Transliterate English text using the Greek alphabet: Difference between revisions

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Rules

A rather silly little task intended as a bit of fun as well as a simple exercise in text substitution. So, if you're a Greek speaker or an expert in ancient Greek, please don't take it too seriously!

As there isn't a one-to-one correspondence between the English and Greek alphabets, we need some rules:

Greek letter	Corresponding English letter(s)
alpha	a
beta	b or v
gamma	g
delta	d
epsilon	e (but not ee)
zeta	z
eta	h or ee (but not ch, kh, ph, rh or th)
theta	th
iota	i or j
kappa	c, k, q or ck (but not ch and kh)
lambda	l
mu	m
nu	n
xi	x
omicron	o (but not oo)
pi	p (but not ph or ps)
rho	r or rh
sigma	s (but not ps)
tau	t (but not th)
upsilon	u or y
phi	f or ph
chi	ch or kh
psi	ps
omega	w or oo

In the case of lower-case sigma, use ς when s is the final letter of an English word or σ otherwise.

Ignore Greek diacritics (accents and breathings) but use the same capitalization, spacing and punctuation as in the English text.

Example

English: The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog.

Greek: Θε κυικ βροων φοξ ιυμπεδ οβερ θε λαζυ δογ.

Task

Transliterate the following English text into Greek using the above rules:

I was looking at some rhododendrons in my back garden,
dressed in my khaki shorts, when the telephone rang.

As I answered it, I cheerfully glimpsed that the July sun
caused a fragment of black pine wax to ooze on the velvet quilt
laying in my patio.

If your language does not support the printing of non-ascii characters, then you can instead transliterate the following lower-case pangram:

sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow.

Just represent the Greek letters by their names in angle brackets. For example:

the dog => <theta><epsilon> <delta><omicron><gamma>

Reference

Wikipedia: Greek alphabet

Other tasks related to string operations:

Metrics

Counting

Remove/replace

Anagrams/Derangements/shuffling

Find/Search/Determine

Formatting

Song lyrics/poems/Mad Libs/phrases

Tokenize

Sequences

Julia

This example is in need of improvement:

Not transliterating 'y'. See lazy, July, my

<lang ruby>const texts = [ """The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog.""", """I was looking at some rhododendrons in my back garden, dressed in my khaki shorts, when the telephone rang.

As I answered it, I cheerfully glimpsed that the July sun caused a fragment of black pine wax to ooze on the velvet quilt laying in my patio.""", """sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow."""]

const replacements = [

   "ch" => "χ", "th" => "θ", "ps" => "ψ", "ph" => "f", r"s(\W)" => s"ς\1",
   "Ch" => "Χ", "Th" => "Θ", "Ps" => "Ψ", "Ph" => "F", "ee" => "h", "ck" => "k",
   "rh" => "r", "kh" => "χ", "oo" => "w", "a" => "α", "b" => "β", "d" => "δ",
   "e" => "ε", "f" => "φ", "g" => "γ", "h" => "η", "i" => "ι", "j" => "ι",
   "l" => "λ", "m" => "μ", "n" => "ν", "o" => "ο", "p" => "π", "q" => "κ",
   "r" => "ρ", "s" => "σ", "t" => "τ", "u" => "υ", "v" => "β", "w" => "ω",
   "x" => "ξ", "z" => "ζ", "A" => "Α", "B" => "Β", "D" => "Δ", "E" => "Ε",
   "F" => "Φ", "G" => "Γ", "H" => "Η", "I" => "Ι", "J" => "I", "L" => "Λ",
   "M" => "Μ", "N" => "Ν", "O" => "Ο", "P" => "Π", "Q" => "Κ", "R" => "Ρ",
   "S" => "Σ", "T" => "Τ", "U" => "Υ", "W" => "Ω", "X" => "Ξ", "Z" => "Ζ"]

for txt in texts

   println("$txt\n=>")
   for pair in replacements
       txt = replace(txt, pair)
   end
   println("$txt\n", "="^65)

end

</lang>

Output:

The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog.
=>
Θε κυιk βροων φοξ ιυμπεδ οβερ θε λαζy δογ.
=================================================================
I was looking at some rhododendrons in my back garden,
dressed in my khaki shorts, when the telephone rang.

As I answered it, I cheerfully glimpsed that the July sun
caused a fragment of black pine wax to ooze on the velvet quilt
laying in my patio.
=>
Ι ωας λωkινγ ατ σομε ροδοδενδρονς ιν μy βαk γαρδεν,
δρεσσεδ ιν μy χαkι σηορτς, ωηεν θε τελεφονε ρανγ.

