The Greek alphabet

The Greek alphabet has 24 letters. Some time ago it had some other letters that were reduced. These letters were got by this alphabet from the Phoenicians where they represented the sounds characteristic for the Semiotic languages. The classical Greek uses these letters only in numbers (determine the number meaning). This alphabet was used by many countries together with Cyrillic alphabet and Arab writing. Some letters were borrowed by other alphabets.

Sometimes the Greek alphabet gets additional letters that are not proper for it to reflect the words of other languages when the letters of Greek alphabet are not able to transmit the pronunciation. With the lapse of time such situation provoked the formation of separate alphabets. Cyrillic one was formed in such way.

During different times this alphabet also had the sound J but because of different reasons people didn't give it its letter. And only in 19th century when scientists turned to the reconstruction of the ancient Greek alphabet they saw the necessity to determine this sound somehow because this sound influenced the meaning of some words.

The Greek alphabet was the first alphabet that was the base for the development and spread of other alphabets. Moreover it was partially borrowed from Phoenician's alphabet that didn't have the vowel sounds that were added by Greeks.