Latin alphabet
Type	Alphabet
Spoken languages	Latin and Romance languages; most languages of Europe; Romanizations exist for practically all known languages. An alphabet is a standardized set of letters basic written symbols each of which roughly represents a Phoneme, a Spoken language, either Latin ( lingua Latīna, laˈtiːna is an Italic language, historically spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. The Romance languages (sometimes referred to as Romanic languages, or Neolatin languages) are a branch of the Indo-European language family comprising all Most of the many Languages of Europe belong to the Indo-European Language family. In Linguistics, romanization (or latinization, also spelled romanisation or latinisation) is the representation of a Word or
Time period	~700 B. C. to the present.
Parent systems	Proto-Canaanite alphabet  → Phoenician alphabet   → Greek alphabet    → Old Italic alphabet     → Latin alphabet
Child systems	Numerous: see Alphabets derived from the Latin
Sister systems	Cyrillic Coptic Armenian Runic/Futhark
Unicode range	See Latin characters in Unicode
ISO 15924	Latn
Note: This page may contain IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. The Proto-Canaanite alphabet is a consonantal alphabet of twenty-two acrophonic glyphs found in Levantine texts of the Late Bronze Age (from ca The Phoenician alphabet is a continuation of the Proto-Canaanite alphabet, by convention taken to originate around 1050 BC The Greek alphabet (Ελληνικό αλφάβητο is a set of twenty-four letters that has been used to write the Greek language since the late 9th or early Old Italic refers to several now extinct Alphabet systems used on the Italian Peninsula in ancient times for various Indo-European (predominantly Italic Variants of the Latin alphabet are used by the Writing systems of many languages throughout the world The Cyrillic alphabet (səˈrɪlɪk also called azbuka, from the old name of the first two letters is actually a family of Alphabets, subsets of which are used by The Coptic alphabet is the script used for writing the Coptic language. The Armenian alphabet is an Alphabet that has been used to write the Armenian language since the year 405 or 406. Unicode ’s Unicode as of version 51 defines the following ranges for encoding the Latin alphabet and derived characters See also Mapping of Unicode characters ISO 15924, Codes for the representation of names of scripts, defines two sets of codes for a number of Writing systems (scripts In Computing, Unicode is an Industry standard allowing Computers to consistently represent and manipulate text expressed in most of the world's

The Latin alphabet, also called the Roman alphabet, is the most widely used alphabetic writing system in the world today. Canadian Aboriginal syllabic writing', or simply syllabics, is a family of Abugidas {dubious}} used to write a number of Aboriginal Canadian Nearly all the segmental scripts (loosely " Alphabets " but see below for more precise terminology used around the globe appear to have derived from the An alphabet is a standardized set of letters basic written symbols each of which roughly represents a Phoneme, a Spoken language, either A writing system is a type of Symbolic system used to represent elements or statements expressible in Language. It evolved from the western variety of the Greek alphabet called the Cumaean alphabet, and was initially developed by the ancient Romans in Classical Antiquity to write the Latin language. The Greek alphabet (Ελληνικό αλφάβητο is a set of twenty-four letters that has been used to write the Greek language since the late 9th or early The Cumae alphabet, was a western variant of the early Greek alphabet, used between the 8th to 5th centuries BC Ancient Rome was a Civilization that grew out of a small agricultural community founded on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 10th century BC Classical antiquity (also the classical era or classical period) is a broad term for a long period of cultural History centered on the Mediterranean Latin ( lingua Latīna, laˈtiːna is an Italic language, historically spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome.

During the Middle Ages, it was adapted to the Romance languages, the direct descendants of Latin, as well as to the Celtic, Germanic, Baltic, and some Slavic languages, and finally to most of the languages of Europe. The Romance languages (sometimes referred to as Romanic languages, or Neolatin languages) are a branch of the Indo-European language family comprising all The Celtic languages are descended from Proto-Celtic, or "Common Celtic" a branch of the greater Indo-European Language family. The Germanic languages are a group of related languages that constitute a branch of the Indo-European (IE Language family. The Baltic languages are a group of related languages belonging to the Indo-European language family and spoken mainly in areas extending east and southeast of the Baltic The Slavic languages (also called Slavonic languages) a group of closely related Languages of the Slavic peoples and a subgroup of Indo-European languages Most of the many Languages of Europe belong to the Indo-European Language family.

With the age of colonialism and Christian proselytism, the Latin alphabet was spread overseas, and applied to Amerindian, Indigenous Australian, Austronesian, East Asian, and African languages. The first European colonization wave took place from the early 15th century until the early 19th century and primarily involved the European colonization of the Americas, though See also Evangelism, Christianization A Christian mission has been widely defined since the Lausanne Congress of 1974 as that which Indigenous languages of the Americas (or Amerindian Languages are spoken by indigenous peoples from the southern tip of South America to Alaska and There are an estimated 2000 Languages spoken in Africa. About a hundred of these are widely used for inter-ethnic communication More recently, western linguists have also tended to prefer the Latin alphabet or the International Phonetic Alphabet (itself largely based on the Latin alphabet) when transcribing or devising written standards for non-European languages, such as the African reference alphabet. Linguistics is the scientific study of Language, encompassing a number of sub-fields The International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA is a system of phonetic notation based on the Latin alphabet, devised by the International Phonetic An African reference alphabet was first proposed in 1978 by a UNESCO -organized conference held in Niamey, Niger, and the proposed Alphabet

In modern usage, the term "Latin alphabet" is used for any straightforward derivation of the alphabet first used to write Latin. These variants may discard some letters (like the Rotokas alphabet) or add extra letters (like the Danish and Norwegian alphabet) to or from the classical Roman script. The Rotokas alphabet used in writing the Rotokas language is a Subset of the Latin alphabet consisting of only the twelve letters Pronunciation The Danish and Norwegian Alphabet is based upon the Latin alphabet and has consisted of the following 29 letters since 1917 (Norwegian and 1955 Letter shapes have changed over the centuries, including the creation of entirely new lower case forms. Lower case (also lower-case or lowercase) minuscule, or small letters are the smaller form of letters as opposed to upper