Ας Ι ανσωερεδ ιτ, Ι χηρφυλλy γλιμψεδ θατ θε Iυλy συν
cαυσεδ α φραγμεντ οφ βλαk πινε ωαξ το ωζε ον θε βελβετ κυιλτ
λαyινγ ιν μy πατιο.
=================================================================
sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow.
=>
σφινξ οφ βλαk κυαρτζ, ιυδγε μy βοω.
=================================================================

Raku

<lang perl6>sub to-Greek (Str $string is copy) {

   my %pre = :Ph<F>, :ck<k>, :ee<h>, :J, :rh<r>,:oo<w>, :ph<f>, 's ' => 'ς ';
   my %post =
   :ch<χ>, :th<θ>, :ps<ψ>, :Ch<Χ>, :Th<Θ>, :Ps<Ψ>, :kh<χ>, :a<α>, :b<β>, :d<δ>,
   :e<ε>, :f<φ>, :g<γ>, :h<η>, :i<ι>, :j<ι>, :k<κ>, :l<λ>, :m<μ>, :n<ν>, :o<ο>,
   :p<π>, :q<κ>, :r<ρ>, :s<σ>, :t<τ>, :u<υ>, :v<β>, :w<ω>, :x<ξ>, :y<υ>, :z<ζ>,
   :A<Α>, :B<Β>, :D<Δ>, :E<Ε>, :F<Φ>, :G<Γ>, :H<Η>, :I<Ι>, :L<Λ>, :M<Μ>, :N<Ν>,
   :O<Ο>, :P<Π>, :Q<Κ>, :R<Ρ>, :S<Σ>, :T<Τ>, :U<Υ>, :W<Ω>, :X<Ξ>, :Z<Ζ>;

