E

E, fifth letter in the English alphabet. While it is the same letter as in the Greek and Latin alphabets, the ancient Phoenician letter from which it is derived was a smooth h sound, which it has retained in the Semitic alphabets. It is thought that the letter was originally a pictorial representation of a window or a fence. Pronounced variously in English, the most common uses are a short vowel as in met, a long vowel as in feet, or a silent e at the end as in bite. In musical terms, Ε represents the sound of mi in the scale of C.