1. What is Orthography?
The science and art of the Letters of
a language.
2. Of what does Orthography treat?
The nature and power of letters, and correct
spelling.
3. From what is the word Orthography
derived?
Two Greek words, signifying “To
write right.”
4. What is a Letter?
A character used to represent an elementary
sound, or combination
of
sounds.
5. What is an Alphabet of a Language?
A complete list of its letters.
6. What is the origin of the word Alphabet?
It is derived from the first two letters
of the Greek Alphabet:
Alpha
and Beta.
7. Where did the Alphabet originate?
The English comes from the Greek, which
was brought by Cadmus from
Phoenicia,
about the year 1490 B.C.
8. What was the first Alphabet ever
used?
The Hebrew.
9 How many letters were in the original
Alphabet?
Sixteen.
10. Where did the other letters originate?
They have been added since the time of
Cadmus, as their use became
necessary.
11. What was the last letter added
to the English Alphabet?
W.
12. Why was it called W?
On account of it being composed of two
u’s, or a double u.
13. How many letters in the English
Alphabet?
Twenty-six.
14. How many in the Latin Alphabet?
Twenty-five.
15. What is the difference between
the Latin Alphabet and the
English?
The Latin omits the letter W.
16. What Alphabet has the greatest
number of letters?
The Chinese.
17. How many letters in the Chinese
Alphabet?
Over two hundred.
18. What is a Perfect Alphabet?
One which contains the same number of
letters that it has
elementary
sounds.
19. Is the English a perfect Alphabet?
It is not.
20. How many Elementary sounds in the
English Language?
About forty-three.
21. What is an Imperfect Alphabet?
One in which the number of sounds exceeds
the number of letters.
22. What is an Equivocal Alphabet?
An Imperfect one.
23. What is an Unequivocal Alphabet?
Same as Perfect.
24. Is the English Alphabet Equivocal
or Unequivocal?
Equivocal.
25. What is a Univocal Alphabet?
One that has a separate character for
each elementary sound.
26. What is an Alphabetic Language?
A language in which the characters represent
separate articulate
sounds.
27. What is a Phonetic Alphabet?
One in which there is a separate character
for each elementary
sound.
