Expert: Maria - 4/5/2005

Question
Hi my name is Connor Karwowski and I attend St. John Nepomuk School in Racine WI. In our computer class, we are learning how to submit questions via the internet My question is who first made an aphabet?  

Answer
Hello,

As far as we know, the idea of an alphabet, that is a system in which one symbol stands for only one sound, was first used by the Phoenicians (about 1200 B.C), a trading people settled in modern Lebanon.

They in fact are credited with developing the world's first alphabet, which was then modified by the addition of vowels, by the Greeks, whose first two letters - alpha (A) and beta (B) - were put together to form the name  "alphabet."

This alphabet was inherited by the Romans, and eventually, us. In fact the characters of the Roman alphabet survive almost intact in modern English alphabet as well as in most of the alphabets of Western Civilization.


As for  the world's first writing system, but not alphabet, people living in Sumeria (modern Iraq)  are thought to have used the first written language, about 5000 years ago, while other claims have been put forward for civilizations in China and India.

Regards
Maria