How did the Romans come to adopt the Greek alphabet?

Answer 1

The Latin and other Italic peoples adopted the Greek alphabet when the Greeks established colonies (settlements) in southern Italy in the 8th century BC. The arrival of the Greeks had a civilising impact on all the Italic peoples they came in contact with. These peoples realised the usefulness of the Greek alphabet for the development of their written languages. Some different characters were created as adaptation to the phonetics (sounds) of their languages which differed from that of the Greeks.

Archaic Latin, like all Old Italic alphabets in Italy (Etruscan, Faliscan, Oscan, Umbrian, Picene, Messapic and Venetic) is thought to have adopted the Cumae alphabet. Cumae was the northernmost Greek settlement in Italy. This alphabet in its turn was a variation of the Western Greek alphabet, one of the three archaic Greek alphabets (the other two were the Cretese and the Ionic). The Western one originated from the island of Euoboea, Boeotia and much of the Peloponnese. These were areas many of the Greek settlers in Italy came from.

It is thought that archaic Latin adopted 21 of the 29 Etruscan letters. The Latin alphabet evolved into what has been called classical Latin alphabet. This adopted two more Greek letters.

Answer 2

Yes. The Greeks established settlements in southernItalyin the 7th and 6th centuries. Because they were a more advanced civilisation, they had aprofoundimpacton all the Italic peoples they came into contact with. All Italic peoples adopted and adapted the westernGreekalphabet to develop theirwrittenlanguages. TheLatins, theEtruscansand other peoples of centralItalyadopted and adapted the Cumaneanvariantof the westernGreekalphabet. This was a variant used in theGreekcity of Cumae, which was near present dayNaples.

Answer 3

Greek colonists (settlers) migrated to southern Italy in the from the late 8th century to the 6th century BC. They were a more advanced civilisation and they had a big impact on all the Italic peoples they came into contact with. All the Italic peoples, including the Latins (the Romans were Latins) adopted and adapted the western Greek alphabet to develop their written languages.