Peter_Constable@... wrote:

>
> On 11/09/2001 08:23:17 AM Michael Everson wrote:
>
> >Daniels means, I think that the alphabetic concept can be called "THE
> >alphabet". This is different from how we think of it in encoding.
>
> But the point is "alphabet" is the name for a class in a classification
> system for "writing systems" (B&D's term, what you and I would, I think,
> call scripts). The classification system is not described as being for
> "families of writing systems" but "writing systems". Moreover, it would be
> impossible to classify families of writing systems, as Marco (I think)
> pointed out earlier: they have evolved. Latin is part of the same family
> as Linear B. If we're going to classify families, then perhaps there are
> *no* alphabets. That's just plain silly.

Whoa ... you have a theory about Linear B that puts it in the same
family with the Latin alphabet??
--
Peter T. Daniels grammatim@...