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Abjad
An abjad ( or abgad) is a writing system in which only consonants are represented, leaving the vowel sounds to be inferred by the reader. This contrasts with alphabets, which provide graphemes for both consonants and vowels. The term was introduced in 1990 by Peter T. Daniels. Other terms for the same concept include partial phonemic script, segmentally linear defective phonographic script, consonantary, consonant writing, and consonantal alphabet. Impure abjads represent vowels with either optional diacritics, a limited number of distinct vowel glyphs, or both. Etymology The name ''abjad'' is based on the Arabic alphabet's first (in its Arabic alphabet#Alphabetical order, original order) four corresponding to ''a'', ''b'', ''j'', and to replace the more common terms "consonantary" and "consonantal alphabet" in describing the family of scripts classified as "West Semitic languages, West Semitic". It is similar to other Semitic languages such as Phoenician alphabet, Phoenician, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Abugida
An abugida (; from Geʽez: , )sometimes also called alphasyllabary, neosyllabary, or pseudo-alphabetis a segmental Writing systems#Segmental writing system, writing system in which consonant–vowel sequences are written as units; each unit is based on a consonant letter, and vowel notation is secondary, similar to a diacritical mark. This contrasts with a full alphabet, in which vowels have status equal to consonants, and with an abjad, in which vowel marking is absent, Abjad#Impure abjads, partial, or optional – in less formal contexts, all three types of the script may be termed "alphabets". The terms also contrast them with a syllabary, in which a single symbol denotes the combination of one consonant and one vowel. Related concepts were introduced independently in 1948 by James Germain Février (using the term ) and David Diringer (using the term ''semisyllabary''), then in 1959 by Fred Householder (introducing the term ''pseudo-alphabet''). The Ethiopian Semitic langu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alphabet
An alphabet is a standard set of letter (alphabet), letters written to represent particular sounds in a spoken language. Specifically, letters largely correspond to phonemes as the smallest sound segments that can distinguish one word from another in a given language. Not all writing systems represent language in this way: a syllabary assigns symbols to spoken syllables, while logographies assign symbols to words, morphemes, or other semantic units. The first letters were invented in Ancient Egypt to serve as an aid in writing Egyptian hieroglyphs; these are referred to as Egyptian uniliteral signs by lexicographers. This system was used until the 5th century AD, and fundamentally differed by adding pronunciation hints to existing hieroglyphs that had previously carried no pronunciation information. Later on, these phonemic symbols also became used to transcribe foreign words. The first fully phonemic script was the Proto-Sinaitic script, also descending from Egyptian hi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Arabic Alphabet
The Arabic alphabet, or the Arabic abjad, is the Arabic script as specifically codified for writing the Arabic language. It is a unicase, unicameral script written from right-to-left in a cursive style, and includes 28 letters, of which most have contextual letterforms. Unlike the modern Latin alphabet, the script has no concept of letter case. The Arabic alphabet is an abjad, with only consonants required to be written (though the long vowels – ''ā ī ū'' – are also written, with letters used for consonants); due to its optional use of diacritics to notate vowels, it is considered an impure abjad. Letters The basic Arabic alphabet contains 28 letter (alphabet), letters. Forms using the Arabic script to write other languages added and removed letters: for example ⟨پ⟩ is often used to represent in adaptations of the Arabic script. Unlike Archaic Greek alphabets, Greek-derived alphabets, Arabic has no distinct letter case, upper and lower case letterforms. Many le ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Semitic Alphabet
Alphabetic writingwhere letters generally correspond to individual sounds in a language (phonemes), as opposed to having symbols for syllables or wordswas likely invented once in human history. The Proto-Sinaitic script emerged during the 2nd millennium BC among a community of West Semitic laborers in the Sinai Peninsula. Exposed to the idea of writing through the complex system of Egyptian hieroglyphs, their script instead wrote their native West Semitic languages. With the possible exception of hangul in Korea, all later alphabets used throughout the world either descend directly from the Proto-Sinaitic script, or were directly inspired by it. It has been conjectured that the community selected a small number of those commonly seen in their surroundings to describe the sounds, as opposed to the semantic values of their own languages. This script was partly influenced by hieratic, an older cursive script derived from hieroglyphs. Mainly through the Phoenician alphabet th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hebrew Alphabet
The Hebrew alphabet (, ), known variously by scholars as the Ktav Ashuri, Jewish script, square script and block script, is a unicase, unicameral abjad script used in the writing of the Hebrew language and other Jewish languages, most notably Yiddish, Judaeo-Spanish, Ladino, Judeo-Arabic languages, Judeo-Arabic, and Judeo-Persian. In modern Hebrew, vowels are increasingly introduced. It is also used informally in Israel to write Levantine Arabic, especially among Druze in Israel, Druze. It is an offshoot of the Aramaic alphabet, Imperial Aramaic alphabet, which flourished during the Achaemenid Empire and which itself derives from the Phoenician alphabet. Historically, a different abjad script was used to write Hebrew: the original, old Hebrew script, now known as the Paleo-Hebrew alphabet, has been largely preserved in a variant form as the Samaritan script, Samaritan alphabet, and is still used by the Samaritans. The present ''Jewish script'' or ''square script'', on the cont ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Aleph
