The oldest decipherable full sentence in an alphabet ever found, dated to 1,700 B.C.E., is inscribed on a tiny ivory comb unearthed in 2016 at the Tel Lachish archeological site in central Israel.

The Canannites invented the first alphabet about 3,800 years ago. The letters, instead of hieroglyphics like those used in Egypt, became the basis for written Latin, Greek, and Hebrew.

Can you create a sentence of 26 words that each start with a different letter of the alphabet, not necessarily in alphabetical order? —Christy Adams Lentz, The Woodlands, Texas Hey, here’s a ...

While early writing systems emerged in Mesopotamia and Egypt over 5,000 years ago, they used symbols rather than a bona fide alphabet, which appeared significantly later, around 1800 BCE.

He said experts dated the script to 1700 B.C. by comparing it to the archaic Canaanite alphabet previously found in Egypt's Sinai desert, dating back to between 1900 B.C. and 1700 B.C.