Where did our letters come from?

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According to Herodotus, an ancient Greek historian, a Phoenician named Cadmus brought the alphabet to Greece.

In the ancient myths, Cadmus was a hero who fought a ferocious monster and founded the city of Thebes. Cadmus was so famous that his deeds were told and retold throughout the ancient world.

In this modern retelling, I use the alphabet that Cadmus brought to Greece to recount the hero’s own story. Part truth, part fancy, this different kind of alphabet book will take you on a journey to the distant past, when our letters were not just marks to record sounds but were pictures of eyes and hands, doors and fences, giant teeth and . . . monsters.