What is isopsephy?
Isopsephy is the Greek version of gematria: each letter of the alphabet is also a number, and the value of a word is the sum of its letters. The name comes from the Greek for “equal pebbles”, a reference to counting with stones. Greek alphabetic numerals gave the 24 letters, plus three archaic ones, the values 1 to 9, 10 to 90 and 100 to 900, so any word could be read as a number.
The practice is attested in the ancient Greek and Roman world. The poet Leonidas of Alexandria wrote isopsephic epigrams in the first century CE, in which the two lines of a couplet add up to the same total. A graffito at Pompeii is often cited as a lover’s message that, in translation, reads “I love her whose number is 545”, with 545 written as the letters φμε.
How to use this calculator
Type Greek directly, paste it from another source, or click the letters in the panel above. You can enter polytonic Greek with all its accents, such as Ἰησοῦς, and the calculator strips them before adding. Ἰησοῦς is ι 10 + η 8 + σ 200 + ο 70 + υ 400 + ς 200 = 888, a number long noted in Christian numerology.
The reduced figure on the right is the digital root of the total, found by adding the digits until one remains. 888 reduces to 6 (8 + 8 + 8 = 24, then 2 + 4 = 6).
Greek letter values
These are the same values the calculator uses. Stigma, koppa and sampi are archaic letters that no longer appear in ordinary words but are kept for writing numbers.
Worked examples
Every number here was computed with the same code as the calculator.
666 and 616 in Greek letters
Early Greek manuscripts of Revelation write the “number of the beast” in letters: χξϛ for 666 (600 + 60 + 6) and χιϛ for 616 (600 + 10 + 6). Both variants exist in the manuscript tradition, which is why scholars discuss reading it through a Hebrew spelling of “Nero Caesar”, as shown on the Hebrew gematria calculator. The calculator above will confirm either figure if you type the letters.
Coincidences worth knowing about
Because the same total can come from many unrelated words, matching numbers are easy to find and do not prove a connection. For example, ἀγάπη (agape, love) and θέλημα (thelema, will) both come to 93, which is central to the modern religion of Thelema, while σοφία (sophia, wisdom) is 781. Treat matches as interesting patterns in the language, not evidence of hidden meaning.
Related calculators
For Hebrew words, use the Hebrew gematria calculator with four classic methods. For English words, try the English gematria calculator with eleven ciphers or the Jewish gematria calculator. The wider background is in the history of gematria.
FAQ
What is Greek gematria?
Greek gematria is usually called isopsephy. Each Greek letter has a fixed numeric value, from 1 for alpha to 800 for omega (900 for the archaic sampi), and the value of a word is the sum of its letters.
What is the isopsephy value of Jesus in Greek?
Ἰησοῦς adds up to 888: iota 10, eta 8, sigma 200, omicron 70, upsilon 400 and final sigma 200. Accents and breathing marks are ignored by the calculator.
Do accents and capital letters matter?
No. The calculator removes accents and breathing marks and treats capitals and lowercase letters the same, so Ἰησοῦς, ΙΗΣΟΥΣ and ιησους all give 888.
Why are stigma, koppa and sampi included?
They are archaic letters that kept their numeric values after they dropped out of the spoken alphabet: stigma (ϛ) is 6, koppa (ϙ) is 90 and sampi (ϡ) is 900. They appear mainly when numbers are written as letters, as in the Greek forms of 666 and 616.
Is the final sigma worth a different amount?
No. Both σ and the word-final ς count as 200.
How is Greek isopsephy different from Hebrew gematria?
The idea is the same, but the alphabets and values differ. Hebrew has 22 letters up to 400 and the final forms can take 500 to 900 in the Gadol method. Greek has 24 standard letters plus three archaic ones, reaching 800 for omega and 900 for sampi.
Can I type in English letters?
No, this calculator counts Greek letters only. For English words use the English gematria calculator, or the Jewish gematria calculator, which maps Latin letters to Hebrew-style values.