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
Osage alphabet or the links below. The 2006 vowels are as follows: It is not clear which vowel the "ə" is, as it is not phonemic in Osage, but it may appear nasalised (not shown). The "a" comes from Latin (without the crossbar, as in the NΛSΛ logo), "e" from Latin (cursive; the English letter "a" is pronounced rather like Osage "e"). The source for "i" is obscure, though Latin does appear in the diphthong "ai". The 2006 consonants are as follows: The alphabet does not distinguish the ejective, fortis and lenis series of obstruents. The aspirate series are written as sequences