Editing Fingerspelling (section)

===Latin manual alphabet===

Some writers have suggested that the body and hands were used to represent alphabets in Greek, Roman, Egyptian and Assyrian antiquity.<ref>Barrois, J. (1850). ''Dactylologie et langage primitif.'' Paris 1850; Firmin Didot freres.</ref> Certainly, "[[finger calculus]]" systems were widespread, and capable of representing numbers up to 1024;<ref>Alföldi-Rosenbaum, E. (1971). ''The finger calculus in antiquity and in the Middle Ages: Studies on Roman game counters'' part I. Friihmiltelalterliche Studien, 6, 1-9.<br>See also: Menninger, K. (1958). ''Number words and number symbols: A cultural history of numbers.'' Translated by Paul Broneer. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1969. (p. 201). Originally published as Zahlwort und Ziffer (Gottingen: Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht).</ref> they are still in use today in parts of the Middle East. The practice of substituting letters for numbers and vice versa, known as [[gematria]], was also common, and it is possible that the two practices were combined to produce a finger calculus alphabet. The earliest known manual alphabet, described by the [[Benedictine]] monk [[Bede]] in 8th century [[Northumbria]], did just that.<ref>[[Bede]]. (AD 710). ''De Computo vel Loguela per Gestum Digitorum'' ("Of counting or speaking with the fingers"), preface to ''De temporum ratione'' ("On the reckoning of time"). Illustrated in AD 1140, National Library, Madrid.</ref> While the usual purpose of the Latin and Greek finger alphabets described by Bede is unknown, they were unlikely to have been used by deaf people for communication — even though Bede lost his own hearing later in life. Historian Lois Bragg concludes that these alphabets were "only a bookish game."<ref>Bragg, Lois (1997). ''Visual-Kinetic Communication in Europe Before 1600: A Survey of Sign Lexicons and Finger Alphabets Prior to the Rise of Deaf Education''. Journal of Deaf Studies and Deaf Education 2:1 Winter 1997</ref>

[[File:Bede finger alphabet.jpg|thumb|right|1494 illustration of a finger alphabet and counting system originally described by [[Bede]] in 710. The [[Greek alphabet]] is represented, with three additional letters making a total of 27, by the first three columns of numbers. The first two columns are produced on the left hand, and the next two columns on the right. [[Luca Pacioli]] modified the finger alphabet to the form shown above, where the handshapes for 1 and 10 on the left hand correspond to the 100s and 1000s on the right.<ref>Richter Sherman, C. (2000). ''Writing on Hands: Memory and Knowledge in Early Modern Europe.'' The Trout Gallery: Pennsylvania. p.168-9</ref>]]

Beginning with [[Robert Alexander Stewart Macalister|R. A. S. Macalister]] in 1938,<ref>Macalister, R. A. S. (1928). ''The Archaeology of Ireland.'' London: Meuthen</ref> several writers have speculated that the 5th century Irish [[Ogham]] script, with its [[quinary]] alphabet system, was derived from a finger alphabet that predates even Bede.<ref>See, for example: [[Robert Graves|Graves, Robert]], (1948). ''[[The White Goddess]]''.</ref>

European monks from at least the time of Bede have made use of forms of [[manual communication]], including alphabetic gestures, for a number of reasons: communication among the monastery while observing [[vow of silence|vows of silence]], administering to the ill, and as [[mnemonic]] devices. They also may have been used as [[cipher]]s for discreet or secret communication.  Clear antecedents of many of the manual alphabets in use today can be seen from the 16th century in books published by friars in Spain and Italy.<ref>Cosma-Rossellios R.P.F. (1579) "Thesavrvs Artificiosae Memoriae", Venice.<br>Fray Melchor de Yebra, (1593) ''Refugium Infirmorum''</ref> From the same time, monks such as the Benedictine [[Friar|Fray]] [[Pedro Ponce de León]] began tutoring deaf children of wealthy patrons — in some places, literacy was a requirement for legal recognition as an heir — and the manual alphabets found a new purpose.<ref>Plann, Susan. (1997). ''A Silent Minority: Deaf Education in Spain, 1550-1835.'' Berkeley: University of California Press.</ref>  They were originally part of the earliest known Mouth Hand Systems. The first book on deaf education, published in 1620 by [[Juan Pablo Bonet]] in Madrid, included a detailed account of the use of a manual alphabet to teach deaf students to read and speak.<ref>Juan Pablo Bonet (1620). ''Reducción de las letras y Arte para enseñar á hablar los Mudos'' ("The Adaptation of Letters and Art of Teaching Mutes to Speak"). Published by Francisco Abarca de Angulo, Madrid.</ref>

