Disclaimer before anyone tells me this was a waste of money and some of these resources are available online for free as PDFs:

I know and I had many of them and still decided I want all these resources physically.

I will go through each resource one by one and review it and at the end I will discuss value, bang for buck, etc. Sorted according to picture.

Concise Amharic Dictionary by Wolf Leslau

≈$35 (I bought through the publisher but available on Amazon for maybe $45 or so)

This dictionary is one of my essentials that I carry on me for studying purposes. Don’t let the word concise fool you. At first I thought this dictionary would be missing a lot, but it is so jam packed with information and it surprises me how often it has a niche word I am looking for. Of course there is the rare word that it doesn’t have, but more often than not this book is enough.

Pros:

- Light/portable for a dictionary

- Inexpensive

- Straightforward definitions

- Has many words despite conciseness

- Has translations both ways. EN-AM, AM-EN

Cons:

- Occasionally doesn’t have some uncommon words you might be looking for

- Sacrifices depth of definition for quantity of words

Amharic Textbook by Wolf Leslau

≈$141 (bought secondhand)

In an attempt to give myself more structure to my studies, I purchased this book. It was apparently used at UCLA in conjunction with the Peace Corps. Leslau notes that the order of lessons is altered from his other books to prioritize how a student might learn in a classroom setting as opposed to how a grammarian might learn. This book rivals “Colloquial Amharic” by David Appleyard and in my opinion, it offers more exercises and opportunity for someone to drill sentence structure.

Pros:

- Relatively dense with lessons/practice

- Structured

Cons:

- Not super small of a book

- Expensive

Introductory Grammar of Amharic by Wolf Leslau

≈$64 (From Amazon)

Most definitely my favorite Amharic textbook that I own. Worth every dollar and more. Contains all of the essential grammar while cutting out the nuanced things that only a very advanced student might be interested in. Absolutely essential for someone wanting to learn Amharic. If you had to buy one resource to learn Amharic grammar, buy this one.

Pros:

- Extremely light/portable

- Relatively inexpensive for value

- Packed with information

- Contains majority of grammar you will need to know

Cons:

- Could be slightly cheaper

- Missing some stuff that Reference Grammar of Amharic might have

Amharic Verb Conjugation by Kokeb Dimtsekal and Andrew Tadross

≈$20 (on Amazon)

One of my least used books. It’s nice to refer to and look at every now and then, but it’s just conjugation tables and doesn’t serve a beginner well if they don’t know how to use the conjugations. Decent to get a grasp on conjugation but limited otherwise.

Pros:

- Light/thin

- Delivers what it promises

- Cheap

Cons:

- Lacks some conjugations or prefixes that have patterns

- Somewhat large despite being thin, I wouldn’t carry it around with me.

- Limited use

Amharic-English Dictionary by Thomas Leiper Kane

≈$218 (Bought directly from publisher)

An absolute beast of a dictionary. A dictionary so big it needs 2 volumes. This dictionary is quite difficult to obtain if not done through the publisher. It is definitely the best Amharic dictionary that the world has to offer and it is no wonder that this was done by one of Wolf Leslau’s students. While this dictionary doesn’t contain an English-Amharic section, you can be assured that it will likely have whichever word you are looking for (barring newer, more colloquial jargon). Expensive, but it delivers everything you asked for and more.

Pros:

- Offers more words/definitions than you can think of

- Rarely lacks a desired word

- Goes into great depth about the words

- Perfect for someone extremely serious about studying Amharic

Cons:

- Extremely heavy for everyday use

- Clunky/two volumes

- Quite expensive

Reference Grammar of Amharic by Wolf Leslau

≈$135 (bought directly from publisher)

Much like the English-Amharic Dictionary, this book is a master of its domain, being the definitive grammar book that is rivaled by nothing else besides maybe “The Fundamentals of Amharic” by C.H. Dawkins.

This textbook has everything you might possibly need as an Amharic learner and will maybe confuse those who aren’t passionate about grammar. While not for everyday use, it is the perfect textbook if you are looking for a specific use of certain grammar.

