The first symbol on the left is the early Semitic symbol for ox. Two such symbols meant two oxen. It later evolved into the letter A.

The second symbol listed is for house or tent. It represents the floor plan of a nomad's tent. The third is the symbol for door, actually a tent curtain that is moved back and forth to open and close. There were 22 such symbols in the early Semitic written language, although current evidence suggests that ayin has replaced another postulated letter, ghayin, within the last 2,000 years. Thus, ancient Semitic probably had 23 letters. The names of the letters given to the right are the modern Hebrew names, which have changed since ancient times.

Later, the scribes would put several symbols together to relate more information. For example ox, meaning strong, and tent, meaning home, could have been combined to mean father, the strong person in the home or the head of the house. The Egyptians added numbers including the number system base of 10, but without place value (similar to Roman numerals).

As more and more people learned to read and write. Treaties ending wars and establishing trade routes between larger groups of people were written down. It became important to have a common way of writing even though the different tribes spoke different languages. The symbols became letters and were given names. Their meaning was similar in each culture even though they might pronounce the resulting word much differently. All early letters were consonants; vowels came much later.

This arrangement worked very well for running the government and for commerce where the exact meaning was not so important. However, the religious leaders had a problem with knowing the precise pronunciation of a given word. They believed that prayers would not work properly unless the words were pronounced exactly. Remember that prayers are spoken in essentially all religions.

Vowels were added, and the written “letters” were used to represent sounds as well as meaning. Over time, the same letter developed a different sounds in different languages and maybe different meanings as well.

Which reminds me of the joke about a new monk in a religious order. His job was to copy manuscripts. One day he obtained permission to look at the original manuscript describing the admonitions of his order. As he read the original he realized that the original text said. "Thou shall live a life of simplicity" and not "a life of celibacy" as he had been copying.

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Contents copyright 2005 by Dr. A. V. Persson and ParaComp, Inc. All rights reserved.

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