Evolution of English Alphabet

Evolution of the English alphabet

When the Roman Empire reached Britain, they brought with them the Latin language. Britain at that time was under the control of the Anglo-Saxons, a Germanic tribe that used Old English as their language. At that time Old English was using Futhorc, an older alphabet. It was also called a runic alphabet.

What is an alphabet?

The letters used by a language are collectively called an alphabet. It has a fixed order based on the custom of the users. The alphabet is used for writing and the symbols used for writing are called letters. Each letter represents one sound or a related sound (also called phoneme) used by the spoken language. With the help of a standard reading direction, spaces and punctuation marks, the alphabet forms words which can be easily read by readers.

The term ‘alphabet’ came from the first two letters of the Phoenician alphabet – ‘Aleph’ and ‘Beth.’ While some languages have their own set of alphabets, the most commonly used is the Latin alphabet, which is also shared by several languages aside from English.

Old English

The combination of the Latin alphabet and the runic alphabet of Futhorc resulted in the modern English alphabet. Some of the additions from the runic alphabets were ‘thorn’ that had a ‘th’ sound and ‘wynn’ that made a ‘w’ sound. Remember that there was no letter ‘w’ in the Latin alphabet. In the Middle Ages, when the people in Britain ceased to use the old runes, the letter thorn was eventually substituted by ‘th’, and the runic ‘wynn’ became ‘uu’ that later evolved into ‘w.’

Later in the same period, the letters ‘j’ and ‘u’ were added and brought the number of letters to 26. However, the letter combinations like ‘æ,’ ‘œ’ and the symbol ampersand (&) were included in the alphabet.

Middle English

When the Normans invaded Britain in 1066 AD, the lowborn were using Old English. The scholars, clergy and nobility were writing and speaking in Latin or Norman. After two centuries under Norman rule, writing in English became popular again, with some of the Old English letters removed. Geoffrey Chaucer used middle English in the Canterbury Tales’ Wife of Bath.

Modern English

In the 15 century, the printing press was introduced to Great Britain by William Caxton. By this time, the English language was standardized. From being used interchangeably, the letters V and U were separated, with the former becoming a consonant while using U as a vowel.

The Table Alphabeticall, the first dictionary in English, published by Robert Cawdrey in 1604. The letter J was also added to Modern English, during this time as well.