Attic Greek is the Greek dialect of the ancient region of Attica, including the polis of Athens. Often called classical Greek, it was the prestige dialect of the Greek world for centuries and remains the standard form of the language that is taught to students of ancient Greek. As the basis of the Hellenistic Koine, it is the most similar of the ancient dialects to later Greek. Attic is traditionally classified as a member or sister dialect of the Ionic branch.
A ballot voting against Themistocles, son of Neocles, under the Athenian Democracy (see ostracism) Inscription: ΘΕΜΙΣΘΟΚΛΕΣ ΝΕΟΚΛΕΟΣ (classical standard Θεμιστοκλῆς Νεοκλέους Themistoklês Neokléous). The text is an example of the epichoric alphabet; the last two letters of Themistocles are written in a boustrophedon manner and that Ε and Ο are used for both long and short e and o.
Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages, native to Greece, Cyprus, Italy, southern Albania, and other regions of the Balkans, the Black Sea coast, Asia Minor, and the Eastern Mediterranean. It has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning at least 3,400 years of written records. Its writing system is the Greek alphabet, which has been used for approximately 2,800 years; previously, Greek was recorded in writing systems such as Linear B and the Cypriot syllabary. The alphabet arose from the Phoenician script and was in turn the basis of the Latin, Cyrillic, Coptic, Gothic, and many other writing systems.
Idealised portrayal of the author Homer
Greek inscription in Cypriot syllabic script
