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OR:

When used as a
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 ''diacrit ...
mark, the term dot refers to the
glyph A glyph ( ) is any kind of purposeful mark. In typography, a glyph is "the specific shape, design, or representation of a character". It is a particular graphical representation, in a particular typeface, of an element of written language. A ...
s "combining dot above" (), and "combining dot below" () which may be combined with some letters of the extended
Latin alphabet The Latin alphabet, also known as the Roman alphabet, is the collection of letters originally used by the Ancient Rome, ancient Romans to write the Latin language. Largely unaltered except several letters splitting—i.e. from , and from � ...
s in use in a variety of languages. Similar marks are used with other scripts.


Overdot

Language scripts or transcription schemes that use the dot above a letter as a diacritical mark: * In some forms of Arabic romanization, stands for '' ghayn'' (غ). * The Latin orthography for Chechen includes ''ċ'', ''ç̇'', ''ġ'', ''q̇'' and ''ẋ'', corresponding to Cyrillic ''цӏ'', ''чӏ'', ''гӏ'', ''къ'' and ''хь'' and representing , , , and respectively. * Traditional Irish typography, where the dot denotes
lenition In linguistics, lenition is a sound change that alters consonants, making them "weaker" in some way. The word ''lenition'' itself means "softening" or "weakening" (from Latin 'weak'). Lenition can happen both synchronically (within a language ...
, and is called a or "dot of lenition": ''ḃ ċ ḋ ḟ ġ ṁ ṗ ṡ ṫ''. Alternatively, lenition may be represented by a following letter ''h'', thus: ''bh ch dh fh gh mh ph sh th''. In
Old Irish Old Irish, also called Old Gaelic (, Ogham, Ogham script: ᚌᚑᚔᚇᚓᚂᚉ; ; ; or ), is the oldest form of the Goidelic languages, Goidelic/Gaelic language for which there are extensive written texts. It was used from 600 to 900. The ...
orthography, the dot was used only for ''ḟ ṡ'', while the following ''h'' was used for ''ch ph th''; lenition of other letters was not indicated. Later the two systems spread to the entire set of lenitable consonants and competed with each other. Eventually the standard practice was to use the dot when writing in Gaelic script and the following ''h'' when writing in antiqua. Thus ''ċ'' and ''ch'' represent the same phonetic element in Modern Irish. * is pronounced as , as opposed to ''ę'', which is pronounced a lower (formerly nasalised), or ''e'', pronounced . * Livonian uses ''ȯ'' as one of its eight vowels, pronounced as . * is used for a voiceless palato-alveolar affricate, ''ġ'' for a voiced palato-alveolar affricate, and ''ż'' for a voiced alveolar sibilant. *
Old English Old English ( or , or ), or Anglo-Saxon, is the earliest recorded form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the Early Middle Ages. It developed from the languages brought to Great Britain by Anglo-S ...
: In modernized orthography, ''ċ'' is used for a voiceless palato-alveolar affricate , ''ġ'' for a
palatal approximant The voiced palatal approximant is a type of consonant used in many spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is ; the equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is j, and in the Americanist phonetic notation i ...
(probably a
voiced palatal fricative The voiced palatal fricative is a type of consonantal sound used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) that represents this sound is (crossed-tail j), and the equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is j\. It is ...
in the earliest texts), and (more rarely) ''sċ'' for a voiceless palato-alveolar fricative and ''cġ'' for a voiced palato-alveolar affricate . * is used for a voiced retroflex sibilant . * The Siouan languages such as Lakota, Osage, and
Crow A crow is a bird of the genus ''Corvus'', or more broadly, a synonym for all of ''Corvus''. The word "crow" is used as part of the common name of many species. The related term "raven" is not linked scientifically to any certain trait but is rathe ...
sometimes use the dot above to indicate ejective stops. * In the
Canadian Aboriginal Syllabics Canadian syllabic writing, or simply syllabics, is a family of writing systems used in a number of indigenous Canadian languages of the Algonquian languages, Algonquian, Eskimo–Aleut languages, Inuit, and (formerly) Athabaskan languages, A ...
orthography for the
Cree The Cree, or nehinaw (, ), are a Indigenous peoples of the Americas, North American Indigenous people, numbering more than 350,000 in Canada, where they form one of the country's largest First Nations in Canada, First Nations. They live prim ...
