Often, I feel that scholars have listed the α-stems first as a sort of test to weed out the unindustrious student. While the first declension has numerous forms, the second declension has only two. Really, once you've learned the second declension and the easiest of the first declension paradigms, you'll be ready to take on the simpler Greek adjectives. In turn, you'll be able to write more interesting sentences, which in turn will improve your fluency.
Lacking a renaissance for Classic Greek, I doubt any browsers in the near future will natively support diacriticals. Poor Aristophanes (not the playright), all his work in vain.
- Words like σκελος, (skelos, leg), most of them masculine, that are -ου in the genitive case.
- Words like τοξον, (tokson, bow), all of them neuter, that take -ου in the genitive as well. Know them by the ending -ν, which would have been a -m in Latin.
The Paradigms:
Nominative: 'ο σκελος 'οι σκελοι
Genitive: του σκελου των σκελων
Accusative: τον σκελον τους σκελους
Dative: τωι σκελωι τοις σκελοις
Nominative: το τοξον τα τοξα
Genitive: του τοξου των τοξων
Accusative: το τοξον τα τοξα
Dative: τωι τοξωι τοις τοξοις
One of the things that makes life decidely easier for neuter nouns: the accusative of a neuter (singular or plural) is the same as the nominative (respectively).
The ending ιs on the dative singular form should be a subscript on the previous vowel. If your browser is awesome, they look like this: ῃ
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