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Latin-script alphabet
A Latin-script alphabet (Latin alphabet or Roman alphabet) is an alphabet that uses letters of the Latin script. The 21-letter archaic Latin alphabet and the 23-letter classical Latin alphabet belong to the oldest of this
group.[1] The 26-letter modern Latin alphabet is the newest of this group.

Encoding
The 26-letter ISO basic Latin alphabet (adopted from the earlier ASCII) contains the 26 letters of the English alphabet. To handle the many other alphabets also derived from the classical Latin one, ISO and other
telecommunications groups "extended" the ISO basic Latin multiple times in the late 20th century. More recent international standards (e.g. Unicode) include those that achieved ISO adoption.

Key types of differences

Apart from alphabets for modern spoken languages, there exist phonetic alphabets and spelling alphabets in use derived from Latin script letters. Historical languages may also have used (or are now studied using) alphabets
that are derived but still distinct from those of classical Latin and their modern forms (if any).

The Latin script was typically slightly altered to function as an alphabet for each different language (or other use), although the main letters are largely the same. A few general classes of alteration cover many particular
cases:

▪ diacritics could be added to existing letters;

▪ two letters could be fused together into ligatures;
▪ additional letters could be inserted; or
▪ pairs or triplets of letters could be treated as units (digraphs and trigraphs).
These often were given a place in the alphabet by defining an alphabetical order or collation sequence, which can vary between languages. Some of the results, especially from just adding diacritics, were not considered
distinct letters for this purpose; for example, the French é and the German ö are not listed separately in their respective alphabet sequences. With some alphabets, some altered letters are considered distinct while others are
not; for instance, in Spanish, ñ (which indicates a unique phoneme) is listed separately, while á, é, í, ó, ú, and ü (which do not; the first five of these indicate a nonstandard stress-accent placement, while the last forces the
pronunciation of a normally-silent letter) are not. Digraphs in some languages may be separately included in the collation sequence (e.g. Hungarian CS, Welsh RH). New letters must be separately included unless collation is
not practised.

Properties

Letter inventory
Coverage of the letters of the ISO basic Latin alphabet can be

▪ complete
▪ partial
and additional letters can be

▪ absent
▪ present, either as
▪ letters with diacritics (e.g. ⟨Å å⟩ in the Danish, Norwegian and Swedish alphabets)

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▪ ligatures (e. g. ⟨Æ æ⟩ in Danish, Norwegian, and Icelandic)

▪ new letter forms (e.g. ⟨Ə ə⟩ in the Azerbaijani alphabet)

Grapheme order
Most alphabets have the letters of the ISO basic Latin alphabet in the same order as that alphabet.

Multigraphs
Some alphabets regard digraphs as distinct letters, e.g. the Spanish alphabet from 1803 to 1994 had CH and LL sorted apart from C and L.

Diacritics and ligatures

Some alphabets sort letters that have diacritics or are ligatures at the end of the alphabet. Examples are the Scandinavian Danish, Norwegian, Swedish, and Finnish alphabets.

New letter forms

Icelandic sorts a new letter form and a ligature at the end, as well as one letter with diacritic, while others with diacritics are sorted behind the corresponding non-diacritic letter.

Grapheme–sound correspondence
The phonetic values of graphemes can differ between alphabets.

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Sound values of letters of the ISO basic Latin alphabet in IPA and various Latin-script languages

Lowercase letter to Latin Alphabet IPA IPA for Classical Latin Alphabet IPA for English Alphabet IPA for French Alphabet [a] IPA for Spanish Alphabet [b] IPA for Malay Orthography IPA for Turkish Alphabet [c]

a a, aː eɪ, æ, ɑː a

b b

c k k, s k, θ ͡ tʃ d͡ ʒ

d d

e e, eː iː, ɛ ə, ɛ e e, ə e

f f

g g g, d͡ ʒ g, ʒ g, x g g, ɟ

h h ∅, h (silent) (silent) h

i i, iː, j aɪ, ɪ i

j (not used) d͡ ʒ ʒ x d͡ ʒ ʒ

k k k, ∅ k, ʔ k, c

l l l, ɫ

m m

n n |ŋ

o o, oː oʊ, ɒ ɔ, o o

p p

q k (not used)

r r ɹ ʁ r ɾ

s s s, z s

t t

u (not used) juː, ʌ, ʊ, uː y u

v u, uː, w v b v

w (not used) w w, v w, b w (not used)

x ks ks, z ks ks, s, x ks (not used)

y y, yː aɪ, iː, ɪ, j i, j j

z z θ~s z

a. The French alphabet also has letters with 5 diacritics: à, â, ç, é, è, ê, ë, î, ï, ô, ù, û, ü, and ÿ, and 2 ligatures, æ and œ
b. The Spanish alphabet has letters with diacritics: á, é, í, ó, ú, and ñ (ñ is considered a separate letter)
c. The Turkish alphabet has additional letters: ç, ğ, ı, ö, ş, ü (all are separate letters)