,
Ojibwe The Ojibwe (; Ojibwe writing systems#Ojibwe syllabics, syll.: ᐅᒋᐺ; plural: ''Ojibweg'' ᐅᒋᐺᒃ) are an Anishinaabe people whose homeland (''Ojibwewaki'' ᐅᒋᐺᐘᑭ) covers much of the Great Lakes region and the Great Plains, n ...
, and
Inuktitut Inuktitut ( ; , Inuktitut syllabics, syllabics ), also known as Eastern Canadian Inuktitut, is one of the principal Inuit languages of Canada. It is spoken in all areas north of the North American tree line, including parts of the provinces of ...
languages, a dot above a symbol signifies that the symbol's vowel should be a long vowel—the equivalent effect using the Roman orthography is achieved by doubling the vowel (ᒥ = mi, ᒦ = mii), placing a macron over the vowel (ᑲ = ka, ᑳ = kā), or placing a
circumflex The circumflex () is a diacritic in the Latin and Greek scripts that is also used in the written forms of many languages and in various romanization and transcription schemes. It received its English name from "bent around"a translation of ...
over the vowel (ᓄ = no, ᓅ = nô). * In Turkish, the dot above lowercase '' i'' and '' j'' (and uppercase '' İ'') is not regarded as an independent diacritic but as an integral part of the letter. It is called a tittle. I without an overdot is a separate letter. * In the Rheinische Dokumenta phonetic writing system overdots denote a special pronunciation of ''r''. * The Ulithian alphabet includes ''ȧ'', ''ė'', and ''ȯ''. * The ISO 9 (1968) Romanization of Cyrillic uses ''ė'', ''ḟ'', and ''ẏ''. * In the
ISO 259 ISO 259 is a series of international standards for the romanization of Hebrew characters into Latin characters, dating to 1984, with updated ISO 259-2 (a simplification, disregarding several vowel signs, 1994) and ISO 259-3 ( Phonemic Conversion, ...
Romanization of Hebrew, the overdot is used to transcribe the dagesh: ; transcribes the shuruk. * In
IAST The International Alphabet of Sanskrit Transliteration (IAST) is a transliteration scheme that allows the lossless romanisation of Brahmic family, Indic scripts as employed by Sanskrit and related Indic languages. It is based on a scheme that ...
and National Library at Calcutta romanization transcribing
languages of India Languages of India belong to several list of language families, language families, the major ones being the Indo-Aryan languages spoken by 78.05% of Indian people, Indians and the Dravidian languages spoken by 19.64% of Indians; both fami ...
, ''ṅ'' is used to represent . * UNGEGN romanization of
Urdu Urdu (; , , ) is an Indo-Aryan languages, Indo-Aryan language spoken chiefly in South Asia. It is the Languages of Pakistan, national language and ''lingua franca'' of Pakistan. In India, it is an Eighth Schedule to the Constitution of Indi ...
includes ṙ. * In the
Venda language Venḓa or Tshivenḓa is a Bantu languages, Bantu language and an Languages of South Africa, official language of South Africa and Zimbabwe. It is mainly spoken by the Venda people (or Vhavenḓa) in the northern part of South Africa's Limpop ...
, ''ṅ'' is used to represent . * Some countries use the overdot as a
decimal mark alt=Four types of separating decimals: a) 1,234.56. b) 1.234,56. c) 1'234,56. d) ١٬٢٣٤٫٥٦., Both a full_stop.html" ;"title="comma and a full stop">comma and a full stop (or period) are generally accepted decimal separators for interna ...
. * The overdot is also used in the
Devanagari script Devanagari ( ; in script: , , ) is an Indic script used in the Indian subcontinent. It is a left-to-right abugida (a type of segmental writing system), based on the ancient '' Brāhmī'' script. It is one of the official scripts of India an ...
