On Fri, 11 Jun 2004 20:25:52 +0100, P&G
<
petegray@...> wrote:
>Omega has a different origin - it develops within Greek itself, and its two
>forms reflect the two different origins. One is simply a double oo written
>closely. This gives the rounded w form of the letter. The other, which can
>still be seen in Greece today, is simply an O with a macron mark underneath.
>When written in one storke of the pen, it becomes the form used by the
>watchseller.
Do you have a reference for this?
Jeffery only records the epichoric variants "capital omega"
(Ionia, Delos, Paros (= /o/)), an "open o" (like C) in
Knidos, Melos (for short /o/), a circle within a circle
(Crete, Thera), and a circle on top a circle (like 8)
perhaps at Phleious. The Cretan, Theran and Phleiasian
examples are all uncertain (specifically, it's unclear
whether they were meant to express /o:/ as distinct from
/o/)
Jeffery hypothesizes that the original shape was "a doublet
formed from O by breaking the circle. The earliest examples
of the letter in Ionia show it with a merked tilt and only
very small, undeveloped struts at the ends". The tilt would
explain the reverse-C as found in Knidian (-> Melos).
Ionia -> Delos
/o/ O
/o:/ capital-Omega
Knidos -> Melos
/o/ reversed-C
/o:/ O
Paros/Thasos (<- Knidos?, Ionia?)
/o/ capital-omega
/o:/ O
This all sounds reasonable, but nevertheless, the "struts"
*are* present in the earliest samples of omega, which
suggests to me that the letter was in origin a double O,
written like 8, but with the lower circle incomplete (whence
the 'struts').
An additional reason for preferring an origin of omega in a
'double o' rather than a 'broken o' would be that it fits
better with my view of the origin of the other Greek
"additional letters" (apart from F/Y). It's clear that X
and \|/ (Ionian /ps/) were originally the same letter,
designed to denote /kh/. The shape (which also occurs as an
X with a vertical line through it) can in my opinion be
derived from two kappas writen back to back. In that case,
perhaps phi is two pi's (of the archaic variety, ancestral
to our P) written back to back. That would also be in
agreement with the name of the letter (pei -> phei).
We then have the "primitive" ("green") alphabets (Crete,
Thera), that do not use the additional letters, and the
"new" system (such as found in Attic, where the additional
letters are used to write /ph/, /ps/, /kh/, /ks/:
"green" Attic
/ph/ p+h P
/ps/ p+s P+s
/kh/ k+h X
/ks/ k+s X+s
The "red" and "blue" alphabets are innovations resulting
from an abbreviated spelling of the /ks/ and /ps/ clusters.
"Blue" Ionian adopted the Phoenician letter xei (samek) to
write /ks/, and subsequently the Psi-variant of /kh/ to
denote /ps/ (the shape X remaining in use as /kh/). The
"red" alphabets simplified by writing /ks/ simply as X
(instead of XS), and reserving the other graphical variant
of the letter (\|/, Ionian psi) to write /kh/. Some "red"
varieties (Thessaly, Lokrides, Arkadia, Achaia) use the
third shape of /kh/ >|< to write /ps/, similarly to what
happened in Ionia.
=======================
Miguel Carrasquer Vidal
mcv@...