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R, or r, is the eighteenth letter of the
Latin alphabet The Latin alphabet or Roman alphabet is the collection of letters originally used by the ancient Romans to write the Latin language. Largely unaltered with the exception of extensions (such as diacritics), it used to write English and the ...
, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is ''ar'' (pronounced ), plural ''ars'', or in Ireland ''or'' . The letter is the eighth most common letter in
English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England ** English national ...
and the fourth-most common consonant (after , , and ). The letter is used to form the ending "-re", which is used in certain words such as ''centre'' in some varieties of English spelling, such as
British English British English (BrE, en-GB, or BE) is, according to Oxford Dictionaries, "English as used in Great Britain, as distinct from that used elsewhere". More narrowly, it can refer specifically to the English language in England, or, more broadl ...
.
Canadian English Canadian English (CanE, CE, en-CA) encompasses the varieties of English native to Canada. According to the 2016 census, English was the first language of 19.4 million Canadians or 58.1% of the total population; the remainder spoke French ( ...
also uses the "-re" ending, unlike
American English American English, sometimes called United States English or U.S. English, is the set of varieties of the English language native to the United States. English is the most widely spoken language in the United States and in most circumstances ...
, where the ending is usually replaced by "-er" (''center''). This does not affect pronunciation.


Name

The name of the letter in Latin was (), following the pattern of other letters representing
continuant In phonetics, a continuant is a speech sound produced without a complete closure in the oral cavity, namely fricatives, approximants, vowels, and trills. While vowels are included in continuants, the term is often reserved for consonant sound ...
s, such as F, L, M, N and S. This name is preserved in
French French (french: français(e), link=no) may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to France ** French language, which originated in France, and its various dialects and accents ** French people, a nation and ethnic group identified with Franc ...
and many other languages. In
Middle English Middle English (abbreviated to ME) is a form of the English language that was spoken after the Norman conquest of 1066, until the late 15th century. The English language underwent distinct variations and developments following the Old Englis ...
, the name of the letter changed from to , following a pattern exhibited in many other words such as ''farm'' (compare French ''ferme'') and ''star'' (compare German ''Stern''). In
Hiberno-English Hiberno-English (from Latin '' Hibernia'': "Ireland"), and in ga, Béarla na hÉireann. or Irish English, also formerly Anglo-Irish, is the set of English dialects native to the island of Ireland (including both the Republic of Ireland ...
the letter is called or , somewhat similar to ''oar'', ''ore'', ''orr''. The letter R is sometimes referred to as the (literally 'canine letter', often rendered in English as the dog's letter). This Latin term referred to the Latin R that was trilled to sound like a growling dog, a spoken style referred to as ('dog voice'). A good example of a trilled R is in the Spanish word for dog, ''perro''. In
William Shakespeare William Shakespeare ( 26 April 1564 – 23 April 1616) was an English playwright, poet and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's nation ...
's ''
Romeo and Juliet ''Romeo and Juliet'' is a tragedy written by William Shakespeare early in his career about the romance between two Italian youths from feuding families. It was among Shakespeare's most popular plays during his lifetime and, along with ''Ham ...
'', such a reference is made by Juliet's nurse in Act 2, scene 4, when she calls the letter R "the dog's name". The reference is also found in
Ben Jonson Benjamin "Ben" Jonson (c. 11 June 1572 – c. 16 August 1637) was an English playwright and poet. Jonson's artistry exerted a lasting influence upon English poetry and stage comedy. He popularised the comedy of humours; he is best known for t ...
's ''English Grammar''.


History


Antiquity

The original Semitic letter may have been inspired by an
Egyptian hieroglyph Egyptian hieroglyphs (, ) were the formal writing system used in Ancient Egypt, used for writing the Egyptian language. Hieroglyphs combined logographic, syllabic and alphabetic elements, with some 1,000 distinct characters.There were about 1,0 ...
for ''tp'', "head". It was used for by Semites because in their language, the word for "head" was ''
rêš Resh is the twentieth letter of the Semitic abjads, including Phoenician Rēsh , Hebrew Rēsh , Aramaic Rēsh , Syriac Rēsh ܪ, and Arabic . Its sound value is one of a number of rhotic consonants: usually or , but also or in Hebrew and Nor ...
'' (also the name of the letter). It developed into Greek ' Ρ' (''rhô'') and Latin R. The descending diagonal stroke develops as a graphic variant in some
Western Greek alphabets Many local variants of the Greek alphabet were employed in ancient Greece during the Archaic Greece, archaic and Classical Greece, early classical periods, until around 400 BC, when they were replaced by the classical 24-letter alphabet that ...
(writing ''rho'' as ), but it was not adopted in most
Old Italic alphabet The Old Italic scripts are a family of similar ancient writing systems used in the Italian Peninsula between about 700 and 100 BC, for various languages spoken in that time and place. The most notable member is the Etruscan alphabet, which ...
s; most Old Italic alphabets show variants of their ''rho'' between a "P" and a "D" shape, but without the Western Greek descending stroke. Indeed, the oldest known forms of the Latin alphabet itself of the 7th to 6th centuries BC, in the Duenos and the Forum inscription, still write ''r'' using the "P" shape of the letter. The Lapis Satricanus inscription shows the form of the Latin alphabet around 500 BC. Here, the rounded, closing Π shape of the ''p'' and the Ρ shape of the ''r'' have become difficult to distinguish. The descending stroke of the Latin letter R has fully developed by the 3rd century BC, as seen in the Tomb of the Scipios sarcophagus inscriptions of that era. From around 50 AD, the letter ''P'' would be written with its loop fully closed, assuming the shape formerly taken by ''R''.


