acrophonyn.
/əˈkrɒfəni/, /əˈkrɒfn̩i/, U.S. /əˈkrɑfəni/ The use of a graphic symbol originally representing a word (or the object to which it refers) to denote the initial syllable or sound of that word.Such a change in the application of a set of symbols was the basis of alphabetic writing.
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society > communication > writing > written character > name of written character > [noun] > method of naming
acrophony1878
1878 Baedeker's Egypt I. iv. 114 The phonetic element makes large concessions to the ideographic, and acrophony becomes very predominant.
1880 R. S. Poole in Encycl. Brit. IV. 808 The Phœnician letters had names indicating an origin from a hieroglyphic system on the same principle of acrophony.
1932 Harvard Theol. Rev. 25 96 It appeared more and more probable that..the Sinaitic script was a Semitic alphabet derived by acrophony from Egyptian hieroglyphs.
1982 Anthropol. Linguistics 24 79 If the Maya ‘alphabet’ of syllables was composed according to a principle of acrophony: i.e. if the glyph stood for the initial sound of the word identifying it.
1998 E. L. Brown in G. Schmeling & J. D. Mikalson Qui miscuit Utile Dulci 57 To assume that the creators of Linear A script relied on the principle of acrophony in choosing the shapes of their syllabograms.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, December 2011; most recently modified version published online December 2021).
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n.1878