History

Main article: History of the Latin alphabet

Origins

It is generally held that the Latins adopted the Cumae alphabet‎, a variant of the Greek alphabet, in the 7th century B.C. from Cumae, a Greek colony in Southern Italy. The Latin alphabet originated in the 7th century BC, undergoing a history of 2500 years before emerging as one of the dominant Writing systems in use today Latin is the name of various peoples or ethnicities related to the Latium region in the Italian Peninsula, to the Latin language, or to its descendants The Cumae alphabet, was a western variant of the early Greek alphabet, used between the 8th to 5th centuries BC The Greek alphabet (Ελληνικό αλφάβητο is a set of twenty-four letters that has been used to write the Greek language since the late 9th or early The 7th century BC started the first day of 700 BC and ended the last day of 601 BC. There is also a small modern Greek Euboean city called Κυμη, near the ruins of the ancient Cuma Geography Southern Italy forms the lower "boot" of the Italian peninsula containing the ankle (Abruzzo and Molise and southern Lazio the toe (Calabria and the heel Roman legend credited the introduction to one Evander, son of the Sibyl, supposedly 60 years before the Trojan War, but there is no historically sound basis to this tale. In Roman mythology, Euander ( Evander, from Greek Εύανδρος - Euandros "good man" or "strong man" was The word sibyl probably comes (via Latin) from the Greek word sibylla, meaning Prophetess (Other schools of thought suggest that the word In Greek mythology, the Trojan War was waged against the city of Troy by the Achaeans after Paris of Troy stole Helen from her From the Cumae alphabet, the Etruscan alphabet was derived and the Latins eventually adopted 21 of the original 26 Etruscan letters. Old Italic refers to several now extinct Alphabet systems used on the Italian Peninsula in ancient times for various Indo-European (predominantly Italic

The letter C was the western form of the Greek gamma, but it was used for the sounds /g/ and /k/ alike, possibly under the influence of Etruscan, which lacked any voiced plosives. Gamma (uppercase &Gamma, lowercase γ Γάμμα is the third letter of the Greek alphabet. The Etruscan Language was spoken and written by the Etruscan civilization in the ancient region of Etruria (modern Tuscany plus western A stop, plosive, or occlusive is a Consonant sound produced by stopping the airflow in the Vocal tract. Later, probably during the 3rd century BC, the letter Z — unneeded to write Latin proper — was replaced with the new letter G, a C modified with a small horizontal stroke, which took its place in the alphabet. The 3rd century BC started the first day of 300 BC and ended the last day of 201 BC From then on, G represented the voiced plosive /g/, while C was generally reserved for the voiceless plosive /k/. Voice or voicing is a term used in Phonetics and Phonology to characterize speech sounds, with sounds described as either voiceless The letter K was used only rarely, in a small number of loanwords such as Kalendae, often interchangeably with C. A loanword (or loan word) is a word directly taken into one Language from another with little or no translation The Calends ( Latin Kalendae "the called" gen plural - arum) correspond to the first days of each month of the Roman calendar.

After the Roman conquest of Greece in the first century BC, Latin adopted the Greek letters Y and Z (or rather readopted, in the latter case) to write Greek loanwords, placing them at the end of the alphabet. Greece (Ελλάδα transliterated: Elláda, historically, Ellás,) officially the Hellenic Republic (Ελληνική Δημοκρατία The 1st century BC started the first day of 100 BC and ended the last day of 1 BC. Greek (el ελληνική γλώσσα or simply el ελληνικά — "Hellenic" is an Indo-European language, spoken today by 15-22 million people mainly An attempt by the emperor Claudius to introduce three additional letters did not last. Tiberius Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus or Claudius I ( August 1, 10 BC &ndash October 13, AD 54 ( Tiberius Claudius Drusus from birth to The Claudian letters were developed by and named after the Roman Emperor Claudius (reigned 41 – 54) Thus it was that during the classical Latin period the Latin alphabet contained 23 letters:

The Duenos inscription, dated to the 6th century BC, shows the earliest known forms of the Old Latin alphabet. Classical Latin is the form of the Latin language used by the ancient Romans in what is usually regarded as "classical" Latin literature. The letter A is the first letter in the Latin alphabet. Its name in English is a (eɪ plural B is the second letter in the Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled bee or occasionally be (biː plural bees. C is the third letter in the Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled cee or occasionally ce (siː D is the fourth letter in the Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled dee or occasionally de (diː E is the fifth letter in the Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled e (iː plural es or ees (also written E's E F is the sixth letter in the Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled ef or eff (ɛf G is the seventh letter in the Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled gee or occasionally ge (dʒiː I is the ninth letter of the Latin alphabet. Its English name is i (aɪ K is the eleventh letter of the modern Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled kay (keɪ L is the twelfth letter of the Latin alphabet. Its name in English is el or occasionally ell (ɛl M is the thirteenth letter of the modern Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled em (ɛm N is the fourteenth letter in the Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled en (ɛn O is the fifteenth letter of the modern Latin Alphabet. Its name in English is spelled o (oʊ plural usually o's or os; sometimes P is the sixteenth letter of the modern Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled pee or occasionally pe (piː Q is the seventeenth letter of the modern Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled cue (kjuː R is the eighteenth letter of the modern Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled ar (ɑr pronounced or) S is the nineteenth letter in the modern Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled ess or occasionally es (ɛs generally es- T is the twentieth letter in the modern Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled tee or occasionally te (tiː V is the twenty-second letter in the modern Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled vee or occasionally ve (viː X is the twenty-fourth letter in the modern Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled ex or occasionally ecks (ɛks plural exes The letter Y is the twenty-fifth letter in the modern Latin alphabet. Z is the twenty-sixth and last letter of the modern Latin alphabet. The Duenos Inscription is one of the earliest known Old Latin texts dating from the early 6th century BCE The 6th century BC started the first day of 600 BC and ended the last day of 501 BC. Old Latin (also called Early Latin or Archaic Latin) refers to the Latin language in the period before the age of Classical Latin; that is all

The Latin names of some of these letters are disputed. In general, however, the Romans did not use the traditional (Semitic-derived) names as in Greek: the names of the plosives were formed by adding /eː/ to their sound (except for K and Q, which needed different vowels to be distinguished from C) and the names of the continuants consisted either of the bare sound, or the sound preceded by /e/. The Proto-Canaanite alphabet is a consonantal alphabet of twenty-two acrophonic glyphs found in Levantine texts of the Late Bronze Age (from ca A stop, plosive, or occlusive is a Consonant sound produced by stopping the airflow in the Vocal tract. A continuant is a Sound produced with an incomplete closure of the Vocal tract. The letter Y when introduced was probably called hy /hyː/ as in Greek, the name upsilon not being in use yet, but this was changed to i Graeca (Greek i) as Latin speakers had difficulty distinguishing its foreign sound /y/ from /i/. Upsilon (uppercase &Upsilon, lowercase υ Ύψιλον is the 20th letter of the Greek alphabet. Z was given its Greek name, zeta. See also Principality of Zeta Zeta (uppercase Ζ, lowercase ζ; Ζήτα Zita is the sixth letter of the Greek alphabet. For the Latin sounds represented by the various letters see Latin spelling and pronunciation; for the names of the letters in English see English alphabet. The Roman alphabet or Latin alphabet, was adapted from the Old Italic alphabet, to represent the Phonemes of the Latin language, which had in The modern English alphabet consists of 26 letters derived from the Latin alphabet: History See also History of the

