Greek Lesson Notes

Phase 1: Greek Alphabet and Nominal Foundations

Master the Alphabet (Lesson 1): Acquire foundational familiarity with the Greek alphabet, including diacritical marks (breathing marks, accents). Practice writing, reading, and pronunciation.

First & Second Declension Nouns and Articles (Lesson 2 and Lesson 3): Grasp gender, number, and case paradigms for nouns and the definite article. Emphasis on nominative, genitive, dative, and accusative cases. Side note, in intermediate Greek we will come back to look at the nuances of Cases.

Make sure you start memorizing the vocabulary systematically.

Phase 2: Present and Imperfect Verb System

Basics of Greek Verbs (Lesson 4): Understand verb morphology, stems, personal endings, and the thematic vowel. Introduction to tense, voice, mood framework.

Master the Present Active Indicative (Lesson 5): Conjugate regular thematic verbs in the present active indicative.

Learn Imperfect Verbs (Lesson 6): Introduction to augment and secondary endings; formation and translation of the imperfect tense.

Tackle Contract Verbs (Lesson 7): Study verbs whose stems end in a vowel (α, ε, ο) and the phonological rules governing their conjugations.

Phase 3: Nominal Syntax and Pronouns

Prepositions and Cases (Lesson 8): Examine prepositional usage with various cases to modify nouns and verbs within sentence structures.

Personal and Relative Pronouns (Lesson 9): Learn paradigms and syntactical roles of personal pronouns (ἐγώ, σύ, αὐτός) and relative pronouns (ὅς, ἥ, ὅ).

Phase 4: Future and Aorist Verb System

Future Tense (Lesson 10): Introduce the temporal augment and sigma marker for regular future tense formation.

First and Second Aorist (Lesson 11 and Lesson 12): Differentiate between the first (sigmatic) and second (thematic) aorist; practice their indicative forms and principal parts.

Liquid Verbs (Lesson 13): Examine phonological changes in verbs with stems ending in λ, μ, ν, ρ when forming certain tenses.

Continue drilling vocabulary and parsing forms daily. Maintain consistent review and parsing practice to reinforce morphology and syntax recognition.

Phase 5: Advanced Noun and Verb Systems, Modifiers

Third Declension Nouns (Lesson 14): Study complex paradigms involving consonantal stem changes and irregular nominative forms.

Perfect and Pluperfect Verbs (Lesson 15): Explore reduplication, perfect active endings, and formation of the pluperfect indicative.

Adjectives and Adverbs (Lesson 16): Learn agreement rules for attributive and predicate adjectives; derivation of adverbs from adjective stems.

Phase 6: Participles – Verbal Adjectives

Begin Present Participles (Lesson 17): Analyze present participle morphology across all genders and voices.

Aorist and Perfect Participles (Lesson 18 and Lesson 19): Understand principal parts and function of participles in attributive and circumstantial clauses.

Phase 7: Non-Indicative Verbs and Complex Syntax

Other Pronouns (Lesson 20): Examine additional pronominal forms beyond personal and relative pronouns. Emphasis on declension patterns, syntactic function, and translation nuances.

Infinitives (Lesson 21), Subjunctives (Lesson 22), Imperatives & Optatives (Lesson 23): Master non-finite verbal forms and their syntactical uses in indirect discourse, purpose clauses, and commands.

μι-Verbs (Lesson 24): Study the unique paradigms of athematic verbs; focus on their complex conjugation patterns.

Plan to spend more time for this phase due to inherent irregularity and complexity.