Learn Ancient Greek (Greek and Latin Language)

I was looking for a good introduction to learning attic and koine Greek and selected Jones' book as my place to start.The good: It's a pretty gentle introduction, many other similar books I've looked at are more eager to hurl the student into the deep end. The book does not require previous knowledge of Latin, as some texts do. Jones supplies the answers to all of his exercises, so it is more appropriate for self-teaching than other books.The bad: Jones cuts some corners with the language to make it easier on the student. He also doesn't provide detailed explanations as to what's going on with the underpinnings of the language. For example, he doesn't explain how "middle" verbs are situated between active and passive forms, which I think would promote understanding. Also, some of the translations early in the book rely so heavily on vocabulary and forms not yet learned that they're not all that useful. This gets a bit better as the book progresses, but even at the end of the book the reader isn't equipped with everything they need to attack confidently most new testament passages and certainly not for most of the classics.The indifferent: As other reviewers have pointed out, some of the author's jokes are a bit ribald. I'd rate them as PG-13. If you're looking for a text to teach a ten year old, I could understand wanting to find a different text, but for anyone in the mid-teens, if they can't handle Jones' jokes, they need to get out more. Another reviewer was disappointed that Jones didn't provide translations of the biblical passages, but there are plenty of free sources online that will serve just fine. Jones doesn't explain the literary convention of accenting classic Greek. Can a Greek student manage without this knowledge? Yes. Except in specific cases which Jones points out, you can mostly get along fine without them. However, for various reasons accents are considered to be an integral part of classic Greek, so truly serious students will probably feel like they have a gap in their knowledge that needs to be filled.So, this is a decent, fairly gentle introduction to classic Greek that is suitable for self-learning. It's not sufficient to get to the point where the learner is really translating significant Greek passages, and such a student will have gaps, but it can be a reasonable starting point before students learning on their own transition to a more rigorous second beginning text.

What will come in the mail is a real cheap looking and slim paper back if you order it. Your first thought will probably be, "Oh, more of the dumb down? How ticky tacky!"What you'll be holding is utterly John Milton. It's a conflict. Every internal alarm bell will be ringing that you bought "2005 garbage" and it is the exact opposite dating all the way back to John Milton and his letter on education. It's an itty handful of vocabulary, a skillful dodge around all that you do not need to know to read ancient Greek, and grammar in increments. That IS the John Milton educational formula.Peter Jones is a British man and oh is he a British man! Pure British. Nothing but British in entirety. There is "to be" and there is "to seem." He is "to be." One knows that upon opening his book and dating Peter Jones all the way back to John Milton and that letter on education. It is the 21st century and he does speak to the reader in light modern banter.This is it folks. John Milton in all his glory. Educational system O' John Milton, Jones University, 1644, England.(My Milton reference is a used copy of The Portable Milton, edited by Douglas Bush, the Viking Portable Library. In addition, I recommend Homer in the Loeb Classic series which has Greek on one page and an English translation on the other. )

_Learn Ancient Greek_ is a solid primer to Attic Greek. However, I offer one caveat: the book is considerably easier for those who have some prior experience with language. (More on that later.)Jones does a remarkable job in getting readers comfortable and confident with Greek, translating simple passages by the end of Chapter Two. His humor is a bit dry, but the lessons are solid and build off each other very well. A CD is offered for those who are concerned with pronunciation (I am only interested in reading Greek, but its nice to have it offered).With that said, I would not recommend this book to those who have no experience with language - Greek gets complicated (as Jones points out relatively early on; to his credit, the exceptions to the rules and the grammar itself are very well explained). While Jones provides some clarification of what grammar is (with humor, thankfully) and how it works, I can't imagine getting further than the first few chapters without prior language experience to draw upon. Hence the four stars.For autodidacts, Hellenophiles, or those seeking to fill gaps in their education, I highly recommend this book. By the end of the book you will be translating excerpts from Homer and the Bible, and have an excellent foundation for further formal study.

Fantastic learning material for Ancient Greek. The author does an amazing job of presenting a vastly different language in an easy and enjoyable manner. Quite honestly, learning beginners Greek was easier than Spanish due to how well this was written.The short chapters are broken up into various sections such as: Presenting a verb form, irregularity, vocabulary, exercises and then a brief overview of some culture pertaining to Ancient Greece in addition to some quirky comic image. To make it even better once you get roughly half way through the author picks parts of plays, historical texts and more for you to translate with what you know.Unlike some other language-learning materials out there, there's answers at the back of every chapter so even though you should try your best to not look at them until you think you're nearly or completely correct, you are never left scratching your head wondering if your right or totally off.The author's sense of humor and thoughtful layout make this probably the absolute best option out there for Beginner-low intermediate Greek. The only bad thing is you have to go to someone else afterwards!

