- Romic alphabet
Infobox Writing system
name = Romic alphabet
type = Alphabet
time = 19th century
languages = Proposed for English
creator = Henry Sweet
children = Influenced the originalInternational Phonetic Alphabet The Romic Alphabet, sometimes known as the Romic Reform, is a phonetic alphabet proposed byHenry Sweet . It is the direct ancestor of the modernInternational Phonetic Alphabet . The alphabet differs from previously proposedspelling reform s by favoring a return to the sound values of the Roman (and consequently Old English) alphabet instead of retaining irregular elements of modern English. Every sound had a dedicated symbol, and every symbol represented a single sound. There were no capital letters.The vowels had their English "short" sounds when written singly, and their "long" (Latinate) sounds when doubled:
Sweet proposed creating new letters by rotating existing letters, and in this way no new type would need to be cast:
The IPA letter IPA|<ɔ> acquired its modern pronunciation and first use with this alphabet. He resurrected two Anglo-Saxon letters, ash <æ> and
eth <ð>, and borrowed the Greek lettertheta <θ>, which had the pronunciations they retain in the IPA. He usedfor IPA|/ŋ/ and
for IPA|/tʃ/. External links
* [http://victorian.fortunecity.com/vangogh/555/Spell/sweet-short.html Henry Sweet's Romic alphabet reform]
Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.
