper case (following character is upper case) |
- | hyphen |
, | comma |
. | period |
: | raised dot (colon) |
; | question mark |
_ | dash |
) | smooth breathing |
( | rough breathing |
/ | acute accent |
= | circumflex accent |
\ | grave accent |
+ | diaeresis |
For lower case, accents and diacritical marks are written directly after the coding for the character. When upper case, the accent and breathing precede the character.
*(ella/s (Hellas) *(/aimwn
mh=nin a)/eide, qe/a, *phlhi+a/dew *)axillh=os ou)lome/nhn, o(\s muri/' e)/qhke ...
e)gw/ ei)mi to\ a)/lfa kai\ to\ w)/mega, to\ prw=ton kai\ to\ e)/sxaton
h(/kw *di/os pai=s *dio/nusos ...
e)gw\ d' o)fei/lw le/gein ta\ lego/mena, pei/qesqai/ ge me\n ou) panta/pasin o)fei/lw
o( a)nece/tastos bi/os ou) biwto\s a)nqrw/pw|
a)/nqrwpos politiko\n zw|=on
kai\ dh=t' e)to/lmas tou/sd' u(perbai/nein no/mous;
ou) ga/r ti/ moi *zeu\s h)=n o( khru/cas ta/de.
h( glw=ss' o)mw/mox' h( de\ frh\n a)nw/motos
ou) dei= gargali/zein dra/konta koimw/menon (motto of Hogwarts!)
*(hra/kleis