All of the common Greek-English transliteration schemes are alphabetic, meaning they are based on the similarity of or lineage of certain letters in the Western alphabet to more or less equivalent Greek letters. In most cases, this simple, straightforward approach is favored both by English speakers, who prefer to use a word or name they can at least pronounce, and by Greeks themselves, who understand the value of keeping things simple. Some of these letters, though, are not pronounced in the same way in both languages. In certain contexts it is both practical and respectful to utilize native Greek pronunciations. Such is the case with Greek varietal names, because the ruling convention is still the native one and a close proximity to the correct pronunciation aids in communication and bestows a certain authority that may be more highly valued in wine circles than in some others.

My pronunciation guides on these pages are designed to keep the process simple. Most people don't know dictionary pronunciation symbols and even fewer know IPA notation. In the interest of promoting the most accurate pronunciation to the widest English-speaking audience, I decided to use symbolic notation only where there is no corresponding alphabetic equivalent and/or where English transliterations would be ambiguous:

• d = th as in "this"
• q = th as in "thick"
• aï is pronouced "eye". (Ex. KaraïskakhV = car-ice-kah-keys)
• However, I do not attempt a transliteration for the hard G, because I feel it is hopeless to introduce a pronunciation that simply does not exist in English. For the soft G, I generally use Y.

Other aspects of pronunciation scheme

• H (Eng.) for CI (gr). I don't believe in using "ch" as a transliteration for "CI", because I can think of no example in English in which "ch" is pronounced like "CI".

More obviously, I use;

• Ks for X
• Ps for Y

Also:

• Accent marks are used (as they often are in Greek) to indicate where syllabic emphasis is expressed: Pameédee

Other notes

• S (=Eng. S) is pronounced in strong form only in Greek, as in "simple." It is never pronounced with a Z sound, as in "these."
• A should be pronounced as it is in the word "palm".