......Before we begin learning the alphabets, let's define some terms that will be used frequently in this program. The first two terms are "family" and "group".
......A Group is the row of letters from the Amharic alphabet as it is arranged in the table you have just seen. Click on the box at the bottom of the page to view the alphabets again. We have separated the groups by color to emphasize the different groups. Below, we have selected 4 groups from the entire alphabet that you have seen. Pay special attention to the minor differences in the way the letters are written between letters of the same group. You can see that letters of the same group look very similar in structure to one another. Now click on the arrows below and listen to the way the letters are pronounced. You will hear that letters of the same group sound very similar to one another as well. That is, all letters in Group 1 have similar sounds. Normally, there are seven letters to one group (exception to this will be discussed later on).