Old Roman cursive script, also called majuscule cursive and capitalis cursive, was the everyday form of handwriting used for writing letters, by merchants writing business accounts, by schoolchildren learning the Latin alphabet, and even emperors issuing commands. Roman cursive (or Latin cursive) is a form of Handwriting (or a script) used in Ancient Rome and to some extent into the Middle Ages Capital letters or majuscules pronunciation /məˈdʒʌskyuls ˈmædʒəˌskyuls/ in the Roman alphabet A, B, C, D, The Roman Emperor was the ruler of the Roman State during the imperial period (starting at about 27 BC A more formal style of writing was based on Roman square capitals, but cursive was used for quicker, informal writing. Roman square capitals, also called inscriptional capitals, elegant capitals and quadrata, are an ancient Roman form of writing and It was most commonly used from about the 1st century BC to the 3rd century, but it probably existed earlier than that. The 1st century BC started the first day of 100 BC and ended the last day of 1 BC. The 3rd century is the period from 201 to 300 in accordance with the Julian calendar in the Christian / Common Era. It led to Uncial, a majuscule script commonly used from the 3rd to 8th centuries AD by Latin and Greek scribes. Uncial is a Majuscule script commonly used from the 3rd to 8th centuries AD by Latin and Greek Scribes From the 8th century to the

New Roman cursive script, also known as minuscule cursive, was in use from the 3rd century to the 7th century, and uses letter forms that are more recognizable to modern eyes; a, b, d, and e had taken a more familiar shape, and the other letters were proportionate to each other. Roman cursive (or Latin cursive) is a form of Handwriting (or a script) used in Ancient Rome and to some extent into the Middle Ages Lower case (also lower-case or lowercase) minuscule, or small letters are the smaller form of letters as opposed to upper This script evolved into the medieval scripts known as Merovingian and Carolingian minuscule. Merovingian script was a medieval script so called because it was developed in France during the Merovingian dynasty Carolingian or Caroline minuscule is a script developed as a writing standard in Europe so that the Roman alphabet could be easily recognized

Medieval and later developments

It was not until the Middle Ages that the letter W (originally a ligature of V and V) was added to the Latin alphabet, to represent sounds from the Germanic languages which did not exist in medieval Latin, and only after the Renaissance did the convention of treating I and U as vowels, and J and V as consonants, become established. W is the twenty-third letter in the Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled double-u (ˈdʌbljuː The Germanic languages are a group of related languages that constitute a branch of the Indo-European (IE Language family. The Renaissance (from French Renaissance, meaning "rebirth" Italian: Rinascimento, from re- "again" and nascere U is the twenty-first letter in the modern Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled u (juː In Phonetics, a vowel is a Sound in spoken Language, such as English ah! or oh!, pronounced with an open Vocal tract J is the tenth letter in the modern Latin alphabet; it was the last of the 26 letters to be added In Articulatory phonetics, a consonant is a Speech sound that is articulated with complete or partial closure of the upper Vocal tract, the upper vocal Prior to that, the former had been merely glyph variants of the latter. A glyph is an element of writing Two or more glyphs representing the same symbol whether interchangeable or context-dependent are called Allographs the abstract unit they

With the fragmentation of political power, the style of writing changed and varied greatly throughout the Middle Ages, and even after the invention of the printing press. Palaeography, palæography ( British) or paleography ( American) (from the Greek grc παλαιός palaiós, A printing press is a mechanical device for applying pressure to an inked surface resting upon a medium (such as paper or cloth thereby transferring an image Early deviations from the classical forms were the uncial script, a development of the Old Roman cursive, and various so-called minuscule scripts that developed from New Roman cursive, of which the Carolingian minuscule was the most influential, introducing the lower case forms of the letters, as well as other writing conventions that have since become standard. Uncial is a Majuscule script commonly used from the 3rd to 8th centuries AD by Latin and Greek Scribes From the 8th century to the Roman cursive (or Latin cursive) is a form of Handwriting (or a script) used in Ancient Rome and to some extent into the Middle Ages Roman cursive (or Latin cursive) is a form of Handwriting (or a script) used in Ancient Rome and to some extent into the Middle Ages Carolingian or Caroline minuscule is a script developed as a writing standard in Europe so that the Roman alphabet could be easily recognized Lower case (also lower-case or lowercase) minuscule, or small letters are the smaller form of letters as opposed to upper

The languages that use the Latin alphabet today generally use capital letters to begin paragraphs and sentences and proper nouns. Capital letters or majuscules pronunciation /məˈdʒʌskyuls ˈmædʒəˌskyuls/ in the Roman alphabet A, B, C, D, The rules for capitalization have changed over time, and different languages have varied in their rules for capitalization. Capitalization (or capitalisation &mdash see spelling differences) is writing a word with its first letter as a Majuscule (upper case letter Old English, for example, was rarely written with even proper nouns capitalised; whereas Modern English of the 18th century had frequently all nouns capitalised, in the same way that Modern German is today, e. Modern English is the form of the English language spoken since the Great Vowel Shift, completed in roughly 1550 The German language (de ''Deutsch'') is a West Germanic language and one of the world's major languages. g. "All the Sisters of the old Town had seen the Birds".

Spread of the Latin alphabet

The Latin alphabet spread, along with the Latin language, from the Italian Peninsula to the lands surrounding the Mediterranean Sea with the expansion of the Roman Empire. Latin ( lingua Latīna, laˈtiːna is an Italic language, historically spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. Th Italian Peninsula or Apennine Peninsula (Penisola italiana or Penisola appenninica) is one of the three Peninsulas of Southern Europe The Roman Empire was the post-Republican phase of the ancient Roman civilization, characterised by an autocratic form of government and large territorial The eastern half of the Empire, including Greece, Asia Minor, the Levant, and Egypt, continued to use Greek as a lingua franca, but Latin was widely spoken in the western half, and as the western Romance languages evolved out of Latin, they continued to use and adapt the Latin alphabet. Greece (Ελλάδα transliterated: Elláda, historically, Ellás,) officially the Hellenic Republic (Ελληνική Δημοκρατία Anatolia (Anadolu Ανατολία Anatolía) or Asia minor, comprising most of modern Turkey, is the geographic region bounded by the Black See also Names of the Levant The Levant (lə'vænt is a geographical term that denotes a large area in Western Asia, roughly bounded on the north by the This article is about the country of Egypt For a topic outline on this subject see List of basic Egypt topics. Greek (el ελληνική γλώσσα or simply el ελληνικά — "Hellenic" is an Indo-European language, spoken today by 15-22 million people mainly A lingua franca (from Italian, literally meaning Frankish language, see etymology under Sabir and Italian below is any Language widely The Romance languages (sometimes referred to as Romanic languages, or Neolatin languages) are a branch of the Indo-European language family comprising all

