Vai alphabet

From the Max Planck Institute a test of a theory about letter evolution. There's an old idea that letters rose from writing signs that were pictographic, and then got simplified over time. It seems quite plausible. Not all alphabets are derived from the mideast scripts. In Liberia, back around 1834, Vai tribesmen decided to create their own alphabet. Neither Roman nor Arabic scripts were a good match for their language, and the creators decided to make their own. They're supposed to have been illiterate in any other language, and their characters don't closely resemble anything else.

The alphabet did not die out, but it underwent some changes. The first link includes a video showing three of the Vai letters and how they were drawn over the years. They morph and simplify. The shape and even direction of the letters shows quite a bit of variation--I'm guessing it wasn't perfectly standardized. That would have made it easier to simplify.

"Visual complexity is helpful if you're creating a new writing system. You generate more clues and greater contrasts between signs, which helps illiterate learners. This complexity later gets in the way of efficient reading and reproduction, so it fades away," says Kelly.

As the letters became less complex, Kelly and team found they also became more uniform. This is despite the language never having been adopted for mass production or for bureaucratic needs.