Languages

For arcane nominal forms used on this site, see the names page.

Alphabet

Codices are written in uncial (now called lowercase), & capitals (now called uppercase) are used for chapter initial decoration. The terms upper- & lower-case are from printing presses.

Hebrew

According to Christians: Abraham invented letters, & taught them to the Chaldæans & Aramæans (i.e. Syrians), & Moses reformed them for the Hebrews, which survives today as Arabian.

But according to the gentiles: Mercury was the first to invent letters, who then taught it to the Ægyptians, &c. They also credit Phœbus with some letters.

Ægyptian

Isis (c. 3748 AM), i.e. Io, taught a form of Syrian letters to the Ægyptians after she married Telegonus, king of Ægypt.

Greek

Cadmus (c. 3769 AM), from Phonœcia, taught a form of sixteen Syrian letters to the Greeks: α β γ δ ε ζ ι κ λ μ ν ο π ρ σ τ φ. Evidently, the Greeks also received the letters ϛ ϡ ϟ as numbers at some time. Despite the disorded reception of letters, those received later were, save for υ ϡ, correctly ordered.

Palamedes (c. 4330 AM), son of Nauplius, added three letters: η χ ω. Some say Cadmus did not teach ζ, but rather Palamedes added it. Further still, Aristotle says rather Epicharmus instead of Palamedes added these.

Previously η was written as ⊢ or ⊣, & was the precursor to breath marks.

Simonides the Lyricist (c. 5041 AM) also added three letters: θ ξ ψ.

Pythagoras (c. 5058 AM) is said to have added one letter: υ. But some say rather Simonides added this.

Aristophanes of Byzantium (c. 5324 AM) invented accent, breath, & punctuation marks.

Latin

Carmentis (c. 3977 AM) taught a form of the initial Greek letters to the Italians: a b c d e f i l m n o p q r s t u.

Evidently the letters f q were received from the Greek letters ϛ ϟ.

Later, h was added from the Greek before Palamedes.

Appius Claudius (c. 5229 AM) some say, as Roman censor, purged z from the alphabet. If so, then Carmentis’ alphabet must have included z instead of u, which would have then been added when Pythagoras invented it.

Spurius Carvilius Libertus (c. 5281 AM) invented the letter g from c, & ordered it correspondingly to the Greek letter ζ.

Salvius Grammaticus added the letter k from the Greek letter κ. Before, c was written instead.

During the reign of Augustus (5524 AM), the letter x was added, & the letters y z were added from Greek. Prior, cs i ss were written instead of x y z.

Gian Giorgio Trissino (7059 AM) invented the letters j, a stylized i, & v, a small capital u. Before, to distinguish between vocal u & consonantal u in English, the digraphs uu (whence w) & ve were used.

Georgian

Pharnabazus (5272 AM) taught a form of Syrian letters to the Iberians, i.e. the Georgians.

Æthiopian

St. Frumentius of Axum (†5892 AM) reformed letters for the Æthiopians, which they had prior received from Hebrew.

Runes

Bp. Ulfilas (†5889 AM) taught a form of Greek letters to the Goths, i.e. Germans, which later was transformed into Runes.

Armenian

Mesropius Mastotzes (†5949 AM) & Isaac the Parthian (†5947 AM)—together with Bramsapuchus, king of Armenia, Bp. Daniel of Mesopotmia, & Rufinus of Samosata—reformed Georgian letters for the Armenians.

Slavonic

SS. Cyril (†6378 AM) & Methodius (†6394 AM) taught a form of Greek letters to the Slavs, further developed by SS. Clement of Ochrid (†6425 AM), Naum, Sabbas, Gorazd, Angelar, which survives as Slavonic, also called Cyrillic.

Indian

Brachmins, i.e. priests of India, received a form of seemingly Syrian letters from the Persians.

The Assyrian cuneiform would seem to have been formed from the Ægyptian hieroglyphs. Chinese han-tzu, in turn, would seem to have been formed from Assyrian cuneiform. These are my opinions.

Pronunciation

The following letters are used so for pronunciation on each language page:

Numerals

Greek:

For continued counting, place a numeral over Μ (for myriás) to multiply ten thousands by it: e.g. ϛ̅Μ = 10,000 * 6.

For fractional counting, append ʹ to the numeral: e.g. ϛ̅ʹ = 1/6.

Latin:

For continued counting, place ‾ over a numeral to multiply the number by one thousand: e.g. v̅i̅. = 6 * 1,000.

For fractional counting, append · for 1/12, : for 2/12, &c., s for 6/12, s· for 7/12, &c.

Slavonic:

For continued counting, prefix ҂ to multiply the following number by 1,000, or overlay:

Georgian:

For continued counting up to ten thousands, the rest of the alphabet is used, i.e. ც ძ წ ჭ ხ ჴ ჯ ჰ ჵ.