With the spread of Western Christianity during the Middle Ages, the alphabet was gradually adopted by the peoples of northern Europe who spoke Celtic languages (displacing the Ogham alphabet) or Germanic languages (displacing their earlier Runic alphabets), Baltic languages, as well as by the speakers of several Finno-Ugric languages, most notably Hungarian, Finnish and Estonian. Western Christianity is a term used to cover the Latin Rite of the Roman Catholic Church, the Churches of the Anglican Communion, the Lutheran Church Northern Europe is a term for the northern part of Europe. The United Nations defines Northern Europe as (Finland The term Insular Celtic refers to those Celtic languages which originated in the British Isles, in contrast to the Continental Celtic languages of Ogham (ogam ˈɔɣam Modern Irish or, English) is an Early Medieval Alphabet used primarily to represent the Old Irish language (and The Germanic languages are a group of related languages that constitute a branch of the Indo-European (IE Language family. The Baltic languages are a group of related languages belonging to the Indo-European language family and spoken mainly in areas extending east and southeast of the Baltic Finno-Ugric (ˌfɪnoʊˈjuːgɹɪk is a grouping of languages in the Uralic language family comprising Finnish, Estonian, Hungarian and Hungarian ( magyar nyelv) is a Uralic language (more specifically a Ugric language) unrelated to most other languages in Europe. Finnish ( or suomen kieli) is the language spoken by the majority of the population in Finland (92% As of 2006) and by ethnic Finns outside Estonian (; ˈeːsti ˈkeːl is the official language of Estonia, spoken by about 1 The alphabet also came into use for writing the West Slavic languages and several South Slavic languages, as the people who spoke them adopted Roman Catholicism. The West Slavic languages is a subdivision of the Slavic language group that includes Czech, Polish, Slovak, and Sorbian. South Slavic languages comprise one of the three geographical groups of Slavic languages (besides West and East Slavic) The speakers of East Slavic languages generally adopted the Cyrillic alphabet along with Orthodox Christianity. The East Slavic languages constitute one of three regional subgroups of Slavic languages, currently spoken in Eastern Europe. The Cyrillic alphabet (səˈrɪlɪk also called azbuka, from the old name of the first two letters is actually a family of Alphabets, subsets of which are used by The Eastern Orthodox Church is the second largest single Christian Communion in the world The Serbian language uses both alphabets. Serbian (sr-Cyrl српски језик sr-Latn ''srpski jezik'' is a South Slavic language,

As late as 1492, the Latin alphabet was limited primarily to the languages spoken in Western, Northern, and Central Europe. Western Europe at its most general meaning means 'all the countries in the West of Europe ' Northern Europe is a term for the northern part of Europe. The United Nations defines Northern Europe as (Finland Central Europe is the Region lying between the variously and vaguely defined areas of Eastern and The Orthodox Christian Slavs of Eastern and Southeastern Europe mostly used the Cyrillic alphabet, and the Greek alphabet was still in use by Greek-speakers around the eastern Mediterranean. The term Orthodox Christianity may refer to The Eastern Orthodox Church: the Eastern Christian churches of Byzantine Eastern Europe is a general term that refers to the Geopolitical region encompassing the easternmost part of the European continent. The Cyrillic alphabet (səˈrɪlɪk also called azbuka, from the old name of the first two letters is actually a family of Alphabets, subsets of which are used by The Arabic alphabet was widespread within Islam, both among Arabs and non-Arab nations like the Iranians, Indonesians, Malays, and Turkic peoples. The Arabic alphabet is the script used for writing several languages of Asia and Africa such as Arabic, Persian, and Urdu. The araB gene Promoter is a bacterial promoter activated by e L-arabinose binding The Iranian people are a collection of Ethnic groups defined along linguistic lines as speaking Iranian languages. The Republic of Indonesia ( (Republik Indonesia is a Country in Southeast Asia. Malays (Melayu are an Ethnic group of Austronesian peoples predominantly inhabiting the Malay Peninsula, the east coast of Sumatra, the coast The Turkic peoples are Eurasian peoples residing in northern central and western Eurasia who speak languages belonging to the Turkic language family Most of the rest of Asia used a variety of Brahmic alphabets or the Chinese script. The Brahmic family is a family of syllabaries (writing systems used in South Asia, Southeast Asia, and parts of Central Asia and East Asia, A Chinese character, also known as a Han character ( is a Logogram used in writing Chinese (hanzi Japanese (

Latin alphabet world distribution. The dark green areas shows the countries where this alphabet is the sole main script. The light green shows the countries where the alphabet co-exists with other scripts.

Over the past 500 years, the alphabet has spread around the world, to the Americas, Oceania, and parts of Asia, Africa, and the Pacific with European colonization, along with the Spanish, Portuguese, English, French, and Dutch languages. The Americas are the lands of the Western hemisphere or New World, consisting of the Continents of North America and South America Portuguese ( or língua portuguesa) is a Romance language that originated in what is now Galicia (Spain and northern Portugal. English is a West Germanic language originating in England and is the First language for most people in the United Kingdom, the United States French ( français,) is a Romance language spoken around the world by 118 million people as a native language and by about 180 to 260 million people Dutch ( is a West Germanic language spoken by around 24 million people 22 million of which are from the Netherlands, Belgium and Suriname The Latin alphabet is also used for many Austronesian languages, including Tagalog and the other languages of the Philippines, and the official Malaysian and Indonesian languages, replacing earlier Arabic and indigenous Brahmic alphabets. Tagalog is one of the major languages used in the Philippines. In Philippines there are over 170 languages almost all of them belong to the Austronesian language family. The Malay language ( ISO 639-1 code MS is an Austronesian language spoken by the Malay people and people of other ethnic groups who reside in the Indonesian or Bahasa Indonesia, based on the Riau version of Malay language, was declared the official language with the declaration of Some glyph forms from the Latin alphabet served as the basis for the forms of the symbols in the Cherokee syllabary developed by Sequoyah; however, the sounds of the final syllabary were completely different. The Cherokee language is written in a Syllabary invented by Sequoyah (also known as George Gist or George Guess in 1819 See also Cherokee Sequoyah (ᏍᏏᏉᏱ S-si-quo-ya in Cherokee) (circa 1767 - 1843 known as George Guess, A syllabary is a set of written symbols that represent (or approximate Syllables which make up Words A symbol in a syllabary typically represents an optional L. L. Zamenhof used the Latin alphabet as the basis for the alphabet of Esperanto. Ludwig Lazarus Zamenhof (ˈzɑːmɨnhɒf in English born Eliezer Samenhof December 15 1859 &ndash April 14 1917 was an ophthalmologist, Philologist is by far the most widely spoken constructed International auxiliary language in the world

