Hawaiian alphabet Hawaiian alphabet The Hawaiian alphabet (in ) is an alphabet used to write Hawaiian. It was adapted from the English alphabet in the early 19th century by American missionaries to print a bible in the Hawaiian language. In 1778, British explorer James Cook made the first reported Europe voyage to Hawaii. In his report, he wrote the name of the islands as "Owhyhee" or "Owhyee". In 1822, a writing system based on one similar to the new "New Zealand Grammar" was developed and printed by American Protestant missionary Elisha Loomis. The original alphabet included five vowels and twelve consonants: and
Checked and free vowels Checked and free vowels In phonetics and phonology, checked vowels are those that commonly stand in a stressed closed syllable; and free vowels are those that commonly stand in a stressed open syllable. The terms "checked vowel" and "free vowel" originated in English phonetics and phonology. They are seldom used for the description of other languages even though a distinction between vowels that usually have to be followed by a consonant and other vowels is common in most Germanic languages. The terms "checked vowel" and "free vowel" correspond closely to the terms "lax vowel" and "tense vowel" respectively, but many