$string.=subst(:g, .key, .value ) for flat %pre, %post; $string
}
my $text = chomp q:to/ENGLISH/;
The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog.
I was looking at some rhododendrons in my back garden, dressed in my khaki shorts, when the telephone rang.
As I answered it, I cheerfully glimpsed that the July sun caused a fragment of black pine wax to ooze on the velvet quilt laying in my patio.
sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow. ENGLISH
say "English:\n\n" ~ $text ~ "\n" ~ '=' x 80;
say "\"Greek\":\n\n" ~ $text.&to-Greek ~ "\n" ~ '=' x 80;
say "Or, to named characters:\n\n$_\n" ~
.&to-Greek.comb.map({ .match(/\W/) ?? $_ !! '<' ~ .uniname.subst( /.+<?after LETTER\s>/).lc ~ '>' }).join given 'sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow.';</lang>
English: The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog. I was looking at some rhododendrons in my back garden, dressed in my khaki shorts, when the telephone rang. As I answered it, I cheerfully glimpsed that the July sun caused a fragment of black pine wax to ooze on the velvet quilt laying in my patio. sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow. ================================================================================ "Greek": Τηε κυικ βροων φοξ ιυμπεδ οβερ τηε λαζυ δογ. Ι ωας λωκινγ ατ σομε ροδοδενδρονς ιν μυ βακ γαρδεν, δρεσσεδ ιν μυ κηακι σηορτσ, ωηεν τηε τελεφονε ρανγ. Ας Ι ανσωερεδ ιτ, Ι χηρφυλλυ γλιμπσεδ τηατ τηε Ιυλυ συν cαυσεδ α φραγμεντ οφ βλακ πινε ωαξ το ωζε ον τηε βελβετ κυιλτ λαυινγ ιν μυ πατιο. σφινξ οφ βλακ κυαρτζ, ιυδγε μυ βοω. ================================================================================ Or, to named characters: sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow. <sigma><phi><iota><nu><xi> <omicron><phi> <beta><lamda><alpha><kappa> <kappa><upsilon><alpha><rho><tau><zeta>, <iota><upsilon><delta><gamma><epsilon> <mu><upsilon> <beta><omicron><omega>.
Wren
Library: Wren-str
<lang ecmascript>import "./str" for Char, Greek
var English2Greek = Fn.new { |text|
// make appropriate substitutions using rarely used control characters // for Greek letters which have no single English letter equivalents var subs = [ ["v", "b"], ["j", "i"], ["y", "u"], ["ch", "\x01"], // chi (l/c) ["kh", "\x01"], // chi (l/c) ["ph", "f"], ["rh", "r"], ["th", "\x02"], // theta (l/c) ["Ch", "\x04"], // chi (u/c) ["Kh", "\x04"], // chi (u/c) ["Ph", "F"], ["Rh", "R"], ["Th", "\x05"], // theta (u/c) ["ee", "h"], ["ck", "q"], ["c", "q"], ["k", "q"], ["oo", "w"], ["ps", "\x03"], // psi(l/c) ["Ps", "\x06"], // psi(u/c) ["V", "B"], ["J", "I"], ["Y", "U"], ["CH", "\x04"], // chi (u/c) ["KH", "\x04"], // chi (u/c) ["PH", "F"], ["RH", "R"], ["TH", "\x05"], // theta (u/c) ["EE", "H"], ["CK", "Q"], ["C", "Q"], ["K", "Q"], ["OO", "W"], ["PS", "\x06"], // psi(u/c) ] for (sub in subs) text = text.replace(sub[0], sub[1])
// now look for final English lower case 's' and use 'DEL' to substitute for that var letters = text.toList for (i in 1...letters.count) { var c = letters[i] if ((Char.isWhitespace(c) || Char.isPunctuation(c)) && letters[i-1] == "s") { letters[i-1] = "\x7f" } }
// finally substitute the remaining English 'letters' with Greek ones // note that some of them look the same but are different codepoints var e2g = { "a": "α", "b": "β", "d": "δ", "e": "ε", "f": "φ", "g": "γ", "h": "η", "i": "ι", "l": "λ", "m": "μ", "n": "ν", "o": "ο", "p": "π", "q": "κ", "r": "ρ", "s": "σ", "t": "τ", "u": "υ", "w": "ω", "x": "ξ", "z": "ζ", "A": "Α", "B": "Β", "D": "Δ", "E": "Ε", "F": "Φ", "G": "Γ", "H": "Η", "I": "Ι", "L": "Λ", "M": "Μ", "N": "Ν", "O": "Ο", "P": "Π", "Q": "Κ", "R": "Ρ", "S": "Σ", "T": "Τ", "U": "Υ", "W": "Ω", "X": "Ξ", "Z": "Ζ", "\x01": "χ", "\x02": "θ", "\x03": "ψ", "\x7f": "ς", "\x04": "Χ", "\x05": "Θ", "\x06": "Ψ" }
var greek = List.filled(letters.count, null) for (i in 0...greek.count) { var c = letters[i] if (Char.isWhitespace(c) || Char.isPunctuation(c)) { greek[i] = c } else { greek[i] = e2g[letters[i]] } } return greek.join("")
}
var texts = [ "The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog.", """ I was looking at some rhododendrons in my back garden, dressed in my khaki shorts, when the telephone rang.
As I answered it, I cheerfully glimpsed that the July sun caused a fragment of black pine wax to ooze on the velvet quilt laying in my patio. """, "sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow." ] for (text in texts) {
System.print(text) System.print() System.print(English2Greek.call(text)) System.print("=" * 65)
} System.print("The last example using the names of the Greek letters instead:") var letters = Greek.names var alphabet = "αβγδεζηθικλμνξοπρςστυφχψω".codePoints.toList var e2gl = {} for (i in 0...alphabet.count) e2gl[String.fromCodePoint(alphabet[i])] = letters[i] var greek = English2Greek.call(texts[2]) var s = "" for (g in greek) {
var c if (Char.isWhitespace(g) || Char.isPunctuation(g)) { c = g } else { c = "<" + e2gl[g] + ">" } s = s + c
} System.print(s)</lang>

Output:
The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog. Θε κυικ βροων φοξ ιυμπεδ οβερ θε λαζυ δογ. ================================================================= I was looking at some rhododendrons in my back garden, dressed in my khaki shorts, when the telephone rang. As I answered it, I cheerfully glimpsed that the July sun caused a fragment of black pine wax to ooze on the velvet quilt laying in my patio. Ι ωας λωκινγ ατ σομε ροδοδενδρονς ιν μυ βακ γαρδεν, δρεσσεδ ιν μυ χακι σηορτς, ωηεν θε τελεφονε ρανγ. Ας Ι ανσωερεδ ιτ, Ι χηρφυλλυ γλιμψεδ θατ θε Ιυλυ συν καυσεδ α φραγμεντ οφ βλακ πινε ωαξ το ωζε ον θε βελβετ κυιλτ λαυινγ ιν μυ πατιο. ================================================================= sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow. σφινξ οφ βλακ κυαρτζ, ιυδγε μυ βοω. ================================================================= The last example using the names of the Greek letters instead: <sigma><phi><iota><nu><xi> <omicron><phi> <beta><lambda><alpha><kappa> <kappa><upsilon><alpha><rho><tau><zeta>, <iota><upsilon><delta><gamma><epsilon> <mu><upsilon> <beta><omicron><omega>.