History of the Greek alphabet retained the sound. A symbol based on the left-hand half ( ├ ) of the letter Η was therefore sometimes used to indicate the presence of where necessary, and its absence was indicated by a symbol based on the right half. During the classical period, ΕΙ came to be pronounced and ΟΥ came to be pronounced , Υ having meanwhile moved to . By about 200 BC, a system of diacritical marks was invented, representing the tone accents in use in Ancient Greek. This also helped to indicate the length of the vowels Α, Ι, and Υ in certain cases
Xi (letter) dialects of most of the Greek mainland and Euboea, the sound [ks] was represented by Χ (which in classical Greek is chi, used for ). Because this variant of the Greek alphabet was used in Italy, the Latin alphabet borrowed Χ rather than Ξ as the Latin letter X. While having no Latin derivative, the Xi was adopted into the early Cyrillic alphabet, as the letter ksi (Ѯ, ѯ). The uppercase letter Ξ is used as symbol for: The lowercase letter ξ is used as a symbol for: These characters are used only as mathematical symbols. Stylized Greek text should