In the late eighteenth century, the Romanians adopted the Latin alphabet, primarily because Romanian is a Romance language. Romania ( dated: Rumania, Roumania Romanian or Daco-Romanian ( dated: Rumanian or Roumanian; self designation limba română, ˈlimba roˈmɨnə is a Romance The Romanians were predominantly Orthodox Christians, and their Church had promoted the Cyrillic alphabet prior to that. Under French rule and Portuguese missionary influence, the Latin alphabet was adapted for writing the Vietnamese language, which had previously used Chinese-like characters. Vietnamese ( tiếng Việt, or less commonly Việt ngữ) formerly known under French colonization as Annamese ( see Annam) Chữ Nôm ( IPA: /cɨ3ˀ5 nom33/ chữ Nôm in Unicode: 字[[wikt 喃|喃]]/ 𡨸 喃/ 𡦂 喃 chữ Nôm in Unicode In 1928, as part of Kemal Atatürk's reforms, Turkey adopted the Latin alphabet for the Turkish language, replacing the Arabic alphabet. Year 1928 ( MCMXXVIII) was a Leap year starting on Sunday (link will display full calendar of the Gregorian calendar. Mustafa Kemal Atatürk (19 May 1881 &ndash 10 November 1938 was an army officer revolutionary Statesman Turkey (Türkiye known officially as the Republic of Turkey ( is a Eurasian Country that stretches Turkish ( tr Türkçe IPA) is a language spoken by over 63 million people worldwide making it the most commonly spoken of the Turkic languages. Most of Turkic-speaking peoples of the former USSR, including Tatars, Bashkirs, Azeri, Kazakh, Kyrgyz and others, used the Latin-based Uniform Turkic alphabet in the 1930s, but in the 1940s all those alphabets were replaced by Cyrillic. The Turkic languages constitute a Language family of some thirty languages spoken by Turkic peoples across a vast area from Eastern Europe and the The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR was a constitutionally Socialist state that existed in Eurasia from 1922 to 1991 Tatars ( Tatar: Tatarlar/Татарлар sometimes spelled Tartars, are a Turkic -speaking ethnic group or multiple ethnic groups The Bashkirs, a Turkic people, live in Russia, mostly in the republic of Bashkortostan. The Azerbaijanis are an Ethnic group mainly in the Republic of Azerbaijan and northwestern Iran. The Kazakhs (also spelled Kazaks, Qazaqs; Kazakh: Қазақтар qɑzɑqtɑr Russian: Казахи the English name is transliterated The Kyrgyz (also spelled Kirgiz, Kirghiz) are a Turkic Ethnic group found primarily in Kyrgyzstan. The Uniform Turkic Alphabet was a Latin based alphabet used by non- Slavic peoples of the USSR in the 1930s The 1930s were described as an abrupt shift to more radical and conservative lifestyles as countries were struggling to find a solution to the Great Depression. The 1940s decade ran from 1940 to 1949 Events and trends The 1940s was a period between the radical 1930s and the conservative 1950s which also leads the period to be After the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, several of the newly-independent Turkic-speaking republics, namely Azerbaijan, Uzbekistan, and Turkmenistan, as well as Romanian-speaking Moldova, have officially adopted the Latin alphabet for Azeri, Uzbek, Turkmen, respectively. The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR was a constitutionally Socialist state that existed in Eurasia from 1922 to 1991 Year 1991 ( MCMXCI) was a Common year starting on Tuesday (link will display full calendar of the Gregorian Calendar. Azerbaijan ( English; Azərbaycan officially the Republic of Azerbaijan (Azərbaycan Respublikası is the largest and most populous country in the South Uzbekistan, officially the Republic of Uzbekistan ( Uzbek: O‘zbekiston Respublikasi or Ўзбекистон Республикаси is a doubly Turkmenistan ( Türkmenistan; also known as Turkmenia) is a Turkic country in Central Asia. Moldova, officially the Republic of Moldova ( Republica Moldova) is a Landlocked country in Eastern Europe, located between Romania Uzbek ( O‘zbek tili or O'zbekcha in Latin script, Ўзбек тили in Cyrillic script; أۇزبېك ﺗﻴﻠی in Arabic Turkmen ( Latin script: türkmen Cyrillic: түркмен ISO 639 -1 tk ISO 639-2 tuk is the name of the national language of Turkmenistan Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and the breakaway region of Transnistria kept the Cyrillic alphabet, chiefly due to their close ties with Russia. Kazakhstan, also Kazakstan ( Қазақстан, Qazaqstan, qɑzɑqˈstɑn Казахстан, Kazakhstán,) officially the Kyrgyzstan (ˈkɻ̩gɪztɑn (AmE or /'kɝgəztan/ (BrE Kyrgyz: Кыргызстан; Russian: Киргизия or Киргизстан or Кыргызстан Tajikistan (təˈdʒɪkɨstæn or /təˈdʒiːkɨstæn/ Тоҷикистон tɔʤikɪsˈtɔn or, Persian تاجیکستان‎ taajikestaan officially the Republic of Transnistria, also known as Trans-Dniester, Transdniestria, and Pridnestrovie (full name Pridnestrovian In the same periods during the 1930s and 1940s, the majority of Kurds throughout the Kurdistan region replaced their use of the Arabic alphabet for writing in the Kurdish language by adopting two forms of the Latin alphabet. The 1930s were described as an abrupt shift to more radical and conservative lifestyles as countries were struggling to find a solution to the Great Depression. The 1940s decade ran from 1940 to 1949 Events and trends The 1940s was a period between the radical 1930s and the conservative 1950s which also leads the period to be History See also History of the Kurdish people Ancient period See also Hurrians, Guti, Mannaeans, Medes The Kurdish language (Kurdish Kurdî or کوردی is a term used for the language spoken by Kurds. Although today the only official Kurdish government located in Iraq uses the Arabic alphabet for public documents, the Latin alphabet remains widely used throughout the region by the majority of Kurdish-speakers. The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG ( Kurdish: حكومه تى هه ريمى كوردستان Hikûmetî Herêmî Kurdistan,) is the official ruling body For a topic outline on this subject see List of basic Iraq topics. The Kurdish language (Kurdish Kurdî or کوردی is a term used for the language spoken by Kurds.

