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Lesson 2 - Piw2 `Cnav ()
Coptic Letters That Don't Look Like English
 

Before we continue with the rest of the letters, there's one very important mark that we need to learn.  As you have probably noticed above, there is a short, sideways dash on top of the Sima (`C).

Now that we've found how easy it is to learn more than half of the Coptic alphabet, let's look at the second half.

These are letters that are not similar to the English alphabet.

Name Letter Pronunciation Example Sound
Ghamma J j g (hard)
gh

ng		 Good
Ghareeb (Arabic)
Language
Delta D d d
th
z		 Door
There
Zoo
Theta ) 0 th
t		 Thank
Table
Lolla L l l Love
Xi & 7 x Fax
Pi P p p Pope
Epsilon V v ee
oo
v		 Eat
Food
Volvo
Phi F f f
v		 Father
Volvo
Psi Y y ps Apse
Shai @ 2 sh Ship
Khai Q q kh Khaled (Arabic)
Hori H h h Hello
Janja G g g (hard)
j		 Good
Judge
Chima S s ch Church

 

Not exactly a letter...

Name Letter Pronunciation Meaning Sound
So ^ 6 soo

The number 6

 

I know that you're thinking, 'This is a number, not a letter.'  You're right.  It's both.  Although "^" is a number and a letter, it is almost always used as any number would be used, but not as a letter.  For example, you wont find ^ in the middle of a word or in any name.  As you become more familiar with the language this will be more apparent to you.
 

What's that bar on the number 6?
You may have noticed that "So" has a bar on top of it.  In Coptic, that's how numbers are written.  All numbers are actually letters with bars over them.  For example, the number 5 (pronounced "Tiow") is =e (Eta with a bar on top).

Congratulations!  You've just learned the entire Coptic alphabet!  As you may have noticed, some letters are pronounced in more than one way.  There are some rules when it comes to pronouncing these letters.  That is the subject of Lesson 3...

 

Lesson 1 Part II

top

Lesson 3


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