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Image for The alphabet  : unraveling the mystery of the alphabet from A to Z


By: Sacks, David

0099436825 / 9780099436829
Stock expected by 13/12/2019
20 cm xiii, 395 p. : ill.
general  Learn More
Reprint. Originally published: U.S.: Broadway; London: Hutchinson, 2003.

There is a story behind each letter of the alphabet.

Why is X the Unknown or shorthand for a kiss? Which letter came last, historically, in the alphabet? (J). How did a few squiggles, invented a thousand years ago to denote sounds of a now vanished Semitic language, survive to become our letters today?

While China and Japan rely mainly on scripts of ideograms, three-quarters of humanity uses some kind of alphabet.

Chinese writing requires 2000 basic symbols (but there's no language barrier), where an alphabet needs typically less than 30.

From A-Z, David Sacks provides answers to the most fascinating questions about the way we talk, write and think in a book which will also be illustrated graphically throughout - not just with variations of individual letters but with maps, charts and general narrative images.


2AB English, CB Language: reference & general, CFF Historical & comparative linguistics

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RRP £7.99
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