Why are the letters of the alphabet in the order that they’re in?
No one seems to know for sure, but a lot of folks have guesses.
Because its alphabetical order?
hehe
This has been discussed before, as a quick search would have shown
. In the thread Alphabetical Order, brianmelendez supplied a link to Evolution of Alphabets. It basically has the same information as the link supplied by DMC, but also a very nifty graphic, if you click on The evolution of the Latin character set.
I’ll get this out of the way, just to make sure it’s properly attributed. Ahem.
“Is it because of that song?” - Stephen Wright
The really interesting question is how can the order be improved?
When people invent alphabets they seem to forget order implications until it’s too late. Say when inventing the American Indian alphabets.
Hard-to-learn orders just waste everyone’s time for years in school, and make for the majority of filing mistakes in the workplace.
I was considering an order that went along the lines of 1) First all the letters (capital forms) that are composed of just straight lines, then lines and curves, then end with curved only.
And within groups, the fewest lines would come first.
I L H F E…P R…U C O S
It’s not exact, but it’s a 90% improvement.
That’s great for writing (in upper case), but what about the phonetic similarities?
By the time both of my older sons reached the age of three (my youngest is two), they knew the order of the Latin alphabet as used in English. I’d say that “improving” it would be a waste of time.
Popup:
That link to the Evolution of Alphabets page was pretty cool. A little bit of music added, and it could rock!
If we were to reorder the alphabet, we should do it on phonetic principles – vowels first, then glottal consonants (k and g), working forward through the mouth to labial consonants (p and b). That would make the alphabet a real SYSTEM with internal organizing principles, like the periodic table of elements!