The Troubled History of Adapting English Spelling to the Latin Alphabet

The History and Development of Written English

English is a West Germanic language that originated from Anglo-Frisian dialects brought to Britain in the mid 5th to 7th centuries AD by Anglo-Saxon settlers. Prior to this, the inhabitants of Britain spoke Celtic languages.

The earliest written forms of English used the runic alphabets of the Anglo-Saxons and Vikings. However, with the Christianization of England, the Latin alphabet was introduced for writing in English. The Latin alphabet, adapted from the alphabet used by the Romans for writing Latin, proved problematic for representing some sounds in English.

One major issue was that English has more vowel sounds than Latin. Old English distinguished between long and short vowels, but the Latin alphabet originally only had five vowel letters - A, E, I, O, U. Various solutions were developed over time, such as using the runic letters thorn (þ) and eth (ð) for "th" sounds and the runic letter wynn for "w." The letters ash (æ) and yogh (ȝ) were also borrowed to represent additional vowel sounds.

The Roman invasion of Britain began in 43 AD under Emperor Claudius. The Romans had previously led two expeditions to Britain in 55 BC and 54 BC, led by Gaius Julius Caesar. However, the first expedition in 55 BC cannot be described as an invasion.

Over the centuries, the spelling of English words became increasingly inconsistent from their pronunciation as pronunciations continued to evolve while spellings remained fixed. For example, the /k/ sound in words like "knee" and "knight" used to be pronounced but became silent over time. Other letter combinations came to be pronounced differently in English than in Latin, like the "gh" in "light."

Attempts at spelling reform to better match the orthography to English phonology were largely unsuccessful. Notable efforts included proposing the introduction of new letters, digraphs, and diacritic marks. English spelling ultimately became conventionalized with mismatched spellings retained for etymological reasons and tradition.

The use of the Latin alphabet for English created difficulties in representing its more diverse consonant and vowel sounds. It also led to the irregular spelling system seen today, though it provided continuity with the written form used for Old English before the Norman Conquest. The alphabet's inconsistencies are the legacy of imposing an ill-fitting foreign orthography on the native phonology of the English language over time. Despite difficulties, the Latin alphabet persists as the standard for written English.