Alphabet

[robin dearde]

Why is the alphabet in that order?

[Clanad]

Keeping in mind that all alphabets originated from pre-Babylonian or Cannanite languages, we find that the letters in those languages also had numerical values. This is still true with the Hebrew alphabet. It's probable that the letters appear the way they do because the earlier letter arrangements were also numbers...

[robin dearde]

Good answer - Could be - like W in Hebrew has equivalent number which is six ...

[DaSwede]

The angle counting concept (here) for numerals is fascinating - what if something similar is true for the letters of the alphabet?

[jno]

wow, hadn't come across that one before Swede. For all that, actual Arabs often use different numbers - 0 is five, as I recall, 7 is six and V is seven. So it's neat, but I wonder if it's true?

[DaSwede]

I have sort of wondered myself, jno... Anyone out there who could confirm or deny? The link above has 'edu' in it, which I've been told warrants a certain reliability, but I really don't know... But once you've heard of the angle concept, you never forget it - that's for sure.

[heathfield]

Ask the Romans - it was their alphabet originally, plus some later additional letters. But there was a different alphabet in use in Britain long before the Roman one became universally adopted. See... http://www.yeoldelog.com/feature/ogham.shtml