# .font: font.text_2
2023-01-25 23:37 dustin  
# .font: font.text_1
given how similar the letter "f" looks compared to its neighbor "e", ^ had almost been certain that both letters share a common history. also, the fact that there's no "f" equivalent in the greek alphabet made ^ think that perhaps "f" was created out of "e". however, now ^ sees that all these clues were misleading. in fact, "e" is only "f"'s step sis, while its true it has a completely different, unexpected and far-distant sibling in the alphabet!  
  
history of the letter "f":  
  
there's a lot to say about this letter, so i split it into two aspects, hoping that it will be clearer to read this way!  
  
1. shape and alphabetical position:  
  
| the egyptian / proto-sinaitic origin was likely a glyph for a club or hook (see the first shape where ^ starts).  
  
| the phoenicians adapted this glyph, called it "waw" (hook) and made it the sixth letter of their alphabet. they deleted the topmost part of the glyph, so it looked now like a rounded "y" (see second shape).  
  
| now it starts to get interesting: the greeks adapted the "waw" letter twice into their alphabet! first, they gave the letter a more angular shape and called this letter "ypsilon" (see third shape). then, they rotated the top part of the "ypsilon" by 90 degrees (see fourth shape) and made another letter out of it. this one reminded the greeks much of their third letter "gamma" but somewhat doubled. this inspired them to call their new letter "digamma"! now they kept "digamma" at sixth position of their alphabet (like the phoenicians had it), while the "ypsilon" was moved to the end of their alphabet as it was back then. (the last four letters of the modern greek alphabet, phi, chi, psi and omega, did not yet exist!) why didn't they put "ypsilon" next to "digamma" instead? well, this would have changed the numerical position of all following letters, which would be problematic because their letters were also number symbols!  
  
so that's the story of the sisters "f" and "y" and how they were seperated directly after their "births"! who would have expected these letters to be related...? :d  
  
| let's focus on the "digamma" for now: on its further way via the etruscians to the romans, the form of the letter was still slightly modified until it became our familiar "f" shape (see last shape in the cave).  
  
2. phonetic history (from "water" to "fire"!) :d  
  
| for the egyptians and the phoenicians, the glyph and the letter "waw" were spoken [w] as in "water".  
  
| as mentioned before in this series, the greeks were the first who wanted own letters for vowels. their language used the [w] sound, but they also wanted a letter for the related vowel [u] (spoken like the "ou" in "you"). this was the very reason why they made all the effort and split the phoenician "waw" into two letters! so they connected the "digamma" to the [w] sound, while the "ypsilon" should be spoken [u]!  
  
| when the etruscians adapted the greek alphabet later on, they kept the [w] sound for their "digamma" version. however, their language also had the [f] sound (as in "firefly")  which the greeks had not used at that time. . so the etruscians had not letter for [f], so they invented the digraph "fh" which should be spoken as [f].  
  
| finally, the romans made the last little adaption. they invented the new letter "v" for the [w] sound, so they did not need the letter "digamma" / "f" for that sound anymore. so "f" was finally free to represent the [f] sound; the etruscian digraph "fh" was abandoned. voila - "f" was finally spoken like [f] in "fire"! :d   
  
notes about the modern greek alphabet:  
Α you might wonder where the "digamma" has gone because it's no longer there in the greek alphabet. the answer is that the greek language has a lot of phonetic changes from ancient to modern, and one of them being that the [w] sound was no longer needed, so the connected "digamma" letter was just deleted from the alphabet (but kept as numerical symbol).  
Α while the ancient greeks did not know the [f] sound, the modern ones do, and they have the letter "phi" for it, which is transliterated as "ph" (for example, in "physics" or "philosophy").  
  
for puzzle fans:  
if you look at the cave map, you might wonder if something isn't kind of missing. doesn't it look incomplete if the bottom half is full of letter shapes while the upper half still has the random ||| from bd1-f? well, my answer is yes, and this cave will return later in the series with more letter shapes in the upper half! can you guess what will there be in the upper half? don't just look it up, but think about it using the following clues:  
Α the info given in this comment is quite instructive, above all the phonetic history of "f"!  
Α also, have a look at the modern greek alphabet, especially the position of the letter "ypsilon"!  
answers, of course, will be given later in this series...! :d  
  
cave difficulty: 3/10

# .font: font.text_2
2023-01-25 23:40 dustin  
# .font: font.text_1
link to the modern greek alphabet ("for puzzle fans"):  
<a href="https://boulderdash.krissz.hu/images/caves/OibRhTJYXoxJ.png?type=20230113003958" target="external">https://boulderdash.krissz.hu/images/caves/OibRhTJYXoxJ.png?type=20230113003958</a>