Extensions

Main article: Alphabets derived from the Latin

In the course of its use, the Latin alphabet was adapted for use in new languages, sometimes representing phonemes not found in languages that were already written with the Roman characters. Variants of the Latin alphabet are used by the Writing systems of many languages throughout the world The phoneME project is Sun Microsystems reference implementation of Java virtual machine and associated libraries of Java ME with source licensed under the GNU To represent these new sounds, extensions were therefore created, be it by adding diacritics to existing letters, by joining multiple letters together to make ligatures, by creating completely new forms, or by assigning a special function to pairs or triplets of letters. A diacritic ( also called a diacritic or diacritical mark, point, or sign, is a small sign added to a letter to alter pronunciation These new forms are given a place in the alphabet by defining a alphabetical order or collation sequence, which can vary with the particular language.

Ligatures

Main article: Ligature (typography)

A ligature is a fusion of two or more ordinary letters into a new glyph or character. A glyph is an element of writing Two or more glyphs representing the same symbol whether interchangeable or context-dependent are called Allographs the abstract unit they Examples are ash, Æ/æ (from AE), Œ/œ (from OE), the abbreviation & (from Latin et "and"), and the German Eszett, ß (from ſz, the archaic medial form of s, followed by a z). Æ ( minuscule: æ) is a Grapheme formed from the letters A and E. This article is about the typographic ligature for other uses see Oe Œ For the HTML tag see HTML element. An abbreviation (from Latin brevis "short" Latin ( lingua Latīna, laˈtiːna is an Italic language, historically spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. The German language (de ''Deutsch'') is a West Germanic language and one of the world's major languages. The letter ß ( Unicode U+00DF is a letter in the German alphabet. The long, medial or descending s ( ſ) is a form of the minuscule letter ' S ' formerly used where 's' occurred in the middle

Wholly new letters

Main article: List of Latin letters

Examples are the Runic letters wynn (Ƿ/ƿ) and thorn (Þ/þ), and the Irish letter eth (Ð/ð), which were added to the alphabet of Old English. List of Latin letters. Basic alphabet Extensions and ligatures Letters with diacritics Digraphs trigraphs and tetragraphs Wynn ( (also spelled wen, ƿynn, or ƿen) was a letter of the Old English alphabet. Thorn, or þorn (Þ þ is a letter in the Anglo-Saxon and Icelandic Alphabets It was also used in Medieval Scandinavia Insular script was a medieval script system used in Ireland and Britain (Latin insula, "island" Eth ( Ð, ð; also spelled edh or eð) is a letter used in Old English, Icelandic, Faroese (in Another Irish letter, the insular g, developed into yogh (Ȝ/ȝ), used in Middle English. Insular G ( is a form of the letter G resembling a Tailed z, used in the British Isles. Not to be confused with the unrelated ʒ. For the rune transcribed as ȝ, see Gyfu. Middle English is the name given by Historical linguistics to the diverse forms of the English language spoken between the Norman invasion of Wynn was later replaced with the new letter w, eth and thorn with th, and yogh with gh. In English the digraph 〈th〉 represents in most cases one of two different Phonemes the Voiced dental fricative /ð/ (as in th is Gh is a digraph found in many languages In Latin-based orthographies English In English, gh historically represented (the Although the four are no longer part of the English alphabet, eth and thorn are still used in the modern Icelandic alphabet. History The modern Icelandic Alphabet has developed from a standard established in the 19th century by the Danish linguist Rasmus Rask primarily

The Azerbaijani alphabet has adopted the letter schwa Ə/ə from the International Phonetic Alphabet, using it to represent the sound [æ]. In Republic of Azerbaijan, the Azerbaijani alphabet may refer to either of two alphabets used to write the Azerbaijani language: one based on the Cyrillic alphabet Ə, or ə, is a letter derived from the Latin alphabet. Both glyphs of the Majuscule and minuscule forms of this letter are based on the rotated Some West, Central and Southern African languages use a few additional letters which have a similar sound value to their equivalents in the IPA. Southern Africa is the Southernmost Region of the African Continent, variably defined by Geography or Geopolitics. For example, Adangme uses the letters Ɛ/ɛ and Ɔ/ɔ, and Ga uses Ɛ/ɛ, Ŋ/ŋ and Ɔ/ɔ. Adangme (also called Dangme) is a Kwa language spoken in south-eastern Ghana by 800000 people The Ga language is a Kwa language spoken in Ghana, in and around the capital Accra. Hausa uses Ɓ/ɓ and Ɗ/ɗ for implosives, and Ƙ/ƙ for an ejective. Hausa is the Chadic language with the largest number of speakers spoken as a first Language by about 24 million people and as a second language by about 15 Implosive consonants are stops (rarely Affricates with a mixed Glottalic ingressive and Pulmonic egressive Airstream mechanism. In Phonetics, ejective consonants are Voiceless Consonants that are pronounced with simultaneous closure of the Glottis. Africanists have standardized these into the African reference alphabet. African studies is the study of Africa, and can encompass such fields as social and Economic development, Politics, History, An African reference alphabet was first proposed in 1978 by a UNESCO -organized conference held in Niamey, Niger, and the proposed Alphabet

Digraphs and trigraphs

Main articles: Digraph and Trigraph

A digraph is a pair of letters used to write one sound or a combination of sounds that does not correspond to the written letters in sequence. A digraph, bigraph, or digram is a pair of characters used to write one Phoneme (distinct sound or a sequence of phonemes that does not correspond A trigraph (from the Greek words treis = three and graphein = write is a group of three letters used to represent a single sound or a combination of sounds Examples are CH, RH, SH in English, or the Dutch IJ (note that ij is capitalised as IJ, never Ij, and that it often takes the appearance of a ligature in handwriting). Ch is a digraph in the Roman alphabet. It is treated as a letter of its own in the Rh is a digraph found in some Languages Most words in the English language that begin with this digraph were originally from the Greek language as Sh is a digraph of the Latin alphabet, a combination of S and H. "Handwriting" redirects here For scripts for writing down notes by hand see " Cursive " A trigraph is made up of three letters, like the German SCH or the Milanese OEU. Milanese ( milanes, milanées, meneghin, meneghìn) is the central variety of Western Lombard language spoken in the In the orthographies of some languages, digraphs and trigraphs are regarded as independent letters of the alphabet in their own right. The orthography of a language specifies the correct way of using a specific Writing system to write the language

Diacritics

Main article: Diacritic

A diacritic, in some cases also called an accent, is a small symbol which can appear above or below a letter, or in some other position, such as the umlaut sign used in the German characters Ä, Ö, Ü. A diacritic ( also called a diacritic or diacritical mark, point, or sign, is a small sign added to a letter to alter pronunciation Diaeresis or trema See also Diaeresis History Historically the diaeresis mark or trema is far older than the umlaut mark " Ä " or " ä " is a character which represents either a letter from several extended Latin alphabets or the letter A with O-Umlaut The glyph O with Umlaut appears in the German alphabet. Letter Ü The letter Ü occurs in Hungarian, Karelian, Turkish, Estonian, Azeri, Turkmen, Crimean Its main function is to change the phonetic value of the letter to which it is added, but it may also modify the pronunciation of a whole syllable or word, or distinguish between homographs. In linguistics a homonym is one of a group of words that share the same pronunciation but have different meanings and are usually spelled differently As with letters, the value of diacritics is language-dependent.