Cursive

The minuscule (lowercase) form (''r'') developed through several variations on the capital form. Along with Latin minuscule writing in general, it developed ultimately from
Roman cursive Roman cursive (or Latin cursive) is a form of handwriting (or a script) used in ancient Rome and to some extent into the Middle Ages. It is customarily divided into old (or ancient) cursive and new cursive. Old Roman cursive Old Roman cursiv ...
via the
uncial Uncial is a majuscule Glaister, Geoffrey Ashall. (1996) ''Encyclopedia of the Book''. 2nd edn. New Castle, DE, and London: Oak Knoll Press & The British Library, p. 494. script (written entirely in capital letters) commonly used from the 4th to ...
script of Late Antiquity into the
Carolingian minuscule Carolingian minuscule or Caroline minuscule is a script which developed as a calligraphic standard in the medieval European period so that the Latin alphabet of Jerome's Vulgate Bible could be easily recognized by the literate class from one reg ...
of the 9th century. In handwriting, it was common not to close the bottom of the loop but continue into the leg, saving an extra pen stroke. The loop-leg stroke shortened into the simple arc used in the Carolingian minuscule and until today. A calligraphic minuscule ''r'', known as r rotunda (ꝛ), was used in the sequence ''or'', bending the shape of the ''r'' to accommodate the bulge of the ''o'' (as in ''oꝛ'' as opposed to ''or''). Later, the same variant was also used where ''r'' followed other lower case letters with a rounded loop towards the right (such as ''b, h, p'') and to write the geminate ''rr'' (as ''ꝛꝛ''). Use of ''r rotunda'' was mostly tied to
blackletter Blackletter (sometimes black letter), also known as Gothic script, Gothic minuscule, or Textura, was a script used throughout Western Europe from approximately 1150 until the 17th century. It continued to be commonly used for the Danish, Norwe ...
typefaces, and the glyph fell out of use along with blackletter fonts in English language contexts mostly by the 18th century.
Insular script Insular script was a medieval script system originating from Ireland that spread to Anglo-Saxon England and continental Europe under the influence of Irish Christianity. Irish missionaries took the script to continental Europe, where they found ...
used a minuscule which retained two downward strokes, but which did not close the loop ("Insular ''r''", ꞃ); this variant survives in the
Gaelic type Gaelic type (sometimes called Irish character, Irish type, or Gaelic script) is a family of Insular script typefaces devised for printing Classical Gaelic. It was widely used from the 16th until the mid-18th century (Scotland) or the mid-20th ...
popular in Ireland until the mid-20th century (but now mostly limited to decorative purposes).


Pronunciation and use


Non-English languages

represents a
rhotic consonant In phonetics, rhotic consonants, or "R-like" sounds, are liquid consonants that are traditionally represented orthographically by symbols derived from the Greek letter rho, including , in the Latin script and , in the Cyrillic script. The ...
in many languages, as shown in the table below. Other languages may use the letter in their alphabets (or Latin transliterations schemes) to represent rhotic consonants different from the alveolar trill. In
Haitian Creole Haitian Creole (; ht, kreyòl ayisyen, links=no, ; french: créole haïtien, links=no, ), commonly referred to as simply ''Creole'', or ''Kreyòl'' in the Creole language, is a French-based creole language spoken by 10–12million people wor ...
, it represents a sound so weak that it is often written interchangeably with , e.g. 'Kweyol' for 'Kreyol'. Brazilian Portuguese has a great number of allophones of such as , , , , , and , the latter three ones can be used only in certain contexts ( and as ; in the syllable coda, as an allophone of according to the European Portuguese norm and according to the Brazilian Portuguese norm). Usually at least two of them are present in a single dialect, such as
Rio de Janeiro Rio de Janeiro ( , , ; literally 'River of January'), or simply Rio, is the capital of the state of the same name, Brazil's third-most populous state, and the second-most populous city in Brazil, after São Paulo. Listed by the GaWC as a b ...
's , , and, for a few speakers, .


Other systems

The
International Phonetic Alphabet The International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) is an alphabetic system of phonetic notation based primarily on the Latin script. It was devised by the International Phonetic Association in the late 19th century as a standardized representation ...
uses several variations of the letter to represent the different rhotic consonants; represents the
alveolar trill The voiced alveolar trill is a type of consonantal sound used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents dental, alveolar, and postalveolar trills is , and the equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is ...
.


