B, the second letter, and first consonant, in all known alphabets, excepting the Ethiopic, where it occupies the ninth place. It is a labial and mute, representing the compression of the lips, and consequently incapable of being uttered or pronounced without the aid of a vowel, or a forcible expiration equivalent in effect to vocality. This letter has a near affinity to the other labials, with which, indeed, it is interchangeable according as the compression of the lips, which it primarily indicates, is modified by simultaneous expiration; and hence, although its ordinary power or effect is intermediate between the smooth and easy sound of P, and the rough aspirations of PH, F, and V, yet, in the articulation of many languages, it is habitually confounded with one or other of the letters of the same class, and, in the same language at different times, is frequently interchanged with its cognate consonants. Thus βo<faω in Greek becomes pasco in Latin; γ∣λβος, gilvus; βp>μω,fremo; τruξoς, buxus; aμφω, ambo; φαxαινα, balaena; βξiαμβoς, triumphus; and so in many other instances. Again, in Latin, the B of the olden time, and of the inscriptions, passes into V in a subsequent age; while, on the other hand, the P of the antique orthgraphy is commuted into B in that of amore recent date. Hence we have abavus for ababus, ave for abe, vixit for bixit , curvatus for curbatus, and hundreds of other analogous instances in Gruter, Reinesius, Funccius, Gorius, Dempster, Fréret, and Lanzi, not to mention the Monumenti degli Scipioni, and similar works; while Poplius for Publius, Poplicus for Publicus, Poplicola for Publicola, are of frequent occurrence in the inscriptions and other elder monuments of the Latin language. This letter is also sometimes inserted in the middle of compound words for the sake of [7:4:265]euphony, and to prevent the hiatus which would otherwise result from the concurrence of vowels, as ambages, ambio, amburo; it is servile in the dative and ablative plural of , the third, fourth, and fifth declensions of Latin nouns, and in the praeterimperfect and future tenses of the first and second conjugations; and it is interchangeable with P, F, and other letters, both in the composition and conjugation of a number of verbs.—In Hebrew, the name of the second letter, n'2, bith or beth, indicates the original hieroglyph to have represented a house or temple; whilst an abbreviated form of the figure has been employed to denote the initial sound of the word in the spoken language; a principle, also, upon which the ancient Egyptians appear to have constructed their phonetic alphabet, or used the symbolical characters of their complex system of writing, for representing the constituent sounds of proper names and of legends. A difference, however, will be observed between the two Phoenician forms of this letter; the first of which is that of a house or temple, whilst, in the second, another figure seems to have been combined with the first; from which it is probable that this people, the inventors of alphabetical characters or signs, had originally two hieroglyphs for the letter, and consequently two words by which it was named. This compound hieroglyph seems to have been composed of the beth or house, and of the head and horns of some animal placed over it, perhaps those of a ιρι=ι, boher, ox or wild goat; which would explain the assertion of Hesiod, that the second or third letter of the Phoenicians was represented by an ox. At all events the Phoenician, reproduced in the early Greek, has servedasthebasisof most modern varieties in the languages of the west; and, amidst every change which time, accident, or caprice, has superinduced, it is still easy to detect and distinguish the elementary or primitive form. With regard to the different sounds or powers attached to the letter in modem languages, these have varied within the limits of its natural affinity; the Germans giving it the effect of P, the Spaniards, Gascons, and others, that of V; and the modem Greeks, sometimes that of V, but more frequently sounding it as we do F. The satirical epigrammatist who affirmed that, in Gascony, bibere is the same as vivere, stated a literal truth, in as far at least as the pronunciation of the words is concerned. In abbreviations B stands for Badio, beatus, Beleno, bene, beneficiarius, berna for verna, biga, bivus for vivus, bixit for vixit, bonum, Brutus, burra, bustum. (a.)