Attic dialect

Attic Greek
Region	Attica, Lemnos
Era	c. 500–300 BC; evolved into Koine
Language family	Indo-European Hellenic Ancient Greek Eastern Attic Greek
Language codes
ISO 639-3	–
Linguist list	grc-att
Glottolog	None
Distribution of Greek dialects in Greek in the classical period. Western group:   Doric proper   Northwest Doric   Achaean Doric Central group:   Aeolic   Arcado-Cypriot Eastern group:   Attic   Ionic

Attic Greek is the Greek dialect of ancient Attica, including of the city of Athens. Of the ancient dialects, it is the most similar to later Greek and is the standard form of the language that is studied in ancient Greek language courses. Attic Greek is sometimes included in the Ionic dialect. Together, Attic and Ionic are the primary influences on Modern Greek.

Greek is the primary member of the Hellenic branch of the Indo-European language family. In ancient times, Greek had already come to exist in several dialects, one of which was Attic. The earliest attestations of Greek, dating from the 16th to 11th centuries BC, are written in Linear B, an archaic writing system used by the Mycenaean Greeks in writing their language; the distinction between Eastern and Western Greek is believed to have arisen by Mycenaean times or before. Mycenaean Greek represents an early form of Eastern Greek, the group to which Attic also belongs. Later Greek literature wrote about three main dialects: Aeolic, Doric, and Ionic; Attic was part of the Ionic dialect group. "Old Attic" is used in reference to the dialect of Thucydides (460-400 BC) and the dramatists of 5th-century Athens whereas "New Attic" is used for the language of later writers following conventionally the accession in 285 BC of Greek-speaking Ptolemy II to the throne of Egypt. Ruling from Alexandria, Ptolemy launched the Alexandrian period, during which the city of Alexandria and its expatriate Greek-medium scholars flourished.