alphabet development and classical latin

Latin Learning Latin
1

Salvete,

I’m new to Latin and I’m trying to (re-)start it right, and maybe even write some software on Latin (I’m a C/C++ programmer).

I did some research to find out about the development of the latin alphabet, but have found inconsistencies and contradictions between the results. Here is what I have:

http://www.pamellaneely.com/alpha/
http://www.omniglot.com/writing/latin.htm
http://www.omniglot.com/writing/latin2.htm

( http://www.phoenicia.org/imgs/siniatic.jpg )
ABGDEVZHIKLMNOPQRST
( http://www.phoenicia.org/imgs/evolchar.gif )

( http://users.tpg.com.au/etr/etrusk/tex/develop.html )
ABCDEV.Z.HIKLMNOPQRST
ABCDEV.G.HIKLMNOPQRST
ABCDEVGHIKLMNOPQRST.Z

( http://www.orbilat.com/Languages/Latin/Grammar/Latin-Alphabet.html )
ABCDEF.Z.HIKLMNOPQRSTVX
ABCDEF.G.HIKLMNOPQRSTVX
ABCDEFGHIKLMNOPQRSTVX.YZ

( http://www.wam.umd.edu/~rfradkin/latin.html )
7 B.C.: ABCDEFZHI.KLMNOPQRST.V.X..
? B.C.: ABCDEFGHI.KLMNOPQRST.V.X..
1 B.C.: ABCDEFGHI.KLMNOPQRST.V.XYZ << (classical) (-J U W)
Mid Ages: ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ

I have marked some dots in the above sets to clear changes up.
What is this alphabet’s evolution that is known today (firmly known)?
What can you tell me about the use of the ligatures ae, oe, au, ui?
What can you tell me about the @, & and % symbols?

Please have in mind that I have done extensive research about these questions, and have not found statements consistent to each other.
What I really want to know is: when were, if at all, the ligatures used? when were, if at all, and how do we know of, the “long vowel” and “short vowel” marks? when were @, & and % used, and where did % come from (I know @ came from ad and & came from “et”, but were they used inside the words - e.g. metum = m&um?)?
And what is the pure classical form? what is “classical” exactly? what letters did the “classical” alphabet have? Were ligatures used in classical latin? were @, & and % used then?

I have no really good books on that (would this be a good book?: http://www.exoticindiaart.com/book/details/IDD824/ ) and am in hope that somebody here has some data to backup what is said that can be shown to me, because as one can see I am already confused just by browsing the web.

Thanks, in advance, for the help

2

Welcome to these here forums!!

I believe the percentage sign is merely 0 \ 0. Since the Romans had no arabic numbers it shouln’t be from latin.

3

Thanks.

So you see how confused I am? :slight_smile:
Although I actually read about % being from Latin on one of the websites I visited.

4

perhaps it is PER CENTVM?

Per=through
centum=hundred

0/0 through hundred??? (like 10/0)

5

No, I doubt it, because as you said they had yet to be introduced to Arabic numerals, which also means that they had no real concept of zero.

6

Ancient Latin: A B C D E FH G H I K L M N O P QV R S T V X Z
Classical Latin: A B C D E F G H I (K) L M N O P QV R S T V X (Y) (Z)
Late Latin: A B C D E F G H I J (K) L M N O Qv R S T V X (Y) (Z)

@ is ‘at’ with the ‘t’ circling around the ‘a’
& stood for ‘et’ or ‘and’ but was a late development, e.g. &cetera, almost modern
% is 1 / 100 but is some weird evolved way?
Ligatures were invented with script, Classical Latin had very few, besides Œ and Æ.

By the way, C/C++ programmer here too! Maybe we can do a project together or something. Let me know…

7

@ is ‘at’ with the ‘t’ circling around the ‘a’

Uhm… so you’re sure it’s not “ad”?

8

If you need this info for application development use the TLG Beta-code guide. It covers Greek and Latin (used in PHI, I believe):

http://www.tlg.uci.edu/BCM2004.pdf


For points of historical relevance you will need something on paleography. Thomson or Bischoff.

http://www.georgetown.edu/labyrinth/subjects/mss/paleobib.html


The trouble is that until printing became possible scribal practices were unstable. One could very easily come up with ligatures at any given moment.

9

The History of Mathematical Symbols: Percent.