Trade, money & letters

alphabet

The names of the first two letters — Phoenician ʾalp 'ox' and bēt 'house', Greek alpha and beta — fused into one Greek-Latin word for the whole row of letters. From Latin it went to every European language, Turkey took alfabe from French around its 1928 script reform, Arabic built its own alifbāʾ from the same two letter names, and English carried the word to Japan, Korea and East Africa.

Weakest linkCertain

The road to English

From Koine Greek to Byzantine Greek, Russian

From Byzantine Greek to Modern Greek

From Late Latin to Middle French, French

From French to Turkish

From Late Latin to Italian

From Late Latin to Spanish

From Late Latin to German

From Late Latin to Polish

From Late Latin to Dutch, Indonesian

From English to Japanese

From English to Korean

From English to Swahili

From Phoenician to Syriac, Arabic, Persian

1000 BCEPhoenician

Hops are evenly spaced; labels show the year each form is first attested.