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4 answers

Evolution of the Alphabet

"While we can claim that it was ultimately the cuneiform script which in one way or another caused the appearance of writing systems around the Mediterranean, in the Middle East and in India, we choose a particular script, the

Proto-Sinaitic,

as the first recognizable form of the alphabet for reasons that will become evident later on.

About 3700 years ago, West Semitic-speaking people of the Sinai became workers or slaves under the sway of Egyptian rule. The Egyptian hieroglyphic symbols these Semitic speakers saw made an impression on them, and encouraged the adoption of a limited number of hieroglyphics to write down sounds in their language. Because phonetic Egyptian hieroglyphs only recorded the consonants, and not the vowels, the Sinaitic script also adopted this convention. On the other hand, unlike hieroglyphs which had multi-consonant signs, the Sinaitic script only used single consonants letters.

The result is a strange system whose symbols were very similar to Egyptian hieroglyphs, but recorded a language related to Phoenician and Hebrew. The result was the Proto-Sinaitic, also known as Proto-Sinaitic."

http://www.ancientscripts.com/alphabet.html

2007-01-04 04:34:22 · answer #1 · answered by $Sun King$ 7 · 1 0

It's hard to say, but some believe it is Sanskrit.
The Sanskrit language first emerged around 2,000 to 1,000 B.C.E. (before the common era). It's one of the oldest languages still in existence, and linguists have grouped it with the Indo-European languages, such as French, German, and English, which may share a common ancestor language. It isn't entirely clear where Sankrit originated, but it probably came from the Indus Valley, in what is now Pakistan and northwestern India.

2007-01-04 04:33:13 · answer #2 · answered by farquaht 2 · 1 0

No one

2007-01-04 04:31:06 · answer #3 · answered by §eeker 5 · 0 0

your mom!

2007-01-04 04:43:30 · answer #4 · answered by Anonymous · 0 0

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