Dodge City times. [volume] (Dodge City, Kan.) 1876-1892, 1884-08-14
History Of the Alphabet.

How many of the millions that daily
use the alphabet ever stop to think of
it's origin and long history? In the
true spirit of student Isaac Taylor, a
well-known English writer on philo-
sophical and pathological subjects, ha
recently written and published in Lon
don two stout volumes under the title:
1.-The Alphabet: An Account of the
Origin and Development of Letters 1t
is only by help of recent discoveries of
early inscriptions and the progress in
the art of reading lost languages and
deciphering hitherto unknown symbols,
that such a well-posted history has be-
come possible. BY careful study of tho
learned essays and scientific investiga-
tions of the latest philologists, Taylor
has set forth in language of easy COM
prehension the origin of the alphabet,
showing that our own Roman" let
tiers may be followed back to their very
beginning, some twenty or more centu-
ries ago, as he asserts. We have no
more letters, according to this account,
than those of the Italian printers of the
fifteenth century. These were initiated
from the beautiful manuscripts of the
tenth and eleventh centuries, the letter.
ing of these being derived from the RO-
man of the Augustan age. Roman let
tiers, in their turn, are traced to these
employed at Rome in the third century
B. c., and these do not differ greatly
from forms used in the earliest existing
specimens of Latin writing, dating from
the fifth century B. G. The primitive
alphabet of Rome was derived from o
local form of the Greek alphabet, in uso
about the sixth century b. c., and that
was variety OF the earliest Greek al
phabet belonging to the eighth, or even
to the ninth century b. G. The Greeks
got their letters from the PhGnicians,
and theirs are clearly traceable in the
most ancient known form of the Semit-
ic.
The most ancient of books, a papyrus
found at Thebes, and now preserved in
the French National Library, supplies
the earliest forms of the letters used in
the Semitic alphabet. The stone tables
of the law could have been possible to
the Jews only because of their posses
sion of an alphabet, and thus the Bible
and modern pathological science unite
IN ascribing common origin to the
alphabet which is in daily use through
out the world. The nineteenth century
B. c. is held by Taylor to be the APP
proximate date of the origin of the
alphabetic writing, and from that time
it grew by slow degrees, while from
Egypt, the home of the Jews during
their long captivity, the knowledge OF
their captivity was carried in all direc-
tions where alphabets are now found.
The Aryans are thought TO have been
the first to bring the primitive alphabet
to perfection, and each letter and each
sound may be traced, by Taylor's care
full analysis through all the changes that
have marked the growth, progress, and.
in some instances, the decay of different
letters of various alphahets. 1t is an
interesting fact that the Oldest knows
ga, Z, c. in existence is chiId's
alphabet, scratched on a little ink bot
tie of black ware, found in one Of the
oldest Greek settlement in Italy, at.
tributed to the fifth century B. c. The
earliest letters of many later ones are
known only by inscriptions, and il is
the rapid increase, by recent discover.
les, of these precious fragments that
hsso AAoPlICA 0All2Cut ICSc6ECu
and quickened the zeal of learned
students in mastering the elements OF
knowledge of their origin and history
throughout the world. As late as 1876
there were found in Cyprus some
bronze plates inscribed with Pheni-
clan characters, dating back to the
tenth, even the eleventh century B. c.
Coins, engraved gems. Inscribed
statues, and, last of all, the Sloan in.
scription, found in 1880, at Jerusalem,
on the wall of an old tunnel, have sup
piled new material for the history.
From the common mother of ma
alphabets, the Phenician, are d~...,,<i
ed the Greek and other Ep--onesn sr.
ems Cd the one &c, Including that
WHICH W. use and have the greatest in.
'o' -ec in; and on The other, the alphs
bets Of Asia, from which have spfu.-
those of the East, Syriac, Arabic and :
Hebrew. = The Household