But an also occurs though less frequently now than formerly. A similar fronting of this sound took place in the Ionic-Attic dialects of Greek, where sounds derive from the a-sound and represented in other dialects by a are represented by η. Sound 3 represents a stage in the development of a on its way from 1 to 4 which was arrested at this point when the sound was followed by r.
Graphic designers refer to the Italic and Roman forms as single-decker a and double decker a respectively. In some of these, the serif that began the right leg stroke developed into an arc, resulting in the printed form, while in others it was dropped, resulting in the modern handwritten form. In Greek handwriting, it was common to join the left leg and horizontal stroke into a single loop, as demonstrated by the uncial version shown. These variants, the Italic and Roman forms, were derived from the Caroline Script version.
The names of the vowel letter u and the semivowel letters w and y are pronounced with a beginning consonant sound. The names of the consonant letters f, h, l, m, n, r, s, and x are pronounced with a beginning vowel sound. Problems arise occasionally when the following word begins with a vowel letter but actually starts with a consonant sound, or vice versa. In algebra, the letter "A" along with other letters at the beginning of the alphabet is used to represent known quantities. In most languages that use the Latin alphabet, ⟨a⟩ denotes an open unrounded vowel, such as /a/, /ä/, or /ɑ/.
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