T

T, 20th letter of the English alphabet. It was derived from the Roman character called te, which was taken from the Greek tau. The Greek character was derived from tāw, the last letter of the Phoenician alphabet, representing a cross or mark of ownership. This in turn was derived from an Egyptian hieroglyph.

In English, the letter t denotes a voiceless dental stop, made by checking the speech current for an instant between the tip of the tongue and the upper gum, the vocal cords being inactive and the nasal passage closed (see Phonetics).