The Eastern alphabet adopted = = x, and added fi = X =x= eh, and ps, The Western alphabet shows X = =x, = ph, ch. ps was expressed] by ire or (1)cr, or in some cases by a new sign *. The origin of these signs, and especially the curious diversity in their use, still lacks a satisfactory explana tion. Among the East Greeks also arose the dif ferentiation of the e and o sounds, which, after some variations, settled into denoting the short c by E, while for the long c was chosen the original aspirate (H) 0 was appropriated for short o, and for long o a new symbol (B) was invented. Van or Digamma (p) was disused, as the sound had been early lost among the Ionians. In adopting the alphabet, the Greeks seem at first. to have adopted also the direction of the Pluenician writing, from right to left, but very early to have become more independent and adopted the form where the lines rim alter nately from right to left and left to right. like the course of the oxen in ploughing, whence the name durarpoOnchii., houstroph(Von. But the di rection was unimportant, and the early inscrip tions show many strange variations. It was not until the fifth century that the habit of writing from left to right supplanted the earlier forms.
Through the Greeks the alphabet was bronght to Italy, and naturally in the Western form, since Chalcidians of Cunne seem to have been the intermediaries. Here also developed many local variations: but most of the Italian alphabets preserved throughout their history the original direction of the writing. The Latins, however, probably because of growing intimacy with the Greeks, adopted the later Greek method. The Greek alphabet was not adopted in its entirety. The aspirates (th, 1)11, rh) were not needed, and Z, though perhaps existing in early times, was soon dropped, and its place later taken by C, differentiation of C, which seems for a time to have done duty for both the lo and sounds, as K early fell into disuse, if it did not actually disappear. About the time of Cicero, for the transcription of Greek names, the characters Y (U) and Z were introduced at the end of the al phabet. This Latin alphabet, as spread by the
Roman conquests, became the alphabet of the modern European languages, with the exception of Russian, which is derived from the Byzantine Greek of the ninth century A.D., and in its early ecclesiastical form was the invention of the mis sionary Cyril. who found it necessary to add twelve signs to express the Slavonic sounds. The number was afterward increased to forty eight, and in the reign of Peter the Great again reduced and the alphabet modified into the pres ent Russian alphabet of thirty-five letters. See RuxEs and OnAm for primitive Germanic and Irish writing, and Gi.man..rrsA and KIRILLITSA for the Slavic alphabets.
BIBLIOGRAPHY. Isaac Taylor, The Alphabet Bibliography. Isaac Taylor, The Alphabet (London, 18991. This is the most complete treatment in English, but must be used with caution. A convenient but rather popular sum mary, with numerous illustrations, may be found in E. Clodd, The Story of the Alphabet (London. 1900). Consult also: _Berger. Histoire de n'eri t are dons Pant boil(' (Paris, 1891) ; Peters, "Recent Theories of the Alphabet," Journal of the American Oriental Society. XXII. (New Haven, 19011; Evans, Cretan Pictographs and Pre-Phecnician Script (London, 1895) : Evans, Further Disroreries of Cretan and .Eyean Script (London, 1494). On the origin of the Plnenieian alphabet, see the books cited above, and compare Lidzbarski. Handbuch der nordsemifisehen Epi graphik (Weimar, 1494), which contains a full bibliography. For the Greek alphabet. see Eirchoti, Studien cur (Ieschiehte des gricchisch en Alphabets (Giitersloh, 1887) : Roberts, Intro duction to Greek Epigraphy (Cambridge, Eng., 1887) ; Reinach, Trait(' dYpigraphie grecque (Paris, 1885) ; Larfeld, in ),Killer's Handbuch der Hassischen Altertum.sicissensehaft, Volume I. (Munich. 1892). For the Latin alphabet, con sult: Ritschl. Iatinitatis Monument(' Epigraphic(' (Berlin, 1862) ; Hubner, Exempla Scripturce Latina' Epigraphica a Ccrsari.s etc. (Berlin, 1845) ; also Hfibner in Mtiller's Handbuch, Volume 1.