Letters of the English Alphabet

The modern alphabet with 26 letters started in the 16th century. The development of the English alphabet had influences from the Semitic, Phoenician, Greek and Roman scripts. It’s quite interesting to learn how each letter was formed.

Letter A

The original shape of the letter A was upside down. It was introduced in the 1800s. Being inverted, it looked like the head of an animal with horns or antlers. It was fitting because, in ancient Semitic, the letter translates to ‘ox.’

Letter B

In its original form, the letter B was borrowed from the Egyptian hieroglyphics and with the letter resting on its belly. In its original shape, it looked like a house with a door, a roof and a room. The symbol represented ‘shelter’ about 4,000 years ago.

Letter C

The letter came from the Phoenicians. It was shaped like a boomerang or hunter’s stick. The Greeks called it ‘gamma’, and from being written facing the other direction, it was flipped to the direction it is written today, with the Italians giving it a better crescent shape.

Letter D

‘Dalet’ was the name given to the letter D by the Phoenicians in 800 BC. It originally looked like a rough triangle that faced left. The original meaning of the letter is ‘door.’ When the Greeks adopted the alphabet, they gave it the name ‘delta.’ It was later flipped, and the Romans gave the right side of the letter a semicircle shape.

Letter E

About 3,800 years ago, the letter ‘E’ was pronounced as an ‘H’ in the Semitic language. It looked like a stick figure of a human with two arms and one leg. In 700 BC, the Geeks flipped it, and they changed the pronunciation into an ‘ee’ sound.

Letter F

The letter ‘F’ was from the Phoenicians and it looked more like a ‘Y.’ When it was pronounced at that time, the sound made was close to ‘waw.’ The ancient Greeks renamed it ‘digamma’ and tipped it to resemble the present-day F. The Romans made it look better by giving it a more geometric shape and changed the sound to ‘fff.’

Letter G

The letter ‘G’ came from ‘zeta’ of the Greeks. At first, it looked like an ‘I’, but the pronunciation made a ‘zzz’ sound. The Romans changed its shape around 250 BC, giving it top and lower arms and a ‘g’ sound. Latin did not have a ‘z’ sound. In the course of its development, the straight lines became curved, ending with its present crescent shape.

Letter H

The letter ‘H’ came from the Egyptians and used as a symbol for fence. It made a breathy sound when pronounced so early academicians thought that it was not necessary and the British and Latin scholars eventually dropped the letter H from the English alphabet by around 500 AD.

Letter I

The letter ‘I’ was called ‘yod’ in 1000 BC. It meant hand and arm. The Greeks called it ‘iota’ and made it vertical. In its evolution, it turned into a straight line around 700 BC.

Letter J

The letter ‘I’ also used to stand for the ‘J’ sound in ancient times. It got its shape letter in the 15th century as a contribution of the Spanish language. It was only about 1640 when the letter regularly appeared in print.

Letter K

The letter ‘K’ is an old letter, as it came from the Egyptian hieroglyphics. In the Semitic language, it was given the name ‘kaph’ which translated into ‘palm of the hand.’ In those times, the letter faced the other way. When the Greeks adopted it in 800 BC, it became ‘kappa’ and flipped to the right.

Letter L

In ancient Semitic, the present-day letter ‘L’ was upside down. Thus it looked like a hooked letter. It was already called ‘El,’ which meant ‘God.’ The Phoenicians were responsible for giving it a reversed look, with the hook facing left. They straightened the hook a bit, and they changed the name to ‘lamed’ (pronounced lah-med), a cattle prod. The Greeks called it ‘lambda’ and turned it around to face right. The final look of the letter ‘L’ with the straight foot at a right angle was courtesy of the Romans.

Letter M

The origin of the letter ‘M’ was the wavy vertical lines with five peaks to symbolize water according to the Egyptians. In 1800 BC the Semites reduced the lines to three waves, and the Phoenicians removed one more wave. In 800 BC, the peaks were turned into zigzags and flipped horizontally to form the letter M we know today.

Letter N

Another Egyptian symbol was the letter ‘N’ that originally looked like a small ripple atop a larger ripple that stood for cobra or snake. It was given the ‘n’ sound by the ancient Semites, which symbolized ‘fish.’ Around 1000 BC, only one ripple appeared, and the Greeks named it ‘nu.’

Letter O

The letter ‘O’ came from the Egyptians as well. It was called ‘eye’ in Egyptian and ‘ayin’ in Semites. The Phoenicians further reduced the hieroglyphics, leaving only the pupil’s outline.

Letter P

In the ancient Semitic language, today’s letter ‘P’ looked like an inverted ‘V.’ It was pronounced ‘pe’ that meant ‘mouth.’ The Phoenicians turned its top into a diagonal hook shape. In 200 BC, the Romans flipped it to the right and closed the loop to form the ‘P.’

Letter Q

The original sound of the letter ‘Q’ was like ‘qoph’ that translated into a ball of wool or monkey. It was written initially as a circle traversed by a vertical line. In the Roman inscriptions around 520 BC, the letter appeared as we know it today.

Letter R

The profile of a human facing left was the original shape of the letter ‘R’ as written by the Semites. It was pronounced ‘resh’ that meant ‘head.’ The Romans turned it to the right and added an inclined foot.

Letter S

The letter ‘S’ used to appear like a horizontal wavy W that was used to represent the bow of an archer. The angularity of the shape was from the Phoenicians, who gave it the name ‘shin’ that translated into ‘tooth. The Romans flipped it to a vertical position and named it ‘sigma’ while the Romans flipped it to the position the letter has today.

Letter T

The ancient Semites used the lower case form of the letter ‘T’ we see today. The Phoenicians called the letter ‘taw’ (mark) that sounded like ‘tee’ when pronounced. It was called ‘tau’ by the Greeks. They also added the cross at the top of the letter to distinguish it from the letter ‘X.’

Letter U

The letter ‘U’ initially looked like ‘Y’ in 1000 BC. At that time it was called ‘waw’ that meant ‘peg.’ Under the Greeks, it was called ‘upsilon.’

Letter V

The Romans used V and U interchangeably. The distinction started to appear around the 1400s.

Letter W

The letter ‘W’ started during the Middle Ages, with the scribes of Charlemagne writing two ‘u’s’ side by side, separated by a space. At that time the sound made was similar to ‘v.’ The letter appeared in print as a unique letter ‘W’ in 1700.

Letter X

The letter ‘ksi’ of ancient Greeks sounded like ‘X.’ The lowercase form of the letter ‘X’ were seen at the handwritten manuscripts available during the medieval times. Late 15th century Italian printers also used lower case ‘X’s.’

Letter Y

From starting out as ‘upsilon’ the letter Y was added by the Romans in 100 AD.

Letter Z

The Phoenicians used to have a letter called ‘zayin.’ It meant an ‘ax.’ Initially, it looked like the letter ‘I’ with serifs at the top and bottom. Around 800 BC, it was adopted as ‘zeta’ by the Greeks and given the sound ‘dz.’ It was not used for several centuries until the arrival of the Norman French and their words that needed the sound of the letter ‘Z.’

Now you know how the letters of the English alphabet came about. We do hope you find this interesting and will share it with your friends.