Collation

Main article: Collating sequence

Modified letters such as the symbols Å, Ä, and Ö may be regarded as new individual letters in themselves, and assigned a specific place in the alphabet for collation purposes, separate from that of the letter on which they are based, as is done in Swedish. The term collating sequence refers to the order in which character strings should be placed when Sorting them The Swedish Alphabet consists of the following 29 letters Upper Case A, B, C, D, E, F In other cases, such as with Ä, Ö, Ü in German, this is not done, letter-diacritic combinations being identified with their base letter. The same applies to digraphs and trigraphs. Different diacritics may be treated differently in collation within a single language. For example, in Spanish the character Ñ is considered a letter in its own, and sorted between N and O in dictionaries, but the accented vowels Á, É, Í, Ó, Ú are not separated from the unaccented vowels A, E, I, O, U. Ñ (lower case ñ) is a letter of the modern Roman alphabet formed by an N with a diacritical Tilde.

Romanization

Main article: Romanization

Words from languages natively written with other scripts, such as Arabic or Chinese, are usually transliterated or transcribed when embedded in Latin text or in multilingual international communication, a process termed romanization. In Linguistics, romanization (or latinization, also spelled romanisation or latinisation) is the representation of a Word or A writing system is a type of Symbolic system used to represent elements or statements expressible in Language. Different approaches and methods for the Romanization of Arabic exist The Romanization of Chinese is the use of the Latin alphabet to write Chinese Transliteration is the practice of Transcribing a Word or text written in one Writing system into another writing system or system of rules for such practice Transcription is the conversion into written typewritten or printed form of a Spoken language source such as the proceedings of a court hearing

Whilst the romanization of such languages is used mostly at unofficial levels, it has been especially prominent in computer messaging where only the limited 7-bit ASCII code is available on older systems. American Standard Code for Information Interchange ( ASCII) However, with the introduction of Unicode, romanization is now becoming less necessary. In Computing, Unicode is an Industry standard allowing Computers to consistently represent and manipulate text expressed in most of the world's

The English alphabet

Main article: English alphabet

As used in modern English, the Latin alphabet consists of the following characters

In addition, the ligatures Æ of A with E (e. The modern English alphabet consists of 26 letters derived from the Latin alphabet: History See also History of the English is a West Germanic language originating in England and is the First language for most people in the United Kingdom, the United States In Typography, a grapheme is the fundamental unit in written language. Capital letters or majuscules pronunciation /məˈdʒʌskyuls ˈmædʒəˌskyuls/ in the Roman alphabet A, B, C, D, The letter A is the first letter in the Latin alphabet. Its name in English is a (eɪ plural B is the second letter in the Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled bee or occasionally be (biː plural bees. C is the third letter in the Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled cee or occasionally ce (siː D is the fourth letter in the Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled dee or occasionally de (diː E is the fifth letter in the Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled e (iː plural es or ees (also written E's E F is the sixth letter in the Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled ef or eff (ɛf G is the seventh letter in the Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled gee or occasionally ge (dʒiː I is the ninth letter of the Latin alphabet. Its English name is i (aɪ J is the tenth letter in the modern Latin alphabet; it was the last of the 26 letters to be added K is the eleventh letter of the modern Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled kay (keɪ L is the twelfth letter of the Latin alphabet. Its name in English is el or occasionally ell (ɛl M is the thirteenth letter of the modern Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled em (ɛm N is the fourteenth letter in the Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled en (ɛn O is the fifteenth letter of the modern Latin Alphabet. Its name in English is spelled o (oʊ plural usually o's or os; sometimes P is the sixteenth letter of the modern Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled pee or occasionally pe (piː Q is the seventeenth letter of the modern Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled cue (kjuː R is the eighteenth letter of the modern Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled ar (ɑr pronounced or) S is the nineteenth letter in the modern Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled ess or occasionally es (ɛs generally es- T is the twentieth letter in the modern Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled tee or occasionally te (tiː U is the twenty-first letter in the modern Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled u (juː V is the twenty-second letter in the modern Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled vee or occasionally ve (viː W is the twenty-third letter in the Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled double-u (ˈdʌbljuː X is the twenty-fourth letter in the modern Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled ex or occasionally ecks (ɛks plural exes The letter Y is the twenty-fifth letter in the modern Latin alphabet. Z is the twenty-sixth and last letter of the modern Latin alphabet. Lower case (also lower-case or lowercase) minuscule, or small letters are the smaller form of letters as opposed to upper Æ ( minuscule: æ) is a Grapheme formed from the letters A and E. g. "encyclopædia"), and Œ of O with E (e. An encyclopedia (or '''encyclopædia''') is a comprehensive written Compendium that contains Information on either all branches of Knowledge This article is about the typographic ligature for other uses see Oe Œ g. "cœlom") may be used, optionally, in words derived from Latin or Greek, and the diaeresis mark is sometimes placed for example on the letter o (e. By the broadest definition a body cavity is any fluid filled space in a Multicellular organism. Diaeresis or trema See also Diaeresis History Historically the diaeresis mark or trema is far older than the umlaut mark g. "coöperate") to indicate the pronunciation of oo as two distinct vowels, rather than a long one. Outside of professional papers on specific subjects that traditionally use ligatures in loanwords, however, ligatures and diaereses are seldom used in modern English. A loanword (or loan word) is a word directly taken into one Language from another with little or no translation