, where it is called anusvara. In
mathematics Mathematics is a field of study that discovers and organizes methods, Mathematical theory, theories and theorems that are developed and Mathematical proof, proved for the needs of empirical sciences and mathematics itself. There are many ar ...
and
physics Physics is the scientific study of matter, its Elementary particle, fundamental constituents, its motion and behavior through space and time, and the related entities of energy and force. "Physical science is that department of knowledge whi ...
, when using Newton's notation the dot denotes the time derivative as in v=\dot. In addition, the overdot is one way used to indicate an infinitely repeating set of numbers in decimal notation, as in 0.\dot, which is equal to the fraction , and 0.\dot\dot\dot\dot\dot\dot or 0.\dot4285\dot, which is equal to .


Underdot

* In a number of languages, an underdot indicates a raised or relatively high vowel, often the counterpart of a lower vowel marked with an
ogonek The tail or ( ; Polish: , "little tail", diminutive of ) is a diacritic hook placed under the lower right corner of a vowel in the Latin alphabet used in several European languages, and directly under a vowel in several Native American langu ...
or left unmarked. ** In Rotuman, ''ạ'' represents /ɔ/. ** In Romagnol, ''ẹ ọ'' are used to represent , o e.g. part of Riminese dialect ''fradẹll, ọcc'' "brothers, eyes". ** In academic notation of
Old Latin Old Latin, also known as Early, Archaic or Priscan Latin (Classical ), was the Latin language in the period roughly before 75 BC, i.e. before the age of Classical Latin. A member of the Italic languages, it descends from a common Proto-Italic ...
, ''ẹ̄'' (''e'' with underdot and macron) represents the long vowel, probably , that developed from the early Old Latin diphthong ''ei''. This vowel usually became ''ī'' in
Classical Latin Classical Latin is the form of Literary Latin recognized as a Literary language, literary standard language, standard by writers of the late Roman Republic and early Roman Empire. It formed parallel to Vulgar Latin around 75 BC out of Old Latin ...
. ** In academic transcription of
Vulgar Latin Vulgar Latin, also known as Colloquial, Popular, Spoken or Vernacular Latin, is the range of non-formal Register (sociolinguistics), registers of Latin spoken from the Crisis of the Roman Republic, Late Roman Republic onward. ''Vulgar Latin'' a ...
, used in describing the development of the
Romance languages The Romance languages, also known as the Latin or Neo-Latin languages, are the languages that are Language family, directly descended from Vulgar Latin. They are the only extant subgroup of the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-E ...
, ẹ and ọ represent the close-mid vowels and , in contrast with the open-mid vowels and , which are represented as ''e'' and ''o'' with
ogonek The tail or ( ; Polish: , "little tail", diminutive of ) is a diacritic hook placed under the lower right corner of a vowel in the Latin alphabet used in several European languages, and directly under a vowel in several Native American langu ...
(ę ǫ). ** Academic transcription of
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 English pe ...
uses the same conventions as Vulgar Latin above. ** In academic transcription of Serbo-Croatian dialects, ''ẹ ọ ạ'' (typically ) represent higher vowels than standard ''e o a'', and the first two often contrast with lower vowels marked with a comma below, ''e̦ o̦'' (typically ). * In Inari Sami, an underdot denotes a half-long voiced consonant: ''đ̣, j̣, ḷ, ṃ, ṇ, ṇj, ŋ̣, ṛ'', and ''ṿ''. The underdot is used in dictionaries, textbooks, and linguistic publications only. * In
IAST The International Alphabet of Sanskrit Transliteration (IAST) is a transliteration scheme that allows the lossless romanisation of Brahmic family, Indic scripts as employed by Sanskrit and related Indic languages. It is based on a scheme that ...
and National Library at Calcutta romanization, transcribing
languages of India Languages of India belong to several list of language families, language families, the major ones being the Indo-Aryan languages spoken by 78.05% of Indian people, Indians and the Dravidian languages spoken by 19.64% of Indians; both fami ...
