88 TEANSACTIONS OF THE [dEC. 7, 



13tli letter: Egypt, '^owl'*' (bird of death) = M ^Q; remains M 



throughout. 

 14th letter: Egypt, ''undulating surface of water "=N_37; re- 

 mains N throughout. ' 

 15th letter: Egypt, "bolt of door '"=8; in Sliemitic sharp s Q; 



Greek changed it into a KS=our X, while the form of this 



letter does not occur after that. 

 16th letter: Egypt. " arm "=peculiar guttural sound only found 



in the Shemitic; Shemitic retains it y; Greek-English make 



of it an as nearest pronunciation. 

 17th letter: Egypt, "square or window " = P; in Shemitic p or 



ph (=f) sen; Greek-English P. 



18th letter: Egypt. "snake"=TZ; Shemitic Z( = tz) ^V; dropped 



in later Greek-English. ' 



19th letter: Egypt. '* triangle "=K or Q; Shemitic q p; old 



Greek q; dropped in Coptic; old Latin q; by shortening 



vertical line Latin Q, English Q. 

 20th letter: Egypt, ''mouth "=R '^; remains R throughout. 

 21st letter: Egypt, "meadow with trees "=:SH; in Shemitic has 



pronunciation of Sh or S according to the dot above the letter 



(dot at beginning J^"=sh, at end j^^s); remains S from 



Greek-English. 

 22d letter: Egypt, "bag (?) "=T or TH; in Shemitic tor th 



f^P; Greek T; Coptic, from Greek T, and also going back to 



Hierogl. gets a new letter for TH; Latin to English T. 

 23d letter: begins with Greek Y; Coptic Y; changes in Latin to 



V=V before vowels, U before consonant; English adds W= 



double V or U. 

 24th letter: Greek ^ phi = PH, only in Greek, Coptic, and old 



Latin. 

 25th letter: Greek X chi = CH (== German ch); becomes Latin 



X (our X) for reasons stated above; English X. 

 26th letter: Latin and English Y coming out of Greek upsilon 



which thus gives rise to four English letters: U V W and Y. 

 27th letter: Latin Z, put at end of alphabet from place No. 7, 



for reasons stated above; English Z. 



Besides this the Egyptian has some more letters, really variants 

 (reading on the chart from left to right): a; 1; u; u; h; sh; b; t; 

 u; m; m; n; s. The Coptic: ch; h; dg (pronounced like gi in 

 giant). Etruscan: f. Umbrian: f; rs; and sh, s or z. Oscan: 

 f;i;n'oro. Greek: psi and omega. The third kind of Egyp- 

 tian writing, Demotic, is not mentioned here, as it originated first 

 about 700 B.C., and therefore did not play any important part in 

 the development of our alphabet. The Coptic, the fourth kind 

 of Egypt writing, took its letters from Greece, and some others. 



