The link below will take you to an animated picture that shows how the alphabet developed starting 900 B.C.

It's interesting to see the efficiency that evolution created.

The multistroke characters such as vanished in favor of new characters such as S and V.

Some characters have evolved into new ones, probably because they were better suited for human use than others just like species that adjusted well to their environment produced new species. Good examples are Y that turned into V and then made a comeback. and an entire set of characters that switched direction and turned into E,F and K in a short 150 years period.

Todays characters can be generated by combination of horisontal vertical and diagonal  lines at approximately similar angles (W,A,V,X, M, K and Y) and can be drawn by connecting about 9 static dots in various ways:

.    .    .

.    .   .

.    .   . 

The old writing cannot be characterized by connections between a small number of fixed points.

Link: http://www.janpeters.net/pics/stuff/alph abet.gif

(Via: European Schoolnet Association Newsletter)