Dictionary Recommendation

Callaina

Feles Curiosissima

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Location:
Canada
First post in a new subforum...exciting! ;)

Anyway: I'm currently learning Ancient Greek (just introductory-level at the moment) and would like a recommendation for a good beginner's dictionary -- i.e. something I will be able to use for the next two years at least. I enjoy doing extra reading on my own and the word list at the back of the textbook is just not up to the job.

It should be:
- (relatively) inexpensive and easy to order (or available online freely)
- if online, easy to use -- I've checked out Perseus' Greek dictionary but inputting Greek text there is just a pain, and I don't feel much like learning their special code for accents, etc. just to use their dictionary.
- comprehensive but not horrendously massive (i.e. not the size of my unabridged Lewis & Short...not quite yet, anyway ;) )

Thanks for your recommendations, and thank you very much to the moderator who created this subforum! I think I'll be hanging out here a lot :)
 

Pacifica

grammaticissima

  • Aedilis

Location:
Belgium
- if online, easy to use -- I've checked out Perseus' Greek dictionary but inputting Greek text there is just a pain, and I don't feel much like learning their special code for accents, etc. just to use their dictionary.
You can just type the words (in their code) without accents, it works.
 

Callaina

Feles Curiosissima

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Well...it's still kind of a pain. I'd rather have either a Greek keyboard (on screen) that I can type on, or a book I can pick up and flip through.
 

Pacifica

grammaticissima

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Location:
Belgium
A pain? I find it extremely easy... You have their table here:
Code.PNG

And then you just transcribe; e.g. ἔπραξαν ---> epracan, simple!
 

Callaina

Feles Curiosissima

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Yes, yes, I know :p

The problem is: if I do that, I'm going to think in transliterated Greek text. This is a problem because:
(1) I learn visually and if I input/look up a word in Greek text, I'll be more likely to remember it in Greek text.
(2) I'm already confusing Greek and Latin vocabulary now & again, and this will only become more of a problem if I start using a tool like this for looking up words.

Sorry, I know you're trying to be helpful, but I can't make myself use this thing (at least not all the time) :(
 

Callaina

Feles Curiosissima

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Location:
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Oh, and (3) I'm trying to learn the proper pronunciation, too, and if I start thinking that ξ is "really" a C (for example), this will have all sorts of disastrous effects.
 

Imber Ranae

Ranunculus Iracundus

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Grand Rapids, Michigan
If you consult it frequently, the letters that don't obviously correspond (there are only a few) will become second nature in no time. It's hard to imagine a much easier system. Having to pick and choose letters on a screen would be far more onerous, it seems to me.
 

Pacifica

grammaticissima

  • Aedilis

Location:
Belgium
Well, then maybe you can buy the paper version of the Liddell and Scott's dictionary (which is better anyway, because it gives info the online version lacks), but I don't know its price.
 

Callaina

Feles Curiosissima

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Maybe most people could use a tool like this, but I just can't. E.g. that word that Pacis gave above: now I've "learned" it as "epracan", LOL, and I'm going to have to "unlearn" "epracan" before I can learn the actual Greek spelling.

My brain is just not set up to use this thing.
 

Imber Ranae

Ranunculus Iracundus

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Location:
Grand Rapids, Michigan
Well, then maybe you can buy the paper version of the Liddell and Scott's dictionary (which is better anyway, because it gives info the online version lacks), but I don't know its price.
The unabridged version, which is a monster, will be well outside her means, I'm sorry to say.
 

Callaina

Feles Curiosissima

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Location:
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Very funny :p

(edit: to Pacis).
 

Pacifica

grammaticissima

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Location:
Belgium
The unabridged version, which is a monster, will be well outside her means, I'm sorry to say.
I was thinking of the "intermediate" one (it's the one that's online, I think).
 

Imber Ranae

Ranunculus Iracundus

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Location:
Grand Rapids, Michigan
I was thinking of the "intermediate" one (it's the one that's online, I think).
Oh, yes. I have the one myself, but what information does it have that the online version lacks?
 

Imber Ranae

Ranunculus Iracundus

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Location:
Grand Rapids, Michigan
The lists of principal parts, most obviously.
You mean there's a list that's separate from the individual word entries? I don't remember there being such a thing...
 

Pacifica

grammaticissima

  • Aedilis

Location:
Belgium

Callaina

Feles Curiosissima

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Location:
Canada
A number of searches turn up an "abridged version". Is this the same as the Intermediate version that you referred to above, Pacis?
 

Pacifica

grammaticissima

  • Aedilis

Location:
Belgium
A number of searches turn up an "abridged version". Is this the same as the Intermediate version that you referred to above, Pacis?
I don't think so... At any rate there's no "abridged" in the title of my dictionary, which is "An intermediate Greek-English lexicon, founded upon the seventh edition of Liddell and Scott's Greek-English lexicon."
 
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