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Psilon Perispomene (Psili Perispomeni) on Majuscular Upsilon

Posted: June 20th, 2011, 3:36 pm
by Mike Baber
ἆ ἦ ἶ ὖ ὦ
Ἆ Ἦ Ἶ Ὦ

Is there a reason why the majuscular upsilon (Υ) does not take a psilon perispomene, while the miniscular upsilon does?

I even opened the "Insert Symbol" dialogue box on Word 2010, scrolled down to "Extended Greek," and tried to look for the majuscular upsilon with a psilon perispomene attached among the Greek letters and diacritics, but lo and behold, it was not present on the chart. The minisular was, however.

Any ideas why this is?

Another interesting observation is that the majuscular upsilon takes a dasu perispomene, but just not a psilon perispomene. Then again, I don't know enough about Greek diacritics, so I'm only assuming that such is unusual. It's probably not.

Re: Psilon Perispomene (Psili Perispomeni) on Majuscular Ups

Posted: June 20th, 2011, 4:15 pm
by cwconrad
Mike Baber wrote:ἆ ἦ ἶ ὖ ὦ
Ἆ Ἦ Ἶ Ὦ

Is there a reason why the majuscular upsilon (Υ) does not take a psilon perispomene, while the miniscular upsilon does?

I even opened the "Insert Symbol" dialogue box on Word 2010, scrolled down to "Extended Greek," and tried to look for the majuscular upsilon with a psilon perispomene attached among the Greek letters and diacritics, but lo and behold, it was not present on the chart. The minisular was, however.

Any ideas why this is?

Another interesting observation is that the majuscular upsilon takes a dasu perispomene, but just not a psilon perispomene. Then again, I don't know enough about Greek diacritics, so I'm only assuming that such is unusual. It's probably not.
Smyth (http://artflx.uchicago.edu/cgi-bin/phil ... monographs):
(§10) "Initial υ (υ and υ_) always has the rough breathing."

I think the reason is that Greek words beginning with Upsilon derive from original forms with an initial sigma (cf. Greek ὑπὲρ Latin 'super', Greek ὑπὸ Latin 'sub', Greek ὗς Latin 'sus' English 'swine').

Re: Psilon Perispomene (Psili Perispomeni) on Majuscular Ups

Posted: June 20th, 2011, 4:25 pm
by Ken M. Penner
It's there at http://www.unicodemap.org/details/0x1F5E/index.html but it's not in Unicode 6.0 at http://www.unicode.org/charts/PDF/U1F00.pdf
The lowercase form could have smooth and circumflex if it's in a diphthong, as the second letter of a word (εὖ). But it wouldn't be capitalized because, as Carl notes, such a letter would not be initial.

Re: Psilon Perispomene (Psili Perispomeni) on Majuscular Ups

Posted: June 20th, 2011, 4:58 pm
by Mike Baber
cwconrad wrote:
Mike Baber wrote:Smyth (http://artflx.uchicago.edu/cgi-bin/phil ... monographs):
(§10) "Initial υ (υ and υ_) always has the rough breathing."
lol...duh! I should have thought about it a little before posting. Basic Greek. hypo-, hyper-...etc.

How about the actual word Ύψιλον? There's no rough breathing on the initial Υ, or is that what the tonos accomplishes? Or, is it because the word is actually a combination of υ ψιλόν?

Re: Psilon Perispomene (Psili Perispomeni) on Majuscular Ups

Posted: June 20th, 2011, 4:59 pm
by Mike Baber
Ken M. Penner wrote:It's there at http://www.unicodemap.org/details/0x1F5E/index.html but it's not in Unicode 6.0 at http://www.unicode.org/charts/PDF/U1F00.pdf
The lowercase form could have smooth and circumflex if it's in a diphthong, as the second letter of a word (εὖ). But it wouldn't be capitalized because, as Carl notes, such a letter would not be initial.
Thank you Ken. :)