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Old 12th January 2017, 07:31 PM   #19
fernando
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Location: Portugal
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Jim McDougall
...That aside, I was relying on the early convention in written language of the times which typically used I for J. However while I know this applied in England, I am not sure how used in Europe...
If i well understand your question, yes, the I for a J was practiced all over, as enough to say it was a Latin trick.
Letter J was initially an alternative version to the letter I, and was the last one to be added to the Classic Latin Alphabet. The distinction between both letters became evident as from the middle ages. Pedro de la Ramée (1515–1572) was the first to explicitly distinguish both, representing different sounds... bla, bla, bla .
Many a thing kept being written with a I for a J, when Latin script was used, namely in coins, like this beautiful XVIII century Portuguese gold piece.


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