Latin Alphabet

The Latin alphabet, or the Roman alphabet, is the collection of letters the ancient Romans originally used to write the Latin language.

The Latin alphabet was adapted from the Etruscan alphabet during the 7th century BC. Latin was originally written either right to left, left to right, or alternated between the two. However, by the 5th or 4th century BC, it was written from left to right.

During the Middle Ages, it was used to write Romance, Celtic, Germanic, Baltic, and Slavic languages. During the age of colonialism, the Latin script came into use for writing American, Australian, African, and other languages. It is currently the official script in 131 sovereign states, including the United States, and is the co-official script in 12 sovereign states and the European Union.

There are 26 characters in the Latin alphabet. There are five vowels (a, e, I, o, and u) and 21 consonants. Each letter has both capital and lowercase versions.