> Have just consulted White's Latin dictionary, and learn that 'u' and 'v'
> were both derived from the Greek letter upsilon, although by the time they
> reached the Latin language they were clearly differentiated into vowel and
> consonant respectively.
Neat, Joanna.
I'd always assumed the u-is-a-vowel, v-is-a-consonant was a late arrival.
More fool me.
:-(
This suggests that Renaissance English *printing* (no paleographer, me) was
running backwards, a Red Queen's Race.
My sense still is that the u/v distinction in mid 16th / early 17th C
England was both simply orthographic (like, it had sod all to do with how
the letters were actually pronounced) and positional.
And dropped-out by about 1700.
D'uh!!!
Anyone able to give a definitive answer on this, and thus prevent Joanna and
me beating ourselves to death with alternate dictionaries?
<g>
Robin
There was a world,
there was a world, my dear,
where u and y met and ...
... the hand that rocked the cradle, afore it kicked the bucket
chortled sweetly
endlessly rocking:
VEE!!!
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