Note: Automatic generated script. Mostly correct but not entirely.

So fans of this channel will already . know that i'm a big fan of reading and . being a fan of reading means that i've . got a special place in my heart for . letters. you remember letters right they're the . building blocks of words you've learned . him in school all 26 of them if you're . an english speaker like me . these 26 letters are like you know a big . deal they're the foundation for the . communication of ideas along with the . ten basic numbers these relatively . simple and fundamental symbols are . routinely combined to express . information and while the occasional . i guess 280 character tweet can cause us . to somewhat lose faith in the future of . humanity without these characters things . would be pretty awful see these 26 . letters they're dependable once you . learn them you rely on them they're . always there and you can count on them . to never change right well not quite . because as you're gonna learn today the . alphabet is you know it wasn't always . this way so here are 10 letters we . dropped from the alphabet that's right . 10 letters that everybody used to know . about news but have since been purged . from history i know you're still reeling . from this concept i'd be dumbfounded too . if i had just learned that my entire . life was a war but not to worry maybe by . the end of this you'll have found a new . outlook on existence itself but we're . just getting started down the rabbit . hole for now so strap in let's start . things off easy with letter number 1 the . long s now some of you have probably . already run into the long ass while . perusing old books or walking around . colonial williamsburg during your annual. family vacation probably happened like . this you came across a word that should . have had an s in it but instead you . found this funky-looking f thing don't . worry the publishers of paradise lost. weren't dumb enough to have a typo on . the front cover of their book this is . the long s you're probably thinking ok . ok i get it they just used this instead . of a lowercase s back then but that's . not entirely true . the modern lowercase s was around even. back then and used just as often as its . long counterpart in fact there was a. ridiculously overly complicated set of. rules to determine which s to use and . where basically you use a long s . whenever you've got a word that uses a . single s or when a word uses two s's at . once in which case the long s is used as . the first s and then you use the regular . s as the second s but only if that s is . at the beginning or in the middle of the . in question claire's mud right everybody . else eventually thought so because the . long ass got the boot at the start of . the 19th century his letters got a bit . modernized this purely stylistic . substitute was seen as unnecessarily. complicated so it becomes letter number. one on our death list letter number two . ampersand now okay this one is still . used occasionally in fact you probably . already know what it means ampersand is . a letter that means and you're probably . thinking austin ampersand is a symbol . not a letter oakland travel food as . recently as two centuries ago ampersand. was considered the 27th letter of the . alphabet often just called and so . instead of singing daddy u x y z little . latin speaking kids would sing daddy u x . y z and per se and that ending . eventually got strung together by. english speakers and became ampersand . with the invention of text messaging and . twitter character limits ampersand has . had a bit of a renaissance in recent . years but i doubt it'll get added back . as letter 27 in english textbooks . anytime soon number three thorn hey . here's a question you ever drive by some . dive downtown and it's got a sign. outside that says ye old brick tavern or . something like that i actually see it . quite a lot my favorite in my hometown . of springfield missouri is this little. car wash that's affectionately called. the old buggy bath buggy anyway it might . interest you to know that that why on ye . isn't actually a y at all but was a . derivative of our third letter thorn in . a nutshell thorn was a letter meant to . represent th if you ask me it looks . pretty sweet but german and italian . printers didn't have that symbol on . their type sets so eventually the symbol . was replaced with a funny-looking y . though it still held its original . pronunciation so even though this looks . like the old buggy bath back then they . just pronounced it as well yeah the old . buggy bath because the y wasn't a y it . was a thorn sorry if that like you know . burst your historic bubble if you . thought otherwise . number four that this is basically just . a remix of the letter thorn you just . draw a line through the top like . ampersand this letter was used as. shorthand this time for the word that it . actually caught on fairly quickly and . lasted even longer than the original . letter thor. did it was probably most widely used in . religious writings so if you happen to . have some old english bible commentaries. lying around just crack them open you'll . be sure to find it number 5 f f is a . little thorne wannabe i am not a fan . look at its stupid face it's just a d . with a line through it. get your own gag you poser so long story . short f was also used as a symbol for th . but a different kind of th what do you . mean different kind th sounds the same . on everything oh yeah check this out. thoughtful thing this them and your the . thunderous difference one of them is . something called a voiceless dental . fricative the other is called a voiced . dental fricative oh yeah . i have words number 6 ash this thing is . basically an a and e smashed together . you might see it occasionally in words . like ether and yawn if you're reading a . sci-fi or fantasy novel that wants to . look cool in old english ash represented . to sound somewhere between a and e. essentially like you would pronounce the . a and cat or there abouts as you might . imagine having a letter meant to. represent a sound somewhere between two . other sounds is not very definitive so . ash fell out of common use though it's . still around in lots of other dialects . but i'm sure you already knew that . because you are way smarter than me . number seven ethyl the letter that . everyone's great-aunt is named after . ethyl looks a bit like our previous . letter and likewise has a lot to do with . pronunciation specifically words with a . long e so we're talking subpoena fetus . and the such like the pronunciation in. question will depend if it is a latin . word or a greek word and if you want to . know how to find out the language of . origin then simply shoot a friend. request over to the closest script . spelling bee judge and i'm sure that . they would be more than happy to tell . you number eight win so this one's . pretty cool . it's a letter that basically came in . second when the english opened up the . phone lines for public voting you might . not know it but there was a time when . english scribes didn't actually have a . letter to represent the wolf sound see . english gets a lot of its alphabet from . latin and the sound would doesn't really . get a lot of airtime in that circle . english writers had to figure out a way . to make one they started by just putting . two used together but lots of scribes . really hated that design . it looked odd and it took too long to . write out so the letter winn was . proposed . when was used for a bit and scribes . really liked it but for whatever reason. folks really couldn't break the habit of . just using those to use eventually the . court of public opinion weighed in and . the to use went out becoming the de . facto letter that we know today as w . well i bet you never knew that number 9 . my personal favorite yeah okay it's . beautiful beautiful i love that design . we should use it for something so yaak . was used for that joy's that you make in . the back of your throat when you say . names like bach or the loch ness monster . sadly the confusion that it caused with . the letter 3 ultimately doomed it from . becoming permanent it was quickly . abandoned and replaced with the gh combo . interestingly the sound that it . indicates has sadly become silent in . english like though or daughter i'd . personally like to see y'all make a . comeback but as long as that pesky . number 3 keeps using the same symbol . it'll likely never happen and finally . number 10 egg our last letter is a great . example of a letter that should work . great in theory but creates too many . problems in practice egg was created by . a dude named alexander gill the elder in . 1619 he was an english scholar and . spelling reformer which evidently was a . viable career choice in the 17th century. gill was big on egg he wanted it to . replace the letter combination in g and . tried to soft open it in many of his . writings so king would look like this . thing would look like this singing would . look like this it don't make sense . sort of but g was really popular in . letter land at the time and printers . really struggled to implement gills . design readers had a hard time . differentiating em from in especially if . the ink started to fade and it wasn't . too long before the letter faded from . use as well but hey you know what . there's nothing stopping you from using . it if you want the letters actually . still around on international phonetic . alphabet keyboards just throwing that. out there in fact there's nothing . stopping you from bringing any of these . puppies back on the scene all it'll take . is stubborn determination and the . convincing of an entire civilization so. why not get started today by sharing . this video with everybody on your . friends list or social media feed let . everybody know that . you're an intellectual guy because you. watch intellectual videos just like this . share this video with 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