I bought this book two years ago after struggling with Teach Yourself Ancient Greek. (I’m a big fan of the TY series and my failure to get beyond Chapter 9 of TYAG is more a reflection of my incompetence than of the book itself).When I bought this book I went through it at a slow pace, making notes and flash cards and found it helpful in getting me back on track with my learning. However, I then went off in a new direction. Instead of returning to TYAG, I moved on to Christophe Rico’s Polis. This is an excellent introduction to Koine, but really needs a teacher as the whole text is in Koine, as are the very useful audio/podcasts and YouTube videos (useful for pronunciation and for bringing the language to life). However, I found that lots of words in the Polis course are either not in my Ancient Greek dictionary, or the meanings given there don’t equate to the meanings they seem to have on the Polis course. Also Polis is designed for listening and speaking so it’s presented like a modern language course. In other words, you have conversations between the prof and his students rather than analysis of Plato and Aristotle. So, as I have no one with whom to speak Koine, I’ve put Polis back on the shelf for the time being and reached for Peter Jones’s book for a second run though.Let me get the irritations out of the way first:• The author’s jaunty style can be annoying, especially the schoolboy humour• He assumes his readers are practicing Christians (and have a copy of the New Testament to hand)• He doesn’t do accents, although he does – briefly – explain what they areIf you can handle those irritations, what you get in this book is an excellent introduction to a kind of hybrid Greek (5th Century BCE Attic, Koine, New Testament, prose and poetry) and that’s exactly what you need if you want to be able to read a range of Ancient Greek literature in the original.The author goes easy on the grammar, introducing just enough to enable you to make progress, and you soon realise you are moving at a fairly brisk pace. By the time you’re half way through the book you’ve covered the present indicative and imperative of regular, middle and contracted verbs; masculine, feminine and neuter nouns; present participles; present subjunctive of the above verbs and aorist (past).I’m halfway through the book now, in about a week, and I know what to expect in the second half. We’ll have more on the aorist, the imperfect, the passive; adjectives; and we’ll get some poetry, with useful notes on metre. As well as biblical passages, there are excerpts from Plato and the dramatists. These are either simplified or have the difficult bits glossed, but knowing you’re getting close to reading some “real” Ancient Greek is immensely satisfying. At the end of each chapter there’s a section on Ancient Greek language and culture. Throughout the author shows how many modern English words derive directly or indirectly from Ancient Greek.I would recommend this book to anyone who wants a gentle introduction to Ancient Greek. If you try this book first, and then move on to TYAG or Polis, you’ll have a great head start when you’re grappling with noun declensions and verb forms (which come at you with a rapid pace in TYAG) or with the demands of Polis (recognising the difference between indicative and imperative).

Similar to his previous Latin book, Peter Jones's 'Learn Ancient Greek' is very compelling, so long as you can stand grammar and vocab lists. Again, a very funny book with interesting info about the Greeks, and the way Greek has changed over the years and its influence on English. It also covers the Greek alphabet in a very good way, with lots of recognisable examples of use. Again, lots of Greek passages from both Classical writers and from the New Testament, although pedants will note that he makes little distinction between Biblical Koine and Classical Attic. Pedants should also be aware that there is no discussion on noun declension, as the case is apparent from the article; the focus is on reading more than writing. However, it is briefly mentioned in the grammar appendix. Also be aware there are no accent marks on words except for clarity where there might be confusion with others. Nevertheless, if you have an interest in Ancient Greek, you should definitely buy this book, and if you're also interested in Latin, check out Jones's previous book. As there is no preview, I have included some photos of the inside and the back cover.

There is no royal way to learning, Watson. Peter Jones does his best to take the pain out of it but it still hurts. I love it! Squeezing the old grey cells is stimulating but what we are faced with here by this master of the language is a bit of a grind. Sometimes bits of teaching just click into place like the edges on a jig-saw puzzle and I feel great. I find the method a bit irritating to be frank and some of the jokes are not the greatest- the author slips in many things that need working out so that you have to do a double take to see if you're being subtly fed vocabulary/grammar or given a nudge-nudge, wink- wink "don't you think this is clever humour" insert when it's not really all that rib-tickling and rather groan-groan.. Having said that it's still a good buy and takes some of the huff and puff out of climbing a steep hill. Nevertheless you will still hit that awful moment when you think "how on earth did these guys-[the Greeks]- ever dream up such a complicated way of communicating? Surely there must have been a few dense ones like me!" I'm sticking with if for the moment because I do feel I'm getting somewhere but cold towels applied to feverish brow might be needed,Watson. This is definitely a three- pipe problem. Pass me my violin. The muse is upon me...

With this book you can tap directly into the linguistic thoughts of Peter V. Jones, arguably a colossus of the classical world in his own right.The pictures and jokes hide quite a heavy-duty introduction to the language, and lots of the thorny issues get addressed.The trouble is, it is still (and is increasingly) Ancient Greek, and there's a lot to learn, and the experts are STILL arguing the toss about how best to translate Plato's "Apology".If you are an absolute beginner, learning on your own, there are thinner, perhaps more approachable books to get you up to speed first.

This is a very entertaining introduction to learning ancient Greek. Don't expect to be an expert from reading this but you will gain sense of accomplishment and learn some interesting things along the way including some basic ancient Greek!Good good bargain.