Phoinikeia Grammata 37

Table 3.2 Full list of Phoenician and Greek scripts (cf. table 7 .1)
Phoenician consonantal script Greek alphabetic script
// alep alpha / / and / /
/b/ bet beta /b/
/g/ gimel
Texto gamma /g/
/d/ dalet delta /d/
/h/ he epsilon / /, / /1 and / /2
/w/ waw wau /w/
/dz/ zayin zeta [z] + [d]
/ / het (h)eta /h/ and / /
/t/ et theta /th/
/y/ yod iota / / and / /
/k/ kap kappa /k/
/l/ lamed lambda /l/
/m/ mem mu /m/
/n/ nun nu /n/
/ts/ samek xi [k] + [s]
// ayin omikron / /, / /1, and / /2
/p/ pe pi /p/
/ts/ sade san [ts]?
/k/ qop qoppa backed [k]
/r/ re rho /r/
/s/ in sigma /s/
/t/ taw tau /t/

That strategy would have ceased to be required for Greek spelling with the intro-
duction of the first supplemental Greek letter. A distinct vowel symbol having the
value of / / and / /, upsilon, was appended to the end of the Greek adapters
alphabet. While upsilon supplements the Phoenician script by extending beyond its
range (i.e., alep to taw), the shape of the appended Greek letter is unmistakably
Phoenician. While the Greek adapters had taken over Phoenician waw into their
alphabet, retaining its name, its place in the periodic order of letters, and its value
/w/, they chose to alter the morphology of waw; as we noted above, the resulting
Greek letter, wau, shows no similarity to its Phoenician source (see McCarter 1975:
934). In contrast, the first addendum to the Greek adaptation of the Semitic script,
upsilon, preserves the form of Phoenician waw, but not its name, its position, or its
consonantal value /w/ being assigned, instead, the value of the vocalic counterpart
of /w/ that is, /u/. Additional supplemental and non-Phoenician consonan-
tal symbols were subsequently attached to the expanded alpha-through-upsilon
Greek abecedarium. A large number of local Greek alphabets show the ensuing
sequence phi, chi, psi, with the graphic shapes and phonic values shown in table 3.2a.
Phi and chi fill out the graphemic provision for voiceless aspirated stop phonemes:
before the addition of these symbols to the alphabetic repertory, the aspirated stops
/ph/ and /kh/ would have been ambiguously spelled using the symbols pi and kappa