Dze

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Heading=Cyrillic letter Dze


uuc=0405|ulc=0455|numeral=6

Dze (unicode|Ѕ ѕ) is a letter of the Cyrillic alphabet, used to represent the sound IPA|/dz/ in the Macedonian alphabet.

It is derived from the letter dzelo or zelo of the old Cyrillic alphabet, used historically for Old Church Slavonic, Russian, and Romanian, and in modern Church Slavonic. The most common early letterform resembles the Latin "S" (Slavonic|Ѕ ѕ), but it is also seen reversed (unicode|Ꙅ ꙅ) like the Tone Two, or with a tail and a tick (unicode|Ꙃ ꙃ).

Origin

The letter is based on Dzělo ( it is called "unicode|ѕѣлѡ" (pronounced "zeló").

The origin of Glagolitic letter "dzelo" is unclear, however, the Cyrillic Ѕ is probably derived in some way from the Greek letter "Unicode|Ϛ" (stigma), which had the same numerical value (6), although had a different pronunciation (IPA|/st/ in Greek, IPA|/dz/ in Slavic). Thus the homoglyphic traits of the Cyrillic Ѕ and Latin S are largely coincidental, although the letters are distantly related: the Latin letter originates directly from the Greek sigma (Σ), whereas the Cyrillic letter originates from the pair of letters Στ (upper case) στ (lower case).

Development

The initial sound of the letter S in Old Church Slavonic was a soft IPA|/dz/ or IPA|/z/, which often became a IPA|/g/ sound in modern Russian, as in мъноѕи ( _ru. мъногъ), по ноѕѣ ( _ru. нога), and растрьѕати ( _ru. растръгати). However, already in the Old Slavic period the difference between S and З began to be blurred, and in the written Church Slavonic language from the middle of the 17th century the letter Ѕ was used only formally. The letter's distinguishing features from З were

* S had the numerical value of 6, whereas З had the numerical value of 7;
* S was used at the beginning of words (for example ѕвѣзда, ѕвѣрь, ѕеліе, ѕлакъ, ѕлый, ѕмій, ѕѣлѡ and their derivatives);
* З was used in all remaining cases.

In Russian it was known as зѣло or zelo (IPA|'zʲɛ.lə) and had the IPA values IPA|/dz/, IPA|/z/ or IPA|/zʲ/.

In the initial version of Russian civil script of Tsar Peter I (1708), the letter S was assigned the sound IPA|/z/, and the letter З was abolished. However, in the second version of the civil script (1710), З was restored, and S was abolished. Both versions of alphabet were used until 1735, which is considered the date of the final cancellation of letter S.

:"See also Reforms of Russian orthography".

S was used in the Romanian Cyrillic alphabet (where it had the IPA value IPA|/dz/) until the alphabet was abolished in favor of a Latin-based alphabet in 1860-62. S was also used -- albeit rarely -- to the middle of the 19th century in the Serbian civil script, whose orthography was closer to Church Slavonic (compared to Russian). Vuk Karadžić's Serbian Cyrillic alphabet (1868) did not include S, instead favoring the digraph ДЗ (IPA|/dz/).

Current Usage

S is now only used in the Macedonian alphabet. A commission formed to standardize the Macedonian language and orthography decided on December 4, 1944 -- after a vote of 10-1 -- to adopt the letter. The letter has the IPA value IPA|/dz/ [examples: ѕид ("dzid", "wall"); ѕвезда ("dzvezda", "star")] . The corresponding sound is used in all dialects of Macedonian, usually at the beginning of a word.

Ѕ is also included on the standard Serbian Cyrillic keyboard, although it is not used in the Serbian Cyrillic Alphabet.

ee also

*Glagolitic alphabet
*Early Cyrillic alphabet
*Cyrillic alphabet
*Russian alphabet
*Reforms of Russian orthography
*Romanian Cyrillic alphabet
*Macedonian alphabet

External links

* [http://www.washington.edu/ark2/archtm/dw1402.html 18th century Macedonian fresco depicting Church Slavonic alphabet]

References

* [http://www.uni-giessen.de/partosch/eurotex99/berdnikov2.pdf A Berdnikov and O Lapko, "Old Slavonic and Church Slavonic in TEX and Unicode", EuroTEX ’99 Proceedings] , September 1999 (PDF)
* Cyrillic S (Russian Wikipedia) ru icon