Greek language

Greek
elliniká
Eλληνικά
Pronunciation	[eliniˈka]
Region	Greece, southern Mediterranean
Native speakers	13 million (2012)
Language family	Indo-European Hellenic Greek
Dialects	Ancient dialects Modern dialects
Writing system	Greek alphabet Greek Braille
Official status
Official language in	Greece Cyprus European Union
Recognised minority language in	Albania Armenia Hungary Germany Italy Romania Ukraine Turkey Croatia Serbia North Macedonia
Language codes
ISO 639-1	el
ISO 639-2	gre (B) ell (T)
ISO 639-3	Variously: ell – Modern Greek grc – Ancient Greek cpg – Cappadocian Greek gmy – Mycenaean Greek pnt – Pontic tsd – Tsakonian yej – Yevanic
Glottolog	gree1276
Linguasphere	56-AAA-a 56-AAA-aa to -am (varieties)

Spoken Greek

The Greek language is an Indo-European language. It is the official language of Greece (Hellas) and Cyprus. It was first spoken in Greece and was also once spoken along the coast of Asia Minor (now a part of Turkey) and in southern Italy. It was also widely used in Western Asia and Northern Africa at one time. In Greek, the language is called Ελληνικά (elliniká).

Greeks write their language using the Greek alphabet. The Latin alphabet (used to write English and many other languages) came from the Greek alphabet. Many other alphabets around the world also came from the Greek one.

Greek has an unbroken history of being a written language for over 3,000 years. This is longer than any other Indo-European language spoken today. This history is often divided into three parts, ancient Greek, medieval Greek, and modern Greek. The years 330-1453 are called medieval Greek because that's the time of the Byzantine Empire.

Over 13 million people in the world speak Greek as of 2021. These speakers mostly live in Greece (almost 11 million) and Cyprus (over 1 million). There are also people in other countries around the world who speak the language. This is largely because people left Greece and emigrated, meaning they moved to other countries. Countries like the United States and Australia have a large Greek diaspora.

Related pages

• Greek numbers
• Ancient Greek language

Other websites

• Greek Dictionary Archived 2012-02-23 at the Wayback Machine, from Webster's Dictionary Archived 2012-02-23 at the Wayback Machine.
• Ancient Greek Dictionaries Archived 2009-04-29 at the Wayback Machine, descriptions of both online dictionaries (with appropriate links) and Greek.