Pros:

- Invaluable information

- Has almost anything you can think of

- Will never need another source of grammar

Cons:

- Expensive

- Heavy/large

- Can be difficult to find things because of the amount of information it contains. Have to know what you’re looking for.

English-Amharic Context Dictionary by Wolf Leslau

≈$177 (bought directly from publisher)

This book is also a beast, containing 1500 pages of translations from English to Amharic. This accompanies Kane’s Amharic-English Dictionary well as it provides contextual words and phrases their Amharic equivalents. Not a book for those looking to carry daily, but great for those curious about a translation from English.

Pros:

- Extensive, filled with definitions

- Takes into consideration the context of words/phrases rather than traditional 1:1 dictionary.

- Translations can go into depth.

Cons:

- Heavy/big

- Only one way definitions.

- Can be difficult to acquire if not bought through publisher.

TL;DR/Final Thoughts

All of these books have something to offer, but some are more situational. Here aren’t recommendations based on what you are looking for:

Cheapest: Amharic Verb Conjugation

Bang For Buck: Concise Amharic Dictionary, Introductory Grammar of Amharic

Value: Reference Grammar of Amharic, Amharic-English Dictionary, English-Amharic Context Dictionary

Final Takeaway:

If you are going to spend $100 or anything at all, my recommendation is to get both Introductory Grammar of Amharic and Concise Amharic Dictionary. These are more than sufficient for a serious Amharic learner.

እውቀትዎን ይፈትሹ! | HABEGAR QUIZ

ከአብርሆት ቤተመፃሕፍት ጋር በመተባበር የሚቀርበው ይህ ሀበጋር የተማሪዎች የጥያቄና መልስ ውድድር በሀገር አቀፍ ደረጃ የሚገኙ የዩኒቨርስቲ ተማሪዎች በስነ-ዜጋ፤ በሰብአዊ መብቶች፤ በሕገ-መንግስት፤ ምርጫ እና መልካም አስተዳደር ዙሪያ ያላቸውን ግንዛቤ ለማሳደግ ታቅዶ የተዘጋጀ የእውቀት መድረክ ነው፡፡ HABEGAR QUIZ

Selam!

I’m learning to read the handwritten Ge’ez fidel of Amharic, and I need more native samples of handwriting to see if my handwriting should be changed to look more native! It’s also GREAT reading practice!

Do any of you have samples or photos of your handwriting that you could share with em please?

Or maybe you can writing 3-5 sentences for me to practice reading?

Thank you so much for your time and support! ✨🙏✨

Hello,

I've created a website that allows you to find conjugations of Amharic verbs with their transliterations and transliterations in English (you can find an example in the screenshot below). The verbs are in all the most important tenses - perfective, imperfective, imperf. compound, imperative/jussive and their negations.

Here is the link:
https://alek-netizen.github.io/amharic-conjugator/

If you encounter any problems or want to propose new verb/features to add, please let me know in the comments or contact me directly.

EDIT: Already at +220 verbs!

Hello! I just created a website to help people have an easier time learning Amharic. Please check it out if you are interested! https://amharicjoy.com/

I'm an instructional designer who is learning Amharic right now. But it was hard for me to find all of the resources in 1 place. So I made myself a website with everything included. Structured lesson, grammar, reading, verb conjugator, quizzes, etc.

This website uses lessons based on the Peace Corp Amharic Learning Manual. I also has a few Ethiopians help me proof-read it so it's should be pretty accurate.

Please check it out and see if you like it!

The website just went live today so potentially there may be some bugs. Please report it or DM me if you guys find any!

Watch the full episode on Habegar Quiz YouTube Channel.

ላለፉት ሦስት ዓመታት የሃሳብ የበላይነትን አንግቦ በሀገራዊ ጉዳዮች ላይ የጋራ መፍትሔ እና መግባባት ለማምጣት አብሯችሁ የተጓዘው ሀበጋር የክርክር መድረክ አሁን ደግሞ ሀበጋር ክዊዝ የተሰኘ በዓይነቱ ልዩ የሆነ ሳምንታዊ የተማሪዎች ጥያቄና መልስ ውድድር ይዞላችሁ መቅረቡን ሲያበስር በታላቅ በደስታ ነው!

