Presented by Ronit Shcori Kk Presented by Ronit Shcori

Around 2000 B. C. the world's first alphabet was invented Around 2000 B.C. the world's first alphabet was invented. The Egyptian hand symbol changed to an upright hand which means "kaph" in the Semitic system.

1000 B.C. - In the Phoenician alphabet. - Written to the left . - Kk is similar to kaph ((כּ. - Kaph and koph became kappa and qoppa. - Nowadays there is only kappa as the Greek K.

700 B.C. - the Etruscans adopted kappa and qoppa. 600 B.C. – the Romans copied the Etruscans alphabet. k became redundant. By 300 B.C. - K was almost ignored. Even in loan words from Greek (Kurpus became Cyprus, though they pronounced the C /k/).

Nevertheless, K survived more than 1000 years in the Roman alphabet (600 B.C. -500). 100 – Mature Kk Greek Kappa Etruscan K Phoenician kaph Proto-Semitic K Egyptian hieroglyph D

500 – In the beginning of the Middle Ages, there was need for K. The arrival of many French words required K to be used in contexts where C would have a plosive sound. Thus, Old English cyning became king

Since the 1600's K favored to C in translating foreign words (kangaroo, koala, karate, karaoke, kiosk, ketchup, and many more). Nowadays K is favored over C in Northern European languages and Eastern European languages that use the Roman alphabet (Germanic and some Slavic tongues, Finish and Hungarian). For example in German: Katalog, Dokument, Effektiv.

In Modern English we use K before E, I, or Y instead of C. Before other vowels we also use it, but less (kangaroo). It is usually not doubled, thus there is ck at the end of short vowel words (except for loan words like trekking and pukka). It is sometimes silent (knee, know). It is used for foreign names (Khrushchev). It is used as non-standard spelling There are some usage variations: disk/disc US check / UK cheque US skeptic / UK sceptic