Cedilla
From Freepedia
| Diacritical marks |
|---|
|
accent
breve ( ˘ )
hook / dấu hỏi ( ̉ ) |
| Marks sometimes used as diacritics |
|
apostrophe ( ’ ) |
A cedilla is a hook (¸) added under certain consonant letters as a diacritic mark to modify their pronunciation. The tail is the bottom half of a miniature cursive z or Ezh: Ʒ/ʒ (Image:Xsampa-Z2.png). The name "cedilla" is the diminutive of the old Spanish name for the letter Z, ceda. An obsolete spelling of "cedilla" is "cerilla" because the letters d and r were interchangeable in 16th-century Spanish.
The most frequent character with cedilla is the ç (c with cedilla). This letter was used for the sound of the affricate [ts] in old Spanish. Spanish has not used it since an orthographic reform in the 18th century.
C-cedilla was adopted for writing other languages. In some languages, including French, Portuguese, Catalan, Occitan, some Friulian dialects, and unofficial Basque, it represents /s/ where "c" would normally represent /k/; in others, including Turkish, Albanian, Azerbaijani, Tatar, Turkmen, Kurdish (at least the Mahabad dialect), and some Friulian dialects, it is used for the sound of the affricate [tʃ] (the same of English in church). It is also sometimes used in the Romanization of Arabic.
In French, Portuguese, and Catalan ç is used before a, o, or u to indicate that it is read /s/ (unlike c, which is read /k/ before a, o, and u). It is not used before e or i, since c itself is read /s/ before e and i. Additionally, Portuguese never uses ç at the beginning of a word. Catalan uses ç as well at the end of a word, and have some rare words with initial ç. One popular word in Catalan that uses ç is Barça" for "Barcelona", a nickname often applied to one of Barcelona's football (soccer) teams that is also used in Spanish media. In French, the cedilla is known as cédille; in Portuguese, as cedilha; in Catalan as ce trencada (that is broken C).
And the s-cedilla, ş, represents /ʃ/ (as in show) in Turkish, Azerbaijan, Tatar, Turkmen, and Kurdish. It is also used in some Romanizations of Arabic, Persian, and Pashto, for the letter ar_r.
In the International Phonetic Alphabet, ç represents the voiceless palatal fricative.
In the Turkish alphabet both Ç and Ş are considered separate letters, not variants of C and S.
A few words are sometimes spelled in English with a ç, almost all of them borrowings from French, for example façade, soupçon and garçon.
The Romanian Ș (ș) seemingly resembles the Turkish s cedilla, but it is actually a comma (Virgula). While it is common in online contexts to use Ş/ş and Ţ/ţ in writing Romanian, that is only because they look almost right and are much more widely supported in character sets. The orthographically correct characters are Ș/ș and Ț/ț (may not appear on your browser).
The Polish letters "ą" and "ę" are not made with the cedilla, but with the unrelated ogonek mark; superficially an ogonek resembles a reversed cedilla (open to the right instead of the left), but the exact shape is quite different.
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| Latin alphabet | Aa | Bb | Cc | Dd | Ee | Ff | Gg | Hh | Ii | Jj | Kk | Ll | Mm | Nn | Oo | Pp | Qq | Rr | Ss | Tt | Uu | Vv | Ww | Xx | Yy | Zz |
|---|---|
| Modified characters | Àà | Áá | Ââ | Ää | Ãã | Āā | Ąą | Ăă | Çç | Ĉĉ | Čč | Ćć | Ðđ | Ďď | Èè | Éé | Êê | Ëë | Ęę | Ēē | Ĕĕ | Ėė | Ěě | Ƒƒ | Ĝĝ | Ğğ | Ġġ | Ģģ | Ǧǧ | Ĥĥ | Ħħ | Ìì | Íí | Îî | Ïï | Įį | İı | Ĩĩ | Īī | Ĭĭ | Ĵĵ | Ķķ | Ǩǩ | Ĺĺ | Ļļ | Ľľ | Ŀŀ | Łł | Ññ | Ńń | Ņņ | Ňň | Òò | Óó | Ôô | Öö | Õõ | Őő | Ǫǫ | Ōō | Ŏŏ | Ơơ | Ŕŕ | Ŗŗ | Řř | Śś | Ŝŝ | Şş | Șș | Šš | Țț | Ťť | Ŧŧ | Ţţ | Țț | Ùù | Úú | Ûû | Üü | Ũũ | Ūū | Ŭŭ | Ųų | Ůů | Űű | Ưư | Ŵŵ | Ýý | Ŷŷ | Ÿÿ | Źź | Žž | Żż |
| Alphabet extensions | Ǎǎ | Ȁȁ | Ȃȃ | Ææ | Ǽǽ | Ǣǣ | Åå | Ċċ | Ðð | DZdz | DŽdž | Ɛɛ | Ʒʒ | Ǯǯ | Ȅȅ | Ȇȇ | Əə | Ȝȝ | Ǥǥ | Ǧǧ | Ƣƣ | Ƕƕ | IJij | Ǐǐ | Ȉȉ | Ȋȋ | Ǩǩ | ĸ | LJlj | LLll | ĿLŀl | NJnj | Ŋŋ | Œœ | Øø | Ǿǿ | Ǒǒ | Ȍȍ | Ȏȏ | Ɔɔ | Ȣȣ | | Ȑȑ | Ȓȓ | ſ | ß | Ʃʃ | Þþ | Ǔǔ | Ȕȕ | Ȗȗ | Ƿƿ | Ƶƶ |
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