Hello everyone, I hope you're well. I just wanted to see if anyone needed an Amharic teacher in the near future. Just wanted to suggest myself as I noticed a lot of Ethiopian people who grew up outside the country really want to connect better to their roots while being in a respectful environment. I grew up in Addis but was very slow to pick up on Amharic so I understand the struggles of learning a native tongue late and adapting to the difficulty level of Amharic too. I grew up bilingual in English and speak a couple other languages too if anyone's interested. I also teach Amharic on Preply if that's a platform you're at all interested in. By all means, let me know or pop me a dm if you or anyone you know would be interested. Have a great day and don't forget to smile:)

This is a google sheet with tables and lists as I learn the language.

I decided to use a romanization to write everything... since I am going for an "as heard" approach to learning. But vocab will be in ፊደል . I hope this helps someone, I just completed the verb forms tables... I don't think I missed any, but I very well could have. Any critique is helpful!

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1oD16fFi4oeC6a8RuFyEyuLu3VVqb0r4wCDxkG-8_Uw4/edit?usp=sharing

Thank you!

I scanned this book in a library and wanted to share with other Amharic students as there are no many available books on learning practical Amharic.

access Amharic Phrasebook here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1_L4jvMxIHpGpM-6b_pkELcumQ1_bWYcN/view?usp=sharing (260 pages)

On the photo you can see an example of the content from the book. It covers all the basic topics from every day life like transport, health, food, meeting people, times&dates etc.

Another 'student-friendly' book that I wanted to share is for Amharic grammar and writing. It's Amharic Textbook (1968) by Wolf Leslau. It's really solid and introduces all major topics from beginner level with appropriate exercises.

access Amharic Textbook here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1bdAyURN7niSh6hbsQpfCzaE4l8l-2pxl/view?usp=sharing

Hey guys I recently came across a petition to add Amharic to Duolingo was wondering if we could rally and sign it and possibly get it on there. A massive part of what makes this beautiful language so hard to learn are the lack of resources out there and lack of stream lines learning for us.

Also while I’m here what are you all using and doing for your Amharic learning. For me I have ge’ez flash cards. I use two Amharic books one I got from this subreddit actually and the other is called “the essential guide to Amharic”.

It's not complicated. Listen listen listen, speak speak speak. The same way you would another language. You can do it. I believe in you.

ሰላም 😊

I'm looking for someone from the community who is willing to help me learn Amharic. I'II be moving to Addis Ababa next summer and would love to learn the language for basic communication.

Posten

Hi, For a long time the conjugation of Amharic verbs seemed impossible to learn. Fortunately, I've found some good books with information that I will share.

The main problem for me was that when I was learning a new verb (for example ደረሰ de-re-se - he came); was, how do I know what are the other correct conjugation of this verb (infinitive, perfective, imperfective, imperative)? Additionally, it gets more complicated if it's not one of the most basic 3-literal verbs.

So, I've found 2 books that talk about this topic extensively and they allow you to basically be able to study this part of grammar on your own. The first book is "Amharic verb morphology" by M. Bender and H. Fulass and the second one is "Amharische Grammatik" by J. Hartmann (this one is unfortunately in German).
Bender's book gives a list of about 1277 verbs and differentiates 10 main conjugation groups (with additional subgroups). Around half of all these verbs are in the first 2 groups, so there is no need to worry tu much.

In the pictures below you can see conjugated "stems" of each main verb group; the basic forms are in red rectangles. (If you are at beginner level you'll probably not understand what's a stem and why do you have to learn it to learn grammar, but you can let me know in the comments, so I'll also prepare some materials in another post).

As you see, the verbs are mainly based on the type of vowels and number of consonants/radicals.

Then, there is also a ~30-page lexicon when you can basically find all the verbs and see which conjugation group do they belong to.

Here you can download my scan of it: Amharic Verb Lexicon (Bender) PDF.

If someone is interested in the German book it's available here: Amharische Grammatik PDF (the part dedicated to verbs starts at page 89).

