* It's an alphabet: Unlike earlier writing systems like cuneiform or hieroglyphs, Greek is an alphabet, meaning its symbols represent individual sounds (phonemes) rather than whole words or syllables.
* It's the ancestor of many modern alphabets: The Greek alphabet directly or indirectly gave rise to the Latin alphabet (used for English, Spanish, French, etc.) and the Cyrillic alphabet (used for Russian, Ukrainian, Serbian, etc.). This makes it incredibly influential in the history of writing.
* It originally lacked vowels: Early Greek writing only used consonants. Vowels were gradually added later, greatly improving clarity and readability.
* It's written left-to-right: While early forms show some variation, the standard direction of Greek writing is from left to right.
* It has both uppercase and lowercase letters: Like many modern alphabets, Greek employs both upper and lower case forms of its letters. The development of lowercase letters happened considerably later than in Latin script.
* It uses different letter forms depending on the time period and location: Different variations of the Greek alphabet existed geographically and evolved over time.
In short, the Greek alphabet is a landmark achievement in the history of writing, marking a shift towards simpler, more phonetic systems and serving as the foundation for numerous alphabets used worldwide today.