Related characters


Descendants and related characters in the Latin alphabet

*R with
diacritic A diacritic (also diacritical mark, diacritical point, diacritical sign, or accent) is a glyph added to a letter or to a basic glyph. The term derives from the Ancient Greek (, "distinguishing"), from (, "to distinguish"). The word ''diacriti ...
s: Ŕ ŕ Ɍ ɍ Ř ř Ŗ ŗ Ṙ ṙ Ȑ ȑ Ȓ ȓ Ṛ ṛ Ṝ ṝ Ṟ ṟ Ꞧ ꞧ Ɽ ɽ R̃ r̃ *
International Phonetic Alphabet The International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) is an alphabetic system of phonetic notation based primarily on the Latin script. It was devised by the International Phonetic Association in the late 19th century as a standardized representation ...
-specific symbols related to R: ʶ ˞ ʴ * IPA superscript letters: 𐞦 𐞧 𐞨 𐞩 𐞪 *
Obsolete and nonstandard symbols in the International Phonetic Alphabet #REDIRECT Obsolete and nonstandard symbols in the International Phonetic Alphabet {{R from other capitalisation ...
: ɼ ɿ *
Uralic Phonetic Alphabet The Uralic Phonetic Alphabet (UPA) or Finno-Ugric transcription system is a phonetic transcription or notational system used predominantly for the transcription and reconstruction of Uralic languages. It was first published in 1901 by Eemil Nes ...
-specific symbols related to R: ** ** ** ** * Teuthonista phonetic transcription-specific symbols related to R: ** ** *''Anthropos'' phonetic transcription: ** ** ** *Otto Bremer's phonetic transcription: ** ** ** *𝼨 : R with mid-height left hook was used by the British and Foreign Bible Society in the early 20th century for
romanization Romanization or romanisation, in linguistics, is the conversion of text from a different writing system to the Roman (Latin) script, or a system for doing so. Methods of romanization include transliteration, for representing written text, a ...
of the
Malayalam Malayalam (; , ) is a Dravidian languages, Dravidian language spoken in the Indian state of Kerala and the union territories of Lakshadweep and Puducherry (union territory), Puducherry (Mahé district) by the Malayali people. It is one of 2 ...
language. *ⱹ : Turned r with tail is used in the Swedish Dialect Alphabet *Other variations of R used for phonetic transcription: 𝼕 𝼖


Calligraphic variants in the Latin alphabet

*Ꝛ ꝛ :
R rotunda The r rotunda ⟨ ꝛ ⟩, "rounded r", is a historical calligraphic variant of the minuscule (lowercase) letter Latin '' r'' used in full script-like typefaces, especially blackletters. Unlike other letter variants such as "long s" which o ...
*Ꞃ ꞃ : "Insular" R (
Gaelic type Gaelic type (sometimes called Irish character, Irish type, or Gaelic script) is a family of Insular script typefaces devised for printing Classical Gaelic. It was widely used from the 16th until the mid-18th century (Scotland) or the mid-20th ...
) *ᫍ : Combining insular r was used in the
Ormulum The ''Ormulum'' or ''Orrmulum'' is a twelfth-century work of biblical exegesis, written by an Augustinian canon named Orm (or Ormin) and consisting of just under 19,000 lines of early Middle English verse. Because of the unique phonemic orth ...


Ancestors and siblings in other alphabets

*𐤓 : Semitic letter
Resh Resh is the twentieth letter of the Semitic abjads, including Phoenician Rēsh , Hebrew Rēsh , Aramaic Rēsh , Syriac Rēsh ܪ, and Arabic . Its sound value is one of a number of rhotic consonants: usually or , but also or in Hebrew and No ...
, from which the following letters derive **Ρ ρ :
Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...
letter Rho, from which the following letters derive ***𐌓 : Old Italic letter R, the ancestor of modern Latin R ****ᚱ :
Runic Runes are the letters in a set of related alphabets known as runic alphabets native to the Germanic peoples. Runes were used to write various Germanic languages (with some exceptions) before they adopted the Latin alphabet, and for specialised ...
letter
Raido *Raidō "ride, journey" is the reconstructed Proto-Germanic name of the ''r''- rune of the Elder Futhark . The name is attested for the same rune in all three rune poems, Old Norwegian Ræið Icelandic Reið, Anglo-Saxon Rad, as well as for t ...
***Р р : Cyrillic letter Er ***𐍂 : Gothic letter Reda


Abbreviations, signs and symbols

*℟ : symbol for " response" in liturgy *℞ :
Medical prescription A prescription, often abbreviated or Rx, is a formal communication from a physician or other registered health-care professional to a pharmacist, authorizing them to dispense a specific prescription drug for a specific patient. Historicall ...
Rx *® : Registered trademark symbol *₹ :
Indian rupee sign The Indian rupee sign (₹) is the currency symbol for the Indian rupee (ISO 4217: INR), the official currency of India. Designed by D. Udaya Kumar, it was presented to the public by the Government of India on 15 July 2010, following its select ...


Encoding

: 1


See also

*
Guttural R Guttural R is the phenomenon whereby a rhotic consonant (an "R-like" sound) is produced in the back of the vocal tract (usually with the uvula) rather than in the front portion thereof and thus as a guttural consonant. Speakers of languages w ...


References


External links

* * * {{Latin alphabet, R} ISO basic Latin letters