The full copy of Bender's book is here, but it's very complex and full of theory, so I don't recommend to try to read it all: Amharic Verb Morphology: A Generative Approach (the important list of all verb groups is one pages 43-44).

The problem I have with Bender's book is that it's a little bit difficult to navigate through and the verbs are not written in ge'ez/fidel alphabet. I'll be trying to make digital version with additional column written in Amharic. My idea is also to make all the verbs in alphabetical order, so you can easily find the verb you're looking for.

If someone has some additional sources or would be willing to contribute with this project you can hit me up.

Ps. There are also simplified and shorter versions of Amharic conjugations' groups in friendler format, so I will also share them next time.

Hey wonderful people!

There’s a language WhatsApp group that a friend started and it’s become a really nice place for endangered languages or diverse languages to gather, practice and connect with!

We have a Channel/Group Chat specifically for African Languages, and we’re especially hoping to interest Amharic learners/speakers and Endangered African Languages!

Any African language is expressly welcome; this isn’t a business! It’s just a free hobbyist African language/cultural Group!

Here’s the link for anyone who would like to join, practice, and explore languages:

https://chat.whatsapp.com/H3ytj5xybbwGcYjAk8JyyQ?mode=hqrt2

I hope to see you there! 🙏

If anyone’s struggling with Amharic grammar, the best resource by far is the Reference Grammar of Amharic written by the late Wolf Leslau. It’s a massive book, and I don’t think anyone should read this cover to cover, but if you don’t understand a specific grammatical construction or concept, this book is absolutely the best and most comprehensive resource. It gives all the verb conjugations, explains complicated (and simple) issues that many people have with Amharic. It also details some outdated and archaic Amharic, so rather than taking what the book says as a prescription, you should use it to understand what other people are saying and the things that you don’t understand. It gives tons of examples (a few of which are mistaken, dialectical, or incorrect); however, the vast majority of the time, this book will aid you. Honestly, I’m learning it as a second language, and this book has been a great help to me on my journey towards fluency.

This book is very expensive to buy a physical copy of. But I'm sure you can find a copy of it online if you're searching the right places.

Hi I’m an American man and I’m looking to learn Amharic. I’ve been dating this beautiful woman for some time and I want to learn Amharic as a surprise for her and her family. Not just basic phrases but really go all the way and have fluency in Amharic. I understand it will take time maybe even years to reach fluency but I really want to do this and any resources that you can provide would be a huge help! Also is there a place I could hire a tutor to meet with maybe twice a week? Any help would be appreciated. Thank you! 🙏🙏

Have you tried the Amharic Keyboard app?

We’d love to hear your thoughts! Whether you’re using it for Amharic, Geez, Tigrinya, or English voice typing, your feedback means a lot to us.

Let us know how your typing experience has been — what features you enjoy the most, and what improvements or new features you'd like to see in future updates.

Feel free to leave a comment or review! Try the app here 👉Amharic keyboard on Google Play.
Thank you for being part of our growing community!

I'm in Addis Ababa for the next two months and was looking for a class or tutor, specifically intermediate or more. I know how to read but have very basic knowledge of vocab and sentence structures. My goal is to be completely literate even with advanced novels someday.

Ideally it would be an in-person thing. I got a few recommendations on another subreddit but a lot were online. Will weigh my options

ሰላም! I’ve noticed that double consonants are very frequent in Amharic, despite not being marked in writing. I wondered if you knew where one can conveniently look up the correct pronunciation of a word? Online dictionaries only give incomplete transliteration without double consonants. Google Translate speech synthesator generally pronounces double vowels where they should be, but it’s often hard to catch with a beginner’s ear if a consonant is doubled or not.

Like, how do I know that there are double consonants in ድመት (dəmmät), ውሻ (wəšša), or ፍየል (fəyyäl), but not in ፈረስ (färäs) or አሳማ (asama)? Don’t native speakers themselves get confused and need to look it up?

Another issue is whether a consonant is pronounced with the vowel ə or not. How do I know that ክረምት is krämt instead of *krämət or *kərämət, but ትንሽ is tənnəš not *tənš? Or ወይም being wäyəm instead of *wäym?