Hey, I bet even Minerva was blonde.  It took me a little while before I noticed the "trick" to it.  Once I wrote the equivalent sequence from A to F, it clicked.

Another hint: Don't look at the shapes like triangles and diamonds.  Try like to make your mind split them up.

The challenge for anyone inventing an "alphabet", clearly, is to come up with something a elegantly simple as seen above. One that looks, in other words, as if it has been in use for a while and has all the "kinks" worked out.

I lean towards staying away from keeping the same number of "letters" when doing alphabets in favour of sounds. However I never thought of the simplicity John refers to here and took a quick stab at it. Maximum lines are two, if refering to lifting the pen.

Joined up script above and seperate "John Byrne" below with a joined up version.

I've sort of passed this interest on to my eight year old who loves making "secret" codes for her and her friends. She's starting to get the hang of becoming more "obscure".

[Edited as "thumbnail" was removed]

There's the full 'bet.

JB, (or anyone else who might know) why did our written language evolve a lower case?  Is this something unique to English?  Does Japanese or Arabic have a "lower case"?

{Edited for grammar and punctuation.  This is a language thread, after all.}

John Byrne wrote: Here's yet another...

Love the "I" and the "J" appearing side on as they do. totally changes the feel.

John Byrne wrote: JB, (or anyone else who might know) why did our written language evolve a lower case?  Is this something unique to English? ****** I was wondering about this just yesterday myself. It is not unique to English, but I don't know when the differentiation began. Worth investigating! Knowledge is Good.

Ah, my field of expertise!

The differentiation in the Roman alphabet occurred between the 7th and 9th centuries A.D. Originally, all writing took the majuscule, upper case, form, but the development of the rounded Roman uncial script which lent itself to cursive writing eventually developed into half-uncial cursive which is the first recognisable minuscule, lower case, script.

The most accomplished early minuscule was the Carolingian minuscule developed by the great medieval philosopher/theologian Alcuin at the court of Charlemagne in the early 9th century.

Independently, in Byzantium a Greek alphabet minuscule was developed at the same time between the 7th and 9th centuries.

Dark Ages my arse! ;-) 

Interesting...:

"Lowercase letters developed because all type was hand copied by scribes who developed less ornate handwriting styles and started using quicker and smaller versions of the letters. The first system of lowercase letterforms was known as the semi-uncial."

http://www.planetoftheweb.com/archives/000143.php