B is the second letter in the Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled bee or occasionally be (), plural bees."B" Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd edition (1989); Merriam-Webster's Third New International Dictionary of the English Language, Unabridged (1993); "bee," op. cit. History The letter B might have started as a pictogram of the floorplan of a house in Egyptian hieroglyphs or the Proto-Sinaitic alphabet. By 1050 BC, the Phoenician alphabet's letter had a linear form that served as the beth. Typography The modern lowercase letter b derives from later Roman times, when scribes began omitting the upper loop of the capital. The letter B is often confused with the visually similar German ß which stands for ss. Usage In English and most other languages that use the Latin alphabet, the letter b denotes the voiced