Latin alphabet and international standards

By the 1960s it became apparent to the computer and telecommunications industries in the First World that a non-proprietary method of encoding characters was needed. The term " first world " refers to countries that are capitalist, which are technologically advanced and whose The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) encapsulated the Latin alphabet in their (ISO/IEC 646) standard. ISO 646 is an ISO standard that since 1972 has specified a 7- Bit character code from which several national standards are derived To achieve widespread acceptance, this encapsulation was based on popular usage. As the United States held a preeminent position in both industries during the 1960s the standard was based on the already published American Standard Code for Information Interchange, better known as ASCII, which included in the character set the 26 x 2 letters of the English alphabet. American Standard Code for Information Interchange ( ASCII) A character encoding consists of a code that pairs a sequence of characters from a given character set (sometimes incorrectly referred to as Code page The modern English alphabet consists of 26 letters derived from the Latin alphabet: History See also History of the Later standards issued by the ISO, for example ISO/IEC 10646 (Unicode Latin), have continued to define the 26 x 2 letters of the English alphabet as the basic Latin alphabet with extensions to handle other letters in other languages. The Universal Character Set (UCS defined by the ISO / IEC 10646 International Standard, is a standard set of characters upon which Unicode as of version 51 defines the following ranges for encoding the Latin alphabet and derived characters See also Mapping of Unicode characters

See also

• Alphabets derived from the Latin
• Beghilos (Calculator spelling)
• Calligraphy
• Collating sequence
• Keyboard layout
• List of Latin letters
• Palaeography
• Penmanship
• Phoenician alphabet
• Roman letters used in mathematics
• Typography
• Category:Latin-derived alphabets

Further reading

• Jensen, Hans (1970). ISO 646 is an ISO standard that since 1972 has specified a 7- Bit character code from which several national standards are derived The letter A is the first letter in the Latin alphabet. Its name in English is a (eɪ plural B is the second letter in the Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled bee or occasionally be (biː plural bees. C is the third letter in the Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled cee or occasionally ce (siː D is the fourth letter in the Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled dee or occasionally de (diː E is the fifth letter in the Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled e (iː plural es or ees (also written E's E F is the sixth letter in the Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled ef or eff (ɛf G is the seventh letter in the Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled gee or occasionally ge (dʒiː I is the ninth letter of the Latin alphabet. Its English name is i (aɪ J is the tenth letter in the modern Latin alphabet; it was the last of the 26 letters to be added K is the eleventh letter of the modern Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled kay (keɪ L is the twelfth letter of the Latin alphabet. Its name in English is el or occasionally ell (ɛl M is the thirteenth letter of the modern Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled em (ɛm N is the fourteenth letter in the Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled en (ɛn O is the fifteenth letter of the modern Latin Alphabet. Its name in English is spelled o (oʊ plural usually o's or os; sometimes P is the sixteenth letter of the modern Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled pee or occasionally pe (piː Q is the seventeenth letter of the modern Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled cue (kjuː R is the eighteenth letter of the modern Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled ar (ɑr pronounced or) S is the nineteenth letter in the modern Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled ess or occasionally es (ɛs generally es- T is the twentieth letter in the modern Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled tee or occasionally te (tiː U is the twenty-first letter in the modern Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled u (juː V is the twenty-second letter in the modern Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled vee or occasionally ve (viː W is the twenty-third letter in the Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled double-u (ˈdʌbljuː X is the twenty-fourth letter in the modern Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled ex or occasionally ecks (ɛks plural exes The letter Y is the twenty-fifth letter in the modern Latin alphabet. Z is the twenty-sixth and last letter of the modern Latin alphabet. The Latin alphabet originated in the 7th century BC, undergoing a history of 2500 years before emerging as one of the dominant Writing systems in use today Palaeography, palæography ( British) or paleography ( American) (from the Greek grc παλαιός palaiós, Variants of the Latin alphabet are used by the Writing systems of many languages throughout the world A diacritic ( also called a diacritic or diacritical mark, point, or sign, is a small sign added to a letter to alter pronunciation Roman numerals are a Numeral system originating in ancient Rome, adapted from Etruscan numerals. Unicode as of version 51 defines the following ranges for encoding the Latin alphabet and derived characters See also Mapping of Unicode characters List of Latin letters. Basic alphabet Extensions and ligatures Letters with diacritics Digraphs trigraphs and tetragraphs Variants of the Latin alphabet are used by the Writing systems of many languages throughout the world Calculator spelling (also known as beghilos; see Description below is a technique of spelling words by reading characters upside-down from Calculators equipped Calligraphy (from Greek kallos "beauty" + graphẽ "writing" is the art of writing (Mediavilla 1996 17 The term collating sequence refers to the order in which character strings should be placed when Sorting them QWERTY keyboardjpg|thumb|right|300px|QWERTY keyboard on a Laptop of 2007]]A keyboard layout is any specific mechanical, visual, or functional List of Latin letters. Basic alphabet Extensions and ligatures Letters with diacritics Digraphs trigraphs and tetragraphs Palaeography, palæography ( British) or paleography ( American) (from the Greek grc παλαιός palaiós, "Handwriting" redirects here For scripts for writing down notes by hand see " Cursive " The Phoenician alphabet is a continuation of the Proto-Canaanite alphabet, by convention taken to originate around 1050 BC Many Roman letters both capital and small are used in Mathematics, Science and Engineering to denote by convention specific or abstracted constants variables of Typography is the art and techniques of arranging type, Type design, and modifying type Glyphs Type glyphs are created and modified using a variety Sign Symbol and Script. London: George Allen and Unwin Ltd. ISBN 0-04-400021-9.  . Transl. of Jensen, Hans (1958). Die Schrift in Vergangenheit und Gegenwart. VEB Deutscher Verlag der Wissenschaften.  , as revised by the author
• Rix, Helmut (1993). Helmut Rix ( July 4, 1926 – December 3, 2004) was a German linguist and professor of the Sprachwissenschaftliches Seminar of Albert-Ludwigs-Universität "La scrittura e la lingua", in Cristofani, Mauro (hrsg. Mauro Cristofani (born Rome Italy 1941 died 1997 was a linguist and researcher in Etruscan studies ): Gli etruschi - Una nuova immagine. Firenze: Giunti, S. 199-227.  
• Sampson, Geoffrey (1985). Writing systems. London (etc. ): Hutchinson.  
• Wachter, Rudolf (1987). Altlateinische Inschriften: sprachliche und epigraphische Untersuchungen zu den Dokumenten bis etwa 150 v. Chr. Bern (etc. ).  : Peter Lang.
• W. Sidney Allen (1978). "The names of the letters of the Latin alphabet (Appendix C)", Vox Latina — a guide to the pronunciation of classical Latin. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-22049-1 (Second edition).  
• Biktaş, Şamil (2003). Tuğan Tel.  
• Diacritics Project — All you need to design a font with correct accents
• Lewis and Short Latin Dictionary on the letter G
• Latin-Alphabet
• Latin alphabet at omniglot.com