RE: h in Greek epigraphy
> BTW, the introductory sentence on page 360 of TUS 3 seems strange. It > says that "IPA includes basic Latin letters and a number of Latin > letters from other blocks" and then puts four Greek letters in the list! > Should this be changed to something like "IPA includes basic Latin > letters and a number of other Latin and Greek letters"? Noted for fix by the editors. --Ken
RE: h in Greek epigraphy
Scripsit Michael Everson: > So when eta is > transliterated by epigraphers they should use either e-macron or h. Right; that's what they do. > Or is the question "when they transliterate into modern Greek fonts"? > Because then you have a problem -- since the Greek inscriptions and > modern Greek are the same, no transliteration should be necessary. I use (I believe correctly, but perhaps not) the term transcribe in this situation. Inscriptions are usually published in lowercase Greek letters (sometimes accompanied by a reproduction of the original all-caps form and sometimes not). Eta is avoided here except when dealing with inscriptions in the Ionic alphabet, and h is used as a lowercase equivalent of Eta that represents an "h" sound. > Is the question "should Greek h be encoded"? Yes. > In such an instance, I'd > say that the need for a Latin theta and chi for IPA would be a lot > more urgent, if cloning a borrowed letter were to be contemplated. What I'm trying to establish here is the principle that Unicode follows (or should follow). Based on the examples mentioned so far, it does seem to be current practice to use a letter encoded in one script as part of another when necessary (relatively rare, snd not approved of by everyone). When I posted my original question I did not know about the practice with Kurdish and Wakhi (thanks to Doug and Peter) and had not thought of the IPA connection, although I should have (thanks Michael). So as long as this is the practice, I have no problem using Latin h in Greek. If the general practice were ever changed and additional letters encoded for Kurish, Wakhi, and IPA, then Greek h should be encoded. (Perhaps somebody can explain why phi and epsilon were encoded in the IPA block when the other four Greek letters weren't.) BTW, the introductory sentence on page 360 of TUS 3 seems strange. It says that "IPA includes basic Latin letters and a number of Latin letters from other blocks" and then puts four Greek letters in the list! Should this be changed to something like "IPA includes basic Latin letters and a number of other Latin and Greek letters"? David
RE: h in Greek epigraphy
David J. Perry a dúirt: Scripsit Michael Everson: Recently I saw a piece of epigraphical Greek, and while Latin "h" was written in the transliteration, the letter used in the actual Greek was ETA. Yes; that is the whole point here. In all variants of the Greek alphabet except the Ionic, eta stood for the "h" sound as in English (hence the equivalent shapes of Eta and H, since it was some western form of the Greek alphabet that was apparently carried to Italy). After the Ionic alphabet was officially adopted at Athens, eta became used for long e in subsequent standardized Greek writing. Knew that. Epigraphers need to indicate when they are transcribing into lowercase form, or transliterating, an Eta that was intended to represent the "h" sound and have adopted the Roman lc h as the means for doing so. Well, when Cyrillic letter SHCHA is being transliterated, either s-caron+c-caron or sometimes s-acute is written when it is Russian, and s-caron+t is used when it is Bulgarian. So when eta is transliterated by epigraphers they should use either e-macron or h. Or is the question "when they transliterate into modern Greek fonts"? Because then you have a problem -- since the Greek inscriptions and modern Greek are the same, no transliteration should be necessary. Though then one would have to know that eta meant, um, heta and that [h] should be read. I have seen Greek text where the Latin h was substituted for the eta in this context. Is the question "should Greek h be encoded"? In such an instance, I'd say that the need for a Latin theta and chi for IPA would be a lot more urgent, if cloning a borrowed letter were to be contemplated. -- Michael Everson * * Everson Typography * * http://www.evertype.com
RE: h in Greek epigraphy
Scripsit Michael Everson: > Recently I saw a piece of epigraphical Greek, and while Latin "h" was > written in the transliteration, the letter used in the actual Greek > was ETA. Yes; that is the whole point here. In all variants of the Greek alphabet except the Ionic, eta stood for the "h" sound as in English (hence the equivalent shapes of Eta and H, since it was some western form of the Greek alphabet that was apparently carried to Italy). After the Ionic alphabet was officially adopted at Athens, eta became used for long e in subsequent standardized Greek writing. Epigraphers need to indicate when they are transcribing into lowercase form, or transliterating, an Eta that was intended to represent the "h" sound and have adopted the Roman lc h as the means for doing so. David
Re: h in Greek epigraphy
Recently I saw a piece of epigraphical Greek, and while Latin "h" was written in the transliteration, the letter used in the actual Greek was ETA. -- Michael Everson * * Everson Typography * * http://www.evertype.com
Re: h in Greek epigraphy
> My first answer to my correspondent was "just use Roman h." That would be my suggestion, too. It is available now -- it matches current practice, and requires no further action. > A program that was sorting text, or trying to determine what script > a word was written in, would get confused by hε̄γεμο̄ν. As for sorting -- if you are sorting epigraphical Greek, you likely need customized tables, anyway. Just add "h" and treat it appropriately. As for determination of script, you need to ask yourself, for what purpose. If this is something like regular expression matching, then again, it doesn't matter so much -- you would just attempt to match against strings containing letters of the Greek script + "h", and you'd get what you expect. > Would this justify a proposal for "Greek small letter epigraphical h"? I don't think so. Not unless you can demonstrate that this really is a distinct character, as opposed to a special usage of the already existing Latin "h" -- which is what it seems to be. --Ken > > David
Re: h in Greek epigraphy
At 18:43 -0800 2002-12-15, Doug Ewell wrote: One classic case of letters being unified across scripts is Kurdish, which uses Latin Q and W in an otherwise all-Cyrillic alphabet. Which is not so smart, as has been pointed out by many. Consider that even CYRILLIC SOFT SIGN has a Latin clone: U+0184 and U+1085 -- Michael Everson * * Everson Typography * * http://www.evertype.com
Re: h in Greek epigraphy
David J. Perry wrote: > My first answer to my correspondent was "just use Roman h." Then I > got to thinking: are there any situations in Unicode where actual > letters of the alphabet are unified across scripts? There are lots of > punctuation marks and symbols that can be used with multiple scripts; > but I can't think of a situation where an actual letter of the > alphabet is so used. A program that was sorting text, or trying to > determine what script a word was written in, would get confused by > hε̄γεμο̄ν. Would this justify a proposal for "Greek small letter > epigraphical h"? One classic case of letters being unified across scripts is Kurdish, which uses Latin Q and W in an otherwise all-Cyrillic alphabet. -Doug Ewell Fullerton, California
Re: h in Greek epigraphy
On 12/15/2002 06:59:33 AM "David J. Perry" wrote: >My first answer to my correspondent was "just use Roman h." Then I got to >thinking: are there any situations in Unicode where actual letters of the >alphabet are unified across scripts? There are lots of punctuation marks and >symbols that can be used with multiple scripts; but I can't think of a >situation where an actual letter of the alphabet is so used. A program that >was sorting text, or trying to determine what script a word was written in, >would get confused by hε̄γεμο̄ν. Would this justify a proposal for "Greek >small letter epigraphical h"? This seems to be a variation on the question I asked recently having to do with gamma, delta and theta being used in an otherwise Latin writing system for Wakhi (and whether we needed to encode Latin versions of these). The answer that most respondents gave was to simply say that this writing system is based on more than one script. - Peter --- Peter Constable Non-Roman Script Initiative, SIL International 7500 W. Camp Wisdom Rd., Dallas, TX 75236, USA Tel: +1 972 708 7485
