How to spell Alexander the Great

[Charles]

I'm not a Greek scholar or even a member of this forum. However, I'm writing a novel (a mystery) in which there is discovered an ancient piece of jewelry (I haven't decided what it is yet) with a name inscribed on it. I want it to be the name "Alexander" (referring to Alexander the Great). How would this name appear in the Greek of that time? Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[beausefaless]

A/\E=AN/\POY Is Alexander's name on the reverse of his SILVER TETRADRACHMS beside the silver coinage his GOLD STATERS were traded through out the known world for three centuries after his death. (After the A is a reversed V after the E three horizontal lines and after the N a reversed V).

[beausefaless]

http://ancient-coin-forum.com/Greek/Ale ... rachm.html

[karen]

With all due apologies to Andrew I'd like to correct two points -- first, the second "inverted v" is not actually that, it's a triangle -- the upper-case Greek letter "delta". Second, the ending "upsilon" ("Y") is the possessive ending of the name, so that spelled this way it means "Alexander's" or "of Alexander," i.e. the coin was produced by Alexander (whether it actually was or not ). If you were writing about him, not something he owned or produced, you'd end it with "sigma". (English equivalent: Alexandros.)Thus (and you'll have to look up the Greek letters, as I have no idea how to get a Greek font into one of these messages) the spelling is: alpha, lambda, epsilon, xi, alpha, nu, delta, rho, omicron, sigma. At the time Greek was written all caps, no accents.Good luck!Love & peace,
Karen

[beausefaless]

ALEXANDROU. Thank you Karen, the fonts were a bear to accomplish so I kept it simple. The translated name on the coins is spelled ALEXANDROU. During Alexander's lifetime, twenty-five mints were producing his coins: two in Macedonia, one in Egypt, and twenty-three in Asia. In the years immediately following his death that number increased to thirty-one, possibly including a Peloponnesian mint at Sicyon. In the last quarter of the third century, over a hundred years after his death, fifty-one mints were still producing Alexanders, mainly the tetradrachms, ALEXANDROU

[karen]

Hi Andrew et al:I know it's spelled ALEXANDROU on the coins. I think perhaps the confusion here is that Greek is a declined language, so that the ending of nouns -- including proper names -- changes, depending on how they are being used. E.g., if you were talking to Alexander you'd address him, "ALEXANDRE". But if talking about him, "ALEXANDROS". Talking about something of or from him, "ALEXANDROU". At least that's as I understand it. Perhaps someone else who's studied Greek can confirm this?Love & peace,
Karen

[jan]

Thanks, Karen, for the Greek alphabetic spelling. That is most helpful.

[beausefaless]

Hello Karen,I own a few of these coins A lambda E xi AN delta POY is spelled on lots of Alexanders and also sigma E lambda EYKOY is spelled on other Alexanders. My reference and source: Studies In The Macedonian Coinage Of Aexander The Great by Hyla A. Troxell Numismatic Studies No.21 (The American Numismtic Society New York 1997), take care.

[marcus]

The good news is, of course, that you can write all the Greek letters in Microsoft Word, which is great for all those of us who are writing our magna opera.The huge stumbling block I came up against at the weekend was how to reproduce cuneiform in my manuscript. If anyone can answer that, or point me to a font that will do it, I'll be extremely grateful!All the bestMarcus

[marcus]

It's all right - I found one!I haven't tried it yet, 'cos I haven't unzipped the file... but it looks dead exciting!All the bestMarcus

[beausefaless]

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[marcus]

So what is "your way", Andrew?By the way, the chap who created the cuneiform font I found (some German with way too much time on his hands), in his readme file almost *begs* people to pass round the fonts. So if anyone wants Persian and Ugaritic cuneiform, Sanskrit, and Meroese hieroglyphs and demotic fonts, let me know (it's about 250kb in zipped form).All the bestMarcus

[beausefaless]

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