Spurius Carvilius Ruga ( fl. 230 BC) was the

freedman A freedman or freedwoman is a formerly enslaved person who has been released from slavery, usually by legal means. Historically, enslaved people were freed by manumission (granted freedom by their captor-owners), emancipation (granted freedom a ...

Spurius Carvilius Maximus Ruga Spurius Carvilius Maximus Ruga (died 212 BC) was Roman consul in 234 and 228 BC. Spurius Carvilius Ruga, the schoolteacher, was his freedman. Consulships The son of Spurius Carvilius Maximus, Carvilius was elected consul with Lucius Postumius A ...

. He is often credited with inventing the Latin letter G. His invention would have been quickly adopted in the

Roman Republic The Roman Republic ( la, Res publica Romana ) was a form of government of Rome and the era of the classical Roman civilization when it was run through public representation of the Roman people. Beginning with the overthrow of the Roman Kin ...

, because the letter C was, at the time, confusingly used both for the /k/ and /g/ sounds. For example, Ruga's own name contained this confusion: ''SPVRIVS CARVILIVS RVCA'' (At that time, "U" and "V" were also the same letter). In the latter half of the 3rd century B.C., Ruga is the first man in

recorded history Recorded history or written history describes the historical events that have been recorded in a written form or other documented communication which are subsequently evaluated by historians using the historical method. For broader world hist ...

to have been attested as opening a

private Private or privates may refer to: Music * " In Private", by Dusty Springfield from the 1990 album ''Reputation'' * Private (band), a Denmark-based band * "Private" (Ryōko Hirosue song), from the 1999 album ''Private'', written and also recorde ...

elementary school A primary school (in Ireland, the United Kingdom, Australia, Trinidad and Tobago, Jamaica, and South Africa), junior school (in Australia), elementary school or grade school (in North America and the Philippines) is a school for primary ed ...

, although other such schools may have existed in Rome prior to his.

Plutarch Plutarch (; grc-gre, Πλούταρχος, ''Ploútarchos''; ; – after AD 119) was a Greek Middle Platonist philosopher, historian, biographer, essayist, and priest at the Temple of Apollo in Delphi. He is known primarily for his ''P ...

is the main source for these inventions, and

Quintus Terentius Scaurus Quintus Terentius Scaurus was a Latin grammarian who flourished during the reigns of Trajan and Hadrian.Holford-Strevens, LeofrancReview of Q. (Quintus) Terentius Scaurus, Federico Biddau, ''Q. Terentii Scavri de orthographia.''Bryn Mawr Classica ...

confirms the former in ''De Orthographia''. The letter G was already in use before 230 BC;

Wilhelm Paul Corssen Wilhelm Paul Corssen (20 January 182018 June 1875) was a German philologist noted for his work on Latin and Etruscan language, Etruscan topics. Biography Corssen was born in Bremen and, after his merchant father moved to Schwedt in the Kingdom ...

theorized in ''Über Aussprache'' that what Plutarch really meant was that Ruga's elementary school was the first place to assign the C and G to their current phonemes of /k/ and /g/.

References

Sources

*
Quaestiones Romanae
' questions 54 and 59.

by Gary Martin
The Origin of the Latin Letters G and Z
by George Hempl {{DEFAULTSORT:Carvilius Ruga, Spurius Ruga, Spurius 3rd-century BC Romans Republican era slaves and freedmen

See also

References

Sources