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Classical Greek

A-Level Classical Greek is an ancient-language qualification, and in England OCR (Cambridge OCR) is the sole provider: specification H444, first taught from 2016. It is not shaped like a modern-languages A-Level. There is no speaking test, no listening test, no contemporary-themes syllabus and no individual research project. The qualification is available in English only and all candidate work is in English, apart from the Greek written in one optional section. What is assessed is the ability to read Greek written by Greek authors, accurately, at speed, and with a critical ear. Four components, all externally assessed, all taken in a single May or June series at the end of the course. Unseen Translation (H444/01) carries 100 marks and 33 per cent: Section A is the translation into English of an unseen passage of Greek prose, and Section B the translation of an unseen passage of Greek verse, that section also requiring the candidate to scan two lines of verse. The specification states that for examination from 2027 to 2032 the unseen prose passage will be taken from Xenophon and the unseen verse passage from Euripides, in iambic trimeter, which settles the metre a candidate must be able to scan. Prose Composition or Comprehension (H444/02) carries 50 marks and 17 per cent, and offers a genuine choice: Section A sets translation, comprehension and questions on syntax and accidence on an unseen passage of Greek prose, which for examination until 2032 will be a passage of oratory that does not overlap with the Group 1 or Group 2 authors examined in that year, while Section B requires the translation of at least 100 words of English into Classical Greek. A candidate answers one or the other, not both, and each is worth the full 50 marks. Prose Literature (H444/03) and Verse Literature (H444/04) carry 75 marks and 25 per cent each, and each has three sections: Section A examines a set text from one prescribed group, Section B a set text from a second group, in each case by translation of a passage into English, comprehension questions and a 15-mark question analysing literary style, characterisation, argument and literary meaning; Section C is an essay drawing on the second set text together with material the specification requires to be read in English translation. For the verse paper the specification adds that detailed knowledge and understanding of the set texts must include metre. The assessment objectives are three, not four: AO1, knowledge and understanding of the language, carries all 150 marks of the two language components; AO2, knowledge and understanding of literature, carries 70 marks; AO3, critical analysis, evaluation and response to literature, carries 80. The total is 300 marks and the total qualification time is 360 hours. Three features of the specification shape how the course must be planned. First, there is no Defined Vocabulary List at A-Level: learners build on the list published for AS Level Classical Greek (H044) and extend it by wider reading, so vocabulary is acquired from texts rather than from a prescribed schedule. Second, the set texts rotate: prose texts are prescribed in Group 1 and Group 2 and verse texts in Group 3 and Group 4, each text is examined for a maximum of three years, and any candidate must confirm the prescription for their own examination series. Third, the specification settles the orthography a candidate needs: learners are not expected to write accents, but must be able to distinguish words of identical spelling that differ only in accentuation; they are expected to write breathing marks in the Component 02 prose composition; knowledge of the dual is not required; and lunate sigma and iota adscript will not be used. What does not rotate is the grammar. Appendix 5d lists the accidence and syntax required for Components 01 and 02, and that list, from the article and the three declensions through both verb conjugations in all moods, voices and tenses to the uses of the participle, the uses of ἄν and the whole range of subordinate clauses, is the spine of the qualification.

0/53 Texts10 Chapters~423 min total

Continue reading — Chapter I Table of contents

OCR H444 Appendix 5d — Classical Greek accentuation: learners will not be expected to write accents, but should be able to distinguish words of identical spelling but with differing accentuationOCR H444 Appendix 5d — learners will be expected to write breathing marks as part of the prose composition in Component 02OCR H444 Appendix 5d — a knowledge of the dual form will not be required; lunate sigma and iota adscript will not be usedOCR H444 Appendix 5d Accidence — nouns of all standard and common irregular typesOCR H444 Appendix 5d Syntax — standard patterns of case usageDfE GCE AS and A level subject content for ancient languages+95 moreFoundationStandardAdvanced

