Etruscan alphabet

It dates from about 700 BC, and lists 26 letters corresponding to contemporary forms of the Greek alphabet, including digamma, san and qoppa, but not omega, which had still not been added at the time.

An additional sign 𐌚, in shape similar to the numeral 8, transcribed as F, was present in Lydian, Neo-Etruscan and Italic alphabets of Osco-Umbrian languages such as Oscan, Umbrian, Old Sabine and South Picene (Old Volscian).

In the course of its simplification, the redundant letters showed some tendency towards a semi-syllabary: C, K and Q were predominantly used in the contexts CE, KA, QU.

Soon after, the Etruscan language itself became extinct — so thoroughly that its vocabulary and grammar are still only partly known, in spite of more than a century of intense research.

The Romans, who did have voiced stops in their language, after taking over the archaic Etruscan alphabet in the 7th century BC, continued to use B and D for /b/ and /d/, and used C for both /k/ and /ɡ/, until they invented a separate letter G to distinguish the two sounds.

The Etruscan alphabet apparently was the immediate ancestor for the Latin alphabet,[7] as well as of several Old Italic scripts used in Italy before the rise of Rome, such as those used in the Oscan, Umbrian, Lepontic, Rhaetian (or Raetic), Venetic, Messapian, North and South Picene, and Camunic inscriptions.