There are many ways to organize a list of terms. You could arrange them from shortest to longest, or vice versa. You could also list the terms alphabetically (the adjective for that is “abecedarian”), or you could arrange them in order of frequency. If the letters of the alphabet were arranged in order from most frequently used to least frequently used in the English language, it would look like this: ETAOINSRHDLCUMFPGWYBVKXJQZ
But that’s not why “Z” comes in last place in the alphabet. The real explanation is historical, based on the relative superfluousness of the letter.
“Z” originated as the Phoenician “zayin,” the seventh letter of that alphabet, pronounced like our “Z.” It was initially depicted as an arrow, then reduced to three lines, similar to our “Z.” It was a glyph (a symbolic depiction) for a weapon or for two armies confronting each other, represented by two parallel lines.
In the Greek alphabet, “zayin” became “zeta,” the sixth letter. When Latin borrowed “zeta” from Greek, it was listed in the alphabet in the same place as in Greek.
Then around 300 BCE, “zeta” was removed from the Latin alphabet under the Roman Censor Appius Claudius Caecus. Through the linguistic process of rhotacism, the “Z” sound had morphed to sound like an “R,” already represented by the letter “rho,” rendering “zeta” superfluous.
But around 200 years later, “Z” was reintroduced to the Latin alphabet in loanwords from Greek. By then, though, the position of “Z” in the alphabet had been taken by “G,” and “Z” was tacked on at the end.
Even though “Z” was once deemed superfluous, it would be catastrophic if it disappeared from our alphabet today. You couldn’t apologize, criticize, fantasize, incentivize, optimize, organize, prioritize, sympathize, or theorize. Do you realize or even recognize the problem?
No zucchini, pizza, mozzarella, zest, zeal, zones, zippers, quizzes, sizzle, razzle-dazzle, or ZIP codes. No zero, which would create numerical havoc. Zowie!
Even some country names would disappear from the map: No Azerbaijan, Belize, Brazil, Czech Republic, Mozambique, New Zealand, Switzerland, Venezuela, or Zambia, not to mention Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Uzbekistan. And what about Zanzibar, part of Tanzania?
As you see, we need “Z,” even though it was once evicted from the alphabet.
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