Learn how to write veeta and ipsilon
Get this lesson’s key vocab, their translations and pronunciations. Sign up for your Free Lifetime Account Now and get 7 Days of Premium Access including this feature.
| Hi everybody, this is Stefania! Welcome to GreekPod101.com’s Alfaveeto made easy. The fastest, easiest, and most fun way to learn the Greek alphabet: the alfaveeto! |
| You’ve made it to the tenth lesson! Are you excited? I certainly am! So I won’t say more but will go directly to our two new letters -- one more consonant and the last vowel. |
| The consonant will look familiar since it appears both as a sound and as a shape in the English alphabet. Its name is “Veeta”. In English, it is commonly called “beta”, but in fact this letter has a “v” sound. Don’t get confused because it looks like the Roman alphabet “B”. |
| As you can see, there is a striking similarity between the uppercase and lowercase versions; their shape won’t be too hard, so just be careful about the sound. |
| This is the uppercase “Veeta”. |
| It is handwritten like this: Β |
| And this is the lowercase “Veeta”. |
| It is handwritten like this: β |
| Like other letters we have seen, the lowercase “Veeta” is written closer to the line and its vertical line extends below it. Easy, isn’t it? |
| Let’s do it again- Here’s the uppercase form: Β |
| And here’s the lowercase form: β |
| Got it? Good! Let’s go to our next letter. Like I said before, this is the last vowel. And it’s an easy one, too because –well, you’ll see! Its name is “Ipsilon,” -- often called “upsilon” in English - and its sound is, well, “ee” –yes, one more “ee” to go with the “Yota” and “Eeta” we already learned. |
| These look familiar, right? The uppercase is an English “y” and the lowercase is pretty much an English “u”, isn’t it? |
| This is the uppercase “Ipsilon”. |
| It is handwritten like this: Υ |
| And this is the lowercase “Ipsilon”. |
| It is handwritten like this: υ |
| Did you get them right? Maybe because they resemble two English/Roman letters they seem a little confusing, no? Oh, well –as they say, practice makes perfect, so… |
| Let’s do it again- Here’s the uppercase form: Υ |
| And here’s the lowercase form: υ |
| Twenty letters down and only four to go; isn’t that a relief? Let’s see what we can do with our new letters. |
| One easy, everyday word that uses both of them is “βραδυ” the Greek word for “evening”. Shall we write this together? |
| βραδυ |
| Not that hard, yes? How about something else. This word is “διαβαση” (“diavasi”) the Greek word for “street crossing” and it’s written like this: |
| διαβαση |
| Did you try them? Good, good! Now let’s do our usual recap, shall we? The letters we’ve learned so far are “Alpha”, “Mee”, “Taf”, “Yota”, “Kappa”, “Omikron”, “Pee”, “Sigma”, “Eeta”, “Psee”, “Gama”, “Epseelon”, “Ro”, “Hee”, “Nee”, “Omega”, “Delta”, “Lamda”, “Veeta” and “Ipsilon”. |
| Now it's time for Stefania’s insights. |
| As I mentioned in the previous lesson, when a letter is exactly the same in form as an English letter, please be careful not to confuse the sounds. “Veeta” is such a case; it’s very easy to slip towards “Beta”, a word that came into the English vocabulary through the University system and continues to be very common in college fraternities. I know it’s hard for these organizations to change their names after all these years, but you know better, don’t you? |
| Did you know there is a Greek letter which if turned on its side, becomes another Greek letter? These letters are both unique to the Greek alphabet, so check out our next lesson and see how they look! |
| See you in the next Alfaveeto made easy lesson! |
| Ya hara! |
Comments
HideHi Ya'Qoba,
Indeed, the lowercase "υ" looks a lot like the English "u".
However, you can easily tell the difference between "Υ" and "γ", because the first letter is uppercase and it makes a different sound.
"Υ/υ" is pronounced as "e" -> βράδυ". And "Γ/γ" is pronounced more like gama -> γη.
The straight line of βήτα is extended below the line in handwriting, but that can differ depending on the font that you use in a computer.
Let me know if you have any further questions.
Katerina,
Team GreekPod101.com
The Ipsilon gets very confusing as it looks not only like the English y and u but also to lower case gama in ellnvika still struggling with that and it's sounds. Any tips?