Table of contents · 10 ChaptersT·10

Ch. IAccidence and syntax6 texts · 0 read

Ch. IIVocabulary and linguistic range5 texts · 0 read

Ch. IIIUnseen prose translation (Xenophon)5 texts · 0 read

Ch. IVUnseen verse translation and scansion6 texts · 0 read

Ch. VProse composition or comprehension6 texts · 0 read

Ch. VIProse literature: Group 1 set text5 texts · 0 read

Ch. VIIProse literature: Group 2 set text5 texts · 0 read

Ch. VIIIVerse literature: Group 3 set text5 texts · 0 read

Ch. IXVerse literature: Group 4 set text5 texts · 0 read

Ch. XGreek literary and cultural context5 texts · 0 read

Instrument · 01Recommended study order

Instrument · 02Exam structure

Component 01 — Unseen Translation (H444/01): 1 hour 45 minutes, 100 marks, 33% of the A-Level, an externally assessed written paper testing AO1 alone. There are two sections and both are answered. Section A, worth 50 marks, is the translation into English of an unseen passage of Classical Greek prose. Section B, worth 50 marks, is the translation into English of an unseen passage of Classical Greek verse, and in this section the candidate is also required to scan two lines of verse. The specification names the authors for a fixed window: for examination from 2027 to 2032 the unseen prose passage will be taken from Xenophon and the unseen verse passage from Euripides, in iambic trimeter. That single sentence settles a great deal of course planning. The prose to train on is plain fourth-century Attic narrative; the metre to train on is the iambic trimeter of tragic dialogue, not the dactylic hexameter of epic, which appears in this qualification only as a set text. There is no Defined Vocabulary List for the component: candidates build their vocabulary through the wider reading they do across the course. Because Section A and Section B carry equal marks, verse cannot be treated as an afterthought — a candidate who never trains the ear for the trimeter is choosing to compete for half the marks of the largest paper in the qualification.
Component 02 — Prose Composition or Comprehension (H444/02): 1 hour 15 minutes, 50 marks, 17% of the A-Level, an externally assessed written paper testing AO1 alone. There are two sections and the candidate answers either Section A or Section B, not both, and each is worth the full 50 marks. Section A sets translation, comprehension and questions on syntax and accidence on an unseen passage of Greek prose; the specification states that for examination until 2032 this passage will be a passage of oratory, and guarantees that its author will not overlap with the authors prescribed in Group 1 or Group 2 for examination in that year. Section B requires the translation of a passage of at least 100 words of English into Classical Greek. The choice is normally made by the centre and the candidate well before the examination, because the two routes need very different preparation: composition demands the active production of correct Greek — agreement, case usage, the article, aspect, mood, sequence, indirect statement, participial phrasing and idiomatic word order — while comprehension demands precise analytical description, in English and in the right grammatical terminology, of Greek somebody else has already written. One orthographic rule applies specifically here: learners are expected to write breathing marks as part of the prose composition, though they are not expected to write accents.
Components 03 and 04 — Prose Literature and Verse Literature: Two 2-hour written papers, 75 marks each, 25% of the A-Level each, testing AO2 and AO3: 35 marks of AO2 and 40 marks of AO3 in each paper. Prose Literature (H444/03) examines one prose set text from Group 1 in Section A and one from Group 2 in Section B; Verse Literature (H444/04) examines one verse set text from Group 3 in Section A and one from Group 4 in Section B. In Sections A and B of both papers the candidate translates a passage of the set text into English, answers comprehension questions, and answers a 15-mark question analysing literary style, characterisation, argument and literary meaning. Section C of each paper is an essay drawing on the Group 2 (prose) or Group 4 (verse) set text together with the material the specification requires to be read in English translation. For the verse paper, detailed knowledge and understanding of the set texts must explicitly include metre. Set texts rotate: each is examined for a maximum of three years, and the specification prints the prescriptions cycle by cycle — for example Herodotus and Plato in the prose groups, and Homer, Sophocles and Aristophanes in the verse groups, across the 2027–2029 and 2030–2032 cycles. Where a passage is printed on a question paper it is taken from the Bloomsbury OCR Anthology listed in the specification, with such modifications as seem appropriate to the examiners. Every candidate must therefore confirm the prescription for their own examination series rather than assume any list is permanent.
Assessment objectives, weightings and administration: Three assessment objectives. AO1, demonstrate knowledge and understanding of the language, is worth 150 of the 300 marks and is carried entirely by Components 01 (100 marks) and 02 (50 marks). AO2, demonstrate knowledge and understanding of literature, is worth 70 marks, 35 in each literature paper. AO3, critically analyse, evaluate and respond to literature, is worth 80 marks, 40 in each literature paper. Half the qualification is therefore linguistic competence and half is literary study, and within the literary half the analytical AO3 marks slightly outweigh the knowledge-based AO2 marks. All four components must be taken for the A-Level to be awarded, all include synoptic assessment, and all are sat in a single series at the end of the course; the qualification is linear, so a retake means retaking every component. Total qualification time is 360 hours, all of it guided learning. The qualification is available in English only and all candidate work is in English, apart from the Greek written in the Component 02 composition option. AS Level Classical Greek (H044) is a separate qualification with its own shorter papers and its own Defined Vocabulary List, which A-Level learners use as the floor of their vocabulary rather than its ceiling. Prior attainment of GCSE Classical Greek is not required, though the specification builds on it.

Instrument · 03Official sources