Qoppa

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Greek alphabet

Αα Alpha	Νν Nu
Ββ Beta	Ξξ Xi
Γγ Gamma	Οο Omicron
Δδ Delta	Ππ Pi
Εε Epsilon	Ρρ Rho
Ζζ Zeta	Σσς Sigma
Ηη Eta	Ττ Tau
Θθ Theta	Υυ Upsilon
Ιι Iota	Φφ Phi
Κκ Kappa	Χχ Chi
Λλ Lambda	Ψψ Psi
Μμ Mu	Ωω Omega
Obsolete letters
Digamma	Qoppa
San	Sampi
Other characters
Stigma	Sho
Heta

Greek diacritics

Qoppa or Koppa (Ϙ) is a letter that was used in early forms of the Greek alphabet, which lacked such a sound, it was instead used for /k/ before back vowels (Ο, Υ and Ω). As the sound /k/ then had two redundant spellings,^{[citation needed]} qoppa was eventually replaced by kappa (Κ). Qoppa remained in use as a letter in some Doric regions into the 5th century BC.^[1]

1 History and use
2 See also
3 References
4 Further reading
5 External links

[edit] History and use

Like all Greek letters, qoppa was also used as a numeral, and had the value of 90. It has continued to be used in this function into modern times, though its shape has changed over time from a Q-like one () one to a Z-like one ()

The Qoppa was used as a symbol for the city of Corinth, which had the early spelling of Ϙόρινθος. Qoppa is also the source of the Latin letter Q and the archaic Cyrillic numeral koppa (Ҁ).

In the Unicode computer encoding standard, there are two pairs of codepoints to represent Qoppa: U+03D8/U+03D9 ("Greek Letter Archaic Koppa" and "Greek Small Letter Archaic Koppa", Ϙϙ), intended for representing the epigraphic Q-like glyph, and U+03DE/U+03DF ("Greek Letter Koppa" and "Greek Small Letter Koppa", Ϟϟ), intended for the numeric Z-like glyphs.^[2]

Corinthian stater. Obverse: Pegasus with qoppa beneath, for Corinth. Reverse: Athena wearing Corinthian helmet.

[edit] See also

The letter qoppa as it appears in three basic fonts: Times New Roman, Arial, and Lucida Grande.

[edit] References

^ Woodard, Roger D. (1997). Greek Writing from Knossos to Homer. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0195105206.
^ Note that computer fonts used in browsers may show these codepoints differently.

[edit] Further reading

Powell, Barry B. (1991). Homer and the Origin of the Greek Alphabet. New York: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0521371570.
Threatte, Leslie (1980). The Grammar of Attic Inscriptions. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter. ISBN 3110073447.
Woodard, Roger D. (1997). Greek Writing from Knossos to Homer. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0195105206.

[edit] External links

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