I thought the lowercase veeta was written with a portion that drops below the line? You wrote it as an uppercase?
Hi Charles,
Thank you for your comment.
This is a very general rule that refers to nouns and adjectives. However, there are many exceptions, mostly found in occupations.
For example, the below occupations use the same word for both genders:
- o/η γιατρός (doctor)
- ο/η μηχανικός (engineer)
- ο/η επιστήμονας (scientist).
Let me know if you have any other questions.
Katerina
Team GreekPod101.com
The ending letters, " Sigma, Eeta and Omicron, which represent masculine, feminine and neutral words; what grammer does this rule apply to?
Hi Andrew,
Thank YOU for the comment! I hope these lessons can help you reach your language goals.
All the best,
Stefania
Team GreekPod101.com
Another great lesson. I really enjoy learning the actual names of the letters as opposed to the English ones that I have grown up with. Now I just need to work on correcting myself when I say or read them wrong. But that is half the fun. Thank you for the lessons.
Hi Matthew,
Thanks for the ❤️️!
There is no way you could just guess the spelling of the word by ear alone, unfortunately. This video is related to your question, so it might help:
https://www.greekpod101.com/lesson/absolute-beginner-questions-answered-by-stefania-2-when-do-you-use-%CE%B9-%CE%B7-%CF%85-%CE%B5%CE%B9-%CE%BF%CE%B9-and-%CF%85%CE%B9/?lp=96
All the best,
Stefania
Team GreekPod101.com
I have LOVED this series!❤️️❤️️❤️️
But when you hear an /ee/ sound, are there ways to make educated guesses on which letter it is?
Γεια σου Ayush,
You are very very welcome. 😇❤️️ We were so happy to read your positive message!
Feel free to contact us if you have any questions.
We wish you good luck with your language studies.
Γεια χαρά,
Λέβεντε (Levente)
Team GreekPod101.com
Hi Stefania !
I am just a begineer to greek , but learning from you I already start to feel that I can be a nice English - Greek translator (though not good at grammer and tenses :laughes:)
Thank you for your lessons
Ayush
Hi Ahmed,
Thank you for your kind message!
I'm glad you are finding these videos easy to learn the alphabet with.
Wishing you all the best on your Greek language learning journey!
If you ever have any questions, let me know.
Kind regards,
Stefania
Team GreekPod101.com
Hi Stefania!
thanks for your great effort helping us learning greek in very easy way
Hi Janó,
Good one! Easy peasy, just like a game! :smile:
Cheers!
Stefania
Team Greekpod101.com
Hi Tim,
Glad you are enjoying this series! Soon you'll be writing Greek in no time!:thumbsup:
Let me know if you have any questions about the letters!
Stefania
Team GreekPod101.com
Thank you so much! This series is fantastic!
Hi Oksana,
Glad we got this cleared up!
Enjoy learning Greek!
Stefania
Team GreekPod101.com
Thank you! Now it's clear :smile: And this series is totally great:thumbsup:
Hi Oksana!
Thank YOU for your positive feedback! I hope this series is helping you learn the Greek letters easily:smile:.
It's good that you asked this question. Ypsilon can be pronounced as v or f when the letter α or ε comes before it.
There is a special lesson about such vowel combinations that will help you understand better how ypsilon sounds in that case (in all other cases its sound is i). It's the lesson 13 of this series:
https://www.greekpod101.com/2012/12/07/greek-alphabet-made-easy-13-digrams-part-1/
I hope it helps! Let me know if you have more questions:smile:.
Stefania
Team GreekPod101.com
Hi Stefania!
First of all, thank you very much for all your lessons - they are incredible! I'm in love with Greek language, though I cannot even call myself a beginner yet:stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:
To be honest, I had to go back to this lesson, because I'm having some problems with Ipsilon... Is it always pronounced as "i" sound? The reason I ask is word ευχαριστω, where I hear it being pronounced as "f" or "v", but not "i"... Or I am making something up and this is a totally different case?:flushed:
Thank you!
Oksana
Hi Lesley,
In order to understand your question better, compared to what do you think it looks different? You mean compared to the lowercase printed version? Or the uppercase handwritten version?
Regards,
Stefania
Team GreekPod101.com