Heptal
Heptal is an alternative alphabet for English created by Katie Molnar.
Its name (derived from the Greek word for "seven") refers both to the fact
that it was originally designed to be rendered on seven segment displays
and to the fact that it took seven years to develop it to its present,
stable state. Katie started designing it in high school in 2003 and
primarily uses it for personal notes. Since then, it has gone through
several major revisions, including replacing letters that were too ambiguous,
adding numerals, and moving from a block script to a connected script
and finally to the current unconnected script.
Notable features
- Type of writing system: alphabet
- Direction of writing: while it is usually written left-to-right,
Heptal can be written right-to-left thanks to the special "start of
sentence" marker placed at the baseline of the text. When it is written
right-to-left, the characters themselves should also be mirrored. (In
essence, Heptal formally supports mirror writing.)
- The symbol for "S" has distinct initial, medial, and final forms.
- Several characters' shapes were inspired by the shape of the corresponding Latin letter.
- Characters that are similar phonetically tend to be similar visually.
Likewise, a given alteration in character shape generally corresponds to
the same phonetic shift across different characters.
- All the vowels have a small stroke above them to distinguish them
from consonants that are otherwise identical. Similarly, the numerals
all have the same small strokes under them that distinguish them (although
6 and 7 would be distinct even without the underline).
Heptal alphabet
Sample Text
Translation
All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed
with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.
(Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights)
A font for Heptal is available from:
http://fontstruct.com/fontstructions/show/436141
Also by Katie Molnar
Narkhokul
Other conscructed scripts for English
Learn Chinese Characters with the Omniglot Chinese app
