Attic Vowel Shifts: A Variationist Approach

In this paper, I use evidence from Attic Greek inscriptions to draw conclusions about when two vowel mergers had become widespread among speakers of Attic Greek. I agree with Sven Tage Teodorsson's claim that there were two subdialects of Attic Greek, a more conservative and a more innovative one, but I push back against his proposal that the innovative subdialect lost ground during the Hellenistic period, suggesting instead that it was the result of a heightened interest in prescriptivism during this time period.Bachelor of Art