1865.] Proceedings of the Asiatic Society. 173 



Phoenicians taught, should have found the symbols and the Shemitic 

 names of the letters inconvenient enough. Hence the numerous 

 changes, abbreviations and additions, in our Western alphabets. These 

 changes were of course introduced very gradually. Thus the Greek 

 letters <f>, if/, co, were added by the Greeks during the 5th century 

 B. C. ; the letter G was invented by a freed slave in Rome about 

 230 B. C. (Plutarch's Quaest. Rom.), who put the new letter 

 after our F, transferring the unroman Z to the end of the alphabet, 

 where it has since stood. Again the letter W, the youngest letter in 

 the world, is of Germanic origin, and found in English and German 

 only. 



" The pictures representing the letters were also more and more re- 

 duced, to two or three strokes. This changed also, though very 

 gradually, the mode of writing from the right to the left. The 

 fiov<TTpocf>r)86v inscriptions form the metabasis to our writing from the 

 left. They are the oldest Greek inscriptions we have. When once 

 the symbols of the letters had become mere strokes, the direction of 

 the strokes was a mere practical question. For if the writing com- 

 mences at the left, the letters are liable to be effaced by the moving 

 hand. For this reason, the modern Japanese also, write the letters in 

 vertical columns commencing at the left. 



" The ultimate origin of our English alphabet from a Shemitic 

 alphabet explains its numerous deficiencies and redundancies. It is a 

 curious circular moving of circumstances, that we should now-a-days 

 induce Shemitic nations to adopt a Romanized alphabet. 



" The question arises now, whether the letters of the Sanscrit shew 

 any resemblance to Shemitic symbols. Dr. Weber believes he has 

 traced several most striking similarities. I should be glad, if any Of 

 the learned members could give me some information on the following 

 points : 



" 1. — Is there any trace that the names of the letters of the Sanscrit 

 alphabet have been longer in form ? At present they are all mono- 

 syllables. 



i ■ 2. — Are there differences in figure between the oldest symbols and 

 the later ones, and are the oldest symbols clumsier and of more strokes ? 



" 3. — Was Sanscrit ever written from the right to the left or fiovaTpo- 