Aleph (or alef or alif, transliterated ʾ) is the first Letter (alphabet), letter of the Semitic abjads, including Phoenician alphabet, Phoenician ''ʾālep'' 𐤀, Hebrew alphabet, Hebrew ''ʾālef'' , Aramaic alphabet, Aramaic ''ʾālap'' 𐡀, Syriac alphabet, Syriac ''ʾālap̄'' ܐ, Arabic alphabet, Arabic ''ʾalif'' , and Ancient North Arabian, North Arabian 𐪑. It also appears as Ancient South Arabian script, South Arabian 𐩱 and Ge'ez script, Ge'ez ''ʾälef'' አ. These letters are believed to have derived from an Egyptian hieroglyph depicting an ox's head to Acrophony, describe the initial sound of ''*ʾalp'', the West Semitic languages, West Semitic word for ox (compare Biblical Hebrew ''ʾelef'', "ox"). The Phoenician variant gave rise to the Alpha (letter), Greek alpha (), being re-interpreted to express not the glottal consonant but the accompanying vowel, and hence the A, Latin A and A (Cyrillic), Cyrillic А and possibly the Armenian letter Ayb (Armenian le ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Writing System
A writing system comprises a set of symbols, called a ''script'', as well as the rules by which the script represents a particular language. The earliest writing appeared during the late 4th millennium BC. Throughout history, each independently invented writing system gradually emerged from a system of proto-writing, where a small number of ideographs were used in a manner incapable of fully encoding language, and thus lacking the ability to express a broad range of ideas. Writing systems are generally classified according to how its symbols, called ''graphemes'', relate to units of language. Phonetic writing systemswhich include alphabets and syllabariesuse graphemes that correspond to sounds in the corresponding spoken language. Alphabets use graphemes called ''letter (alphabet), letters'' that generally correspond to spoken phonemes. They are typically divided into three sub-types: ''Pure alphabets'' use letters to represent both consonant and vowel sounds, ''abjads'' gene ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Phoenician Alphabet
The Phoenician alphabet is an abjad (consonantal alphabet) used across the Mediterranean civilization of Phoenicia for most of the 1st millennium BC. It was one of the first alphabets, attested in Canaanite and Aramaic inscriptions found across the Mediterranean basin. In the history of writing systems, the Phoenician script also marked the first to have a fixed writing direction—while previous systems were multi-directional, Phoenician was written horizontally, from right to left. It developed directly from the Proto-Sinaitic script used during the Late Bronze Age, which was derived in turn from Egyptian hieroglyphs. The Phoenician alphabet was used to write Canaanite languages spoken during the Early Iron Age, sub-categorized by historians as Phoenician, Hebrew, Moabite, Ammonite and Edomite, as well as Old Aramaic. It was widely disseminated outside of the Canaanite sphere by Phoenician merchants across the Mediterranean, where it was adopted and adap ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Dalet
Dalet (, also spelled Daleth or Daled) is the fourth letter of the Semitic abjads, including Phoenician ' 𐤃, Hebrew , Aramaic ' 𐡃, Syriac ' ܕ, and Arabic (in abjadi order; 8th in modern order). Its sound value is the voiced alveolar plosive (). It is also related to the Ancient North Arabian 𐪕, South Arabian , and Ge'ez . The letter is based on a glyph of the Proto-Sinaitic script, probably called ' (''door'' in Modern Hebrew is delet), ultimately based on a hieroglyph depicting a door: O31 Arabic ''dāl'' The letter is named (), and is written in several ways depending on its position in the word: The letter represents a sound. Phoenician The Phoenician dālet gave rise to the Greek delta (Δ), Latin D, and the Cyrillic letter Д. Aramaic Hebrew dalet Hebrew spelling: The letter is ''dalet'' in the modern Israeli Hebrew pronunciation (see Tav (letter)). ''Dales'' is still used by many Ashkenazi Jews and ''daleth'' by some Jews of M ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gimel
Gimel is the third (in alphabetical order; fifth in spelling order) letter of the Semitic abjads, including Phoenician ''gīml'' 𐤂, Hebrew ''gīmel'' , Aramaic ''gāmal'' 𐡂, Syriac ''gāmal'' ܓ and Arabic ''ǧīm'' . It is also related to the Ancient North Arabian 𐪔, South Arabian , and Ge'ez . Its sound value in the original Phoenician and in all derived alphabets, except Arabic ( see below), is a voiced velar plosive ; in Modern Standard Arabic, it represents either a or for most Arabic speakers except in Northern Egypt, the southern parts of Yemen and some parts of Oman where it is pronounced as the voiced velar plosive . In its Proto-Canaanite form, the letter may have been named after a weapon that was either a staff sling or a throwing stick (spear thrower), ultimately deriving from a Proto-Sinaitic glyph based on the hieroglyph below: T14 The Phoenician letter gave rise to the Greek gamma (Γ), the Latin C, G, Ɣ and Ȝ, and the Cyril ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bet (letter)
Bet, Beth, Beh, or Vet is the second Letter (alphabet), letter of the Semitic abjads, including Phoenician language, Phoenician ''bēt'' 𐤁 , Hebrew language, Hebrew ''bēt'' , Aramaic language, Aramaic ''bēṯ'' 𐡁, Syriac alphabet, Syriac ''bēṯ'' ܒ and Arabic Alphabet, Arabic ''bāʾ'' . It is also related to the Ancient North Arabian 𐪈, Ancient South Arabian script, South Arabian , and Ge'ez . Its sound value is the voiced bilabial stop ⟨b⟩ or the voiced labiodental fricative ⟨v⟩. The letter's name means "house" in various Semitic languages (Arabic '':wikt:بيت#Arabic, bayt'', Akkadian '':wikt:𒂍#Akkadian, bītu, bētu'', Hebrew: '':wikt:בית#Hebrew, bayīṯ'', Phoenician '':wikt:𐤁𐤉𐤕#Phoenician, bēt'' etc.; ultimately all from Proto-Semitic '':wikt:Reconstruction:Proto-Semitic/bayt-, *bayt-''), and appears to derive from an Egyptian hieroglyph of a house by acrophony. O1 The Phoenician letter gave rise to, among others, the Greek al ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