This alphabet was adopted by the [[Charles-Michel de l'Épée|Abbé de l'Épée]]'s deaf school in Paris in the 18th century and then spread to deaf communities around the world in the 19th and 20th centuries via educators who had learned it in Paris. Over time variations have emerged, brought about by the natural [[Sound change|phonetic changes]] that have occurred over time, adaptations for local written forms with special characters or [[diacritic]]s (which are sometimes represented with the other hand) and avoidance of handshapes considered [[Obscene gesture|obscene]] in some cultures.

Meanwhile, in Britain, manual alphabets were also in use for a number of purposes, such as secret communication,<ref>Wilkins, John (1641). ''Mercury, the Swift and Silent Messenger''. The book is a work on cryptography, and fingerspelling was referred to as one method of "secret discoursing, by signes and gestures".  Wilkins gave an example of such a system: "Let the tops of the fingers signifie the five vowels; the middle parts, the first five consonants; the bottomes of them, the five next consonants; the spaces betwixt the fingers the foure next.  One finger laid on the side of the hand may signifie T.  Two fingers V the consonant; Three W.  The little finger crossed X.  The wrist Y.  The middle of the hand Z." (1641:116-117)</ref> public speaking, or used for communication by deaf people.<ref>John Bulwer's "Chirologia: or the natural language of the hand.", published in 1644, London, mentions that alphabets are in use by Deaf people, although Bulwer presents a different system which is focused on public speaking.</ref> In 1648, [[John Bulwer]] described "Master Babington", a deaf man proficient in the use of a manual alphabet, "contryved on the joynts of his fingers", whose wife could converse with him easily, even in the dark through the use of [[tactile signing]].<ref>Bulwer, J. (1648) ''Philocopus", or "the Deaf and Dumbe Mans Friend'', London: Humphrey and Moseley.</ref> In 1680, [[George Dalgarno]] published ''Didascalocophus, or, The deaf and dumb mans tutor'',<ref>Dalgarno, George. ''Didascalocophus, or, The deaf and dumb mans tutor''. Oxford: Halton, 1680.</ref> in which he presented his own method of deaf education, including an arthropological alphabet. Charles de La Fin published a book in 1692 describing an alphabetic system where pointing to a body part represented the first letter of the part (e.g. Brow=B), and vowels were located on the fingertips as with the other British systems.<ref>Charles de La Fin (1692). ''Sermo mirabilis, or, The silent language whereby one may learn ... how to impart his mind to his friend, in any language ... being a wonderful art kept secret for several ages in Padua, and now published only to the wise and prudent ...'' London, Printed for Tho. Salusbury... and sold by Randal Taylor... 1692. {{OCLC|27245872}}</ref> He described codes for both English and Latin.

The [[vowel]]s of these early British manual alphabets, across the tips of the fingers, have survived in the contemporary alphabets used in [[British Sign Language]], Auslan and New Zealand Sign Language.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://mediacentral.ucl.ac.uk/Play/8401|title = DCAL History of BSL 17 Charles de la Fin or la Fin}}</ref> The earliest known printed pictures of consonants of the modern [[two-handed alphabet]] appeared in 1698 with ''Digiti Lingua'', a pamphlet by an anonymous author who was himself unable to speak.<ref>Moser H.M., O'Neill J.J., Oyer H.J., Wolfe S.M., Abernathy E.A., and Schowe, B.M. "Historical Aspects of Manual Communication" ''Journal of Speech and Hearing Disorders'' '''25''' (1960) 145-151.</ref><ref>
Hay, A. and Lee, R. ''A Pictorial History of the evolution of the British Manual Alphabet'' (British Deaf History Society Publications: Middlesex, 2004)</ref>  He suggested that the manual alphabet could also be used by mutes, for silence and secrecy, or purely for entertainment. Nine of its letters can be traced to earlier alphabets, and 17 letters of the modern two-handed alphabet can be found among the two sets of 26 handshapes depicted.