| Word of the Week--"alphabet" |
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Definition--a set of letters, characters, or symbols arranged in a fixed order by custom.
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Discussion--You probably learned the alphabet at an early age, but it's a hard word for a toddler to say. Instead we often ask youngsters to saying their ABC's, possibly not realizing that the term alphabet is a similar construction from the first two Greek letters of the Greek alphabet. A similar term, abecedarian, has a similar derivation. It means one who studies alphabets and is based on the first four letters of the English alphabet.
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Etymology--alphabet comes from a combination of the first two Greek letters, alpha and beta.
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| The languages below all show the same early Greek roots. |
Foreign Translations
| German and French: | Alphabet (nt) | | Italian and Spansih: | alfabeto | | Dutch: | alfabet (het) | | |
