Peter Giles

“ In languages where the diphthong ai has become a monophthong, the resulting sound is some variety of long e. Often the gradual assimilation can be traced through the intermediate stage of ae to ē, as in the Old Latin aidilis, which in classical Latin is aedilis, and in medieval MSS. edilis. ”

“ In some of the Greek alphabets it appears as with the upright prolonged at both top and bottom, but it soon took the form with which we are familiar, though in the earlier examples of this form the cross-strokes are not horizontal but drop at an angle, . In Corinth and places under its early influence like Megara, or colonized from it like Corcyra, the symbol for e takes the form or , while at Sicyon in the 6th and 5th centuries B.C. it is represented by . ”