Names of letters

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Names of letters of the ISO basic Latin alphabet in various Latin-script languages

Lowercase Latin alphabet a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z

Written
Á BÉ CÉ DÉ É EF GÉ HÁ Í KÁ EL EM EN Ó PÉ QV́ ER ES TÉ V́ — IX Í GRAECA ZÉTA
(majus)

Classical Written
ā bē cē dē ē ef gē hā ī kā el em en ō pē qū er es tē ū — ix ī Graeca zēta
Latin (modern)

Pronunciation
aː beː keː deː eː ɛf ɡeː haː iː kaː ɛl ɛm ɛn oː peː kuː ɛr ɛs teː uː — iks iː ˈɡraɪka ˈdzeːta
(IPA)

ef, aitch, zed,

Written a bee cee dee e ɡee i jay kay el em en o pee cue ar ess tee u vee double-u ex wye
eff haitch zee
English
Pronunciation /eɪtʃ/, /zɛd/,
/eɪ/ /bi/ /siː/ /diː/ /iː/ /ɛf/ /dʒiː/ /aɪ/ /dʒeɪ/ /keɪ/ /el/ /em/ /en/ /oʊ/ /piː/ /kjuː/ /ɑːr/ /ɛs/ /tiː/ /juː/ /viː/ /ˈdʌbəl.juː/ /ɛks/ /waɪ/
(IPA) /heɪtʃ/ /ziː/

Written a bé cé dé e effe gé ache i ji ka elle emme enne o pé qu erre esse té u vé double vé ixe i grec zède
French Pronunciation
/a/ /be/ /se/ /de/ /ə/ /ɛf/ /ʒe/ /aʃ/ /i/ /ʒi/ /ka/ /ɛl/ /ɛm/ /ɛn/ /o/ /pe/ /ky/ /ɛʁ/ /ɛs/ /te/ /y/ /ve/ /dubləve/ /iks/ /iɡʁɛk/ /zed/
(IPA)

uve,
be, uve
ve,
be doble, ve
ve ye, i
Spanish[2] a larga, ce de e efe ge hache i jota ka ele eme ene o pe cu erre ese te u doble, equis zeta
corta, griega
be doble ve,
ve
alta doble u
baja

Written a bé cé dé é éf gé ha i jé ka él ém én o pé ki ér és té u vé wé éks yé zét

Malay
(Indonesia) Pronunciation /ve/,
/a/ /be/ /t͡ ʃe/ /de/ /e/ /ef/ /ge/ /ha/ /i/ /d͡ ʒe/ /ka/ /el/ /em/ /en/ /o/ /pe/ /ki/ /er/ /es/ /te/ /u/ /we/ /eks/ /je/ /zet/
(IPA) /fe/

Malay Written e bi si di i éf ji héc ay jé ké él ém én o pi kiu ar és ti yu vi dabel yu éks way zet

(Malaysia,
Brunei and Pronunciation /qiu/, /ar/,
/e/ /bi/ /si/ /di/ /i/ /ef/ /d͡ ʒi/ /het͡ ʃ/ /i/ /d͡ ʒe/ /ke/ /el/ /em/ /en/ /o/ /pe/ /es/ /ti/ /ju/ /vi/ /dabəlˈju/ /eks/ /wai̯ / /zed/
Singapore) (IPA) /qju/ /aː/

he, ke, kû,

Written a be ce de e fe ge i je le me ne o pe re se te u ve çift ve iks ye ze
ha ka kü
Turkish
Pronunciation /heː/, /ceː/, /cuː/,
/aː/ /beː/ /d͡ ʒeː/ /deː/ /eː/ /feː/ /ɟeː/ /iː/ /ʒeː/ /leː/ /meː/ /neː/ /oː/ /peː/ /ɾeː/ /seː/ /teː/ /uː/ /veː/ /t͡ ʃift veː/ /ics/ /jeː/ /zeː/
(IPA) /haː/ /kaː/ /cyː/

References
1. "Latin alphabet | Definition, Description, History, & Facts" (https://www.britannica.com/topic/Latin-alphabet). Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved January 8, 2021.
2. Ortografía de la lengua española (2010). Real Academia Española y Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española. p. 63.

External links
▪ Appendix:Latin script/alphabets at Wiktionary (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Appendix:Latin_script/alphabets)

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