Doug Ewell wrote:

>
> Peter T. Daniels <grammatim at worldnet dot att dot net> wrote:
>
> >>> No, non-linear sequence somehow distinguishes it from an alphabet.
> >>
> >> Not true at all:
> >
> > This is wrong in three of four lines:
>
> You know, I just knew that was going to happen. "Boy, Suzanne seems
> confused about the different types of writing systems. I'd like to
> explain them to her, only I'm afraid Peter will pick my explanation to
> bits." I went ahead and pulled some definitions out of someplace near
> my back pocket, and pretty much got what I asked for. None of them came
> from WWS, and I guess I should apologize for that.
>
> >> * An alphabet has symbols for both consonants and vowels, and all are
> >> mandatory.
> >> * An abjad is similar, but symbols for most vowels are optional.
> >
> > The definition of "abjad" does not mention vowels at all; Phoenician
> > never indicated vowels in any way (until Late Punic under Greek
> > influence)
>
> Phoe what? Oh, you mean those alternative glyphs for Hebrew. ;-)

But without even _matres lectionis_.

> How about "symbols for most vowels are optional, or may not be present
> at all"? As opposed to an alphabet, where they must be present.

No. Symbols for vowels are not present at all. Period.

> >> * An abugida has the concept of an inherent vowel, which must be
> >> explicitly overridden if not present.
> >
> > An abugida has the inherent unmarked vowel; overriding is irrelevant
>
> How does one indicate vowels other than A, or consonant clusters, in an
> abugida without overriding them? If they go totally unmarked, aren't we
> really using an abjad?

No, we're providing minimal definitions. The use of vowel marks is
implicit in the definition. The virama is _not_ part of the definition,
since Ethiopic has no such thing.

> >> * A syllabary has a separate symbol for each syllable. The shape of
> >> these symbols may be systematic (Ethiopic) or not (hiragana).
> >
> > Ethiopic is not a syllabary, but an abugida -- the word "abugida" is
> > itself Ethiopic.
>
> OK, I freely admit my error wrt Ethiopic. I'm neither the first nor the
> last to be misled (*) by the fact that it's encoded that way.
> (* semi-gratuitous use of the word)

That what's encoded what way?

> >> Notice that linear and non-linear sequence was not mentioned in this
> >> taxonomy. In fact, there's really no reason why an alphabet couldn't
> >> have reordrant letters, though I can't think of such an alphabet
> >> offhand.
> >
> > Linear vs. non-linear is important to Bill Bright, whose definition of
> > "alphasyllabary" excludes hPags pa because the vowel-letters only
> > follow their consonants.
>
> But is linearity a generally agreed-upon criterion for an alphabet, and
> if so, why? (I guess that's really a question for Dr. Bright.)

Is Korean an alphabet? It's not linear.
--
Peter T. Daniels grammatim@...