, a dot below a letter distinguishes the
retroflex consonant A retroflex () or cacuminal () consonant is a coronal consonant where the tongue has a flat, concave, or even curled shape, and is articulated between the alveolar ridge and the hard palate. They are sometimes referred to as cerebral consona ...
s ''ṭ, ḍ, ṛ, ḷ, ṇ, ṣ'', while ''m'' with underdot (''ṃ'') signifies an '' anusvara'' and ''h'' with underdot (''ḥ'') signifies a '' visarga''. Very frequently (in modern transliterations of Sanskrit) an underdot is used instead of the ring (diacritic) below the vocalic ''r'' and ''l''. * In romanizations of some
Afroasiatic languages The Afroasiatic languages (also known as Afro-Asiatic, Afrasian, Hamito-Semitic, or Semito-Hamitic) are a language family (or "phylum") of about 400 languages spoken predominantly in West Asia, North Africa, the Horn of Africa, and parts of th ...
, particularly
Semitic Languages The Semitic languages are a branch of the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family. They include Arabic, Amharic, Tigrinya language, Tigrinya, Aramaic, Hebrew language, Hebrew, Maltese language, Maltese, Modern South Arabian language ...
and
Berber Languages The Berber languages, also known as the Amazigh languages or Tamazight, are a branch of the Afroasiatic language family. They comprise a group of closely related but mostly mutually unintelligible languages spoken by Berbers, Berber communities, ...
, an underdot indicates an emphatic consonant. The romanization of Arabic uses . * In the DIN 31636 and
ALA-LC ALA-LC (American Library AssociationLibrary of Congress) is a set of standards for romanization, the representation of text in other writing systems using the Latin script. Applications The system is used to represent bibliographic information by ...
Romanization of Hebrew, ''ṿ'' represents vav ( ו), while ''v'' without the underdot represents beth ( ב). ''ḳ'' represents qoph ( ק) while ''k'' represents kaph ( כ). ḥ represents chet ( ח). * The underdot is also used in the PDA orthography for Domari to show pharyngealization—the underdotted consonants represent the emphaticized sounds . *In Asturian, '' ḷḷ'' (underdotted double ''ll'') represents the voiced retroflex plosive or the voiceless retroflex affricate, depending on dialect, and ''ḥ'' (underdotted ''h'') the
voiceless glottal fricative The voiceless glottal fricative, sometimes called voiceless glottal transition or the aspirate, is a type of sound used in some spoken languages that patterns like a fricative or approximant consonant '' phonologically'', but often lacks the ...
. *In the O'odham language, '' '' (''d'' with underdot) represents a voiced retroflex stop. *In Vietnamese, The ''nặng'' tone (low, glottal) is represented with a dot below the base vowel: ''ạ ặ ậ ẹ ệ ị ọ ộ ợ ụ ự ỵ''. * In Igbo, an underdot can be used on ''i'', ''o'', and ''u'' to make ''ị'', ''ọ'', and ''ụ''. The underdot symbolizes a reduction in the vowel height. * In Yoruba, an underdot can be used on ''e'' and ''o'' to make ''ẹ'' and ''ọ'', symbolizing a reduction in the vowel height, as well as on ''s'' to make ''ṣ'', symbolizing a postalveolar articulation. * In Americanist phonetic notation, ''x'' with underdot '' '' represents a voiceless uvular fricative. * Underdots are used in the Rheinische Dokumenta phonetic writing system to denote a voiced ''s'' and special pronunciations of ''r'' and ''a''. * In the Fiero-Rhodes orthography for Eastern Ojibwe and Odaawaa, in ''g̣'', ''ḥ'', and ''ḳ'', underdot is used to indicate labialization when either or following them was lost in syncope. * The Sicilian nexus ''ḍḍ'' is used to represent . * In Kalabari, ''ḅ'' and ''ḍ'' are used. * In Marshallese, underdots on consonants represent velarization, such as the velarized bilabial nasal ''ṃ''. * UNGEGN romanization of
Urdu Urdu (; , , ) is an Indo-Aryan languages, Indo-Aryan language spoken chiefly in South Asia. It is the Languages of Pakistan, national language and ''lingua franca'' of Pakistan. In India, it is an Eighth Schedule to the Constitution of Indi ...
includes ''ḍ, g̣, ḳ, ṭ, ẉ'', and ''ỵ''. * In Mizo, ''ṭ'' represents . * The underdot is also used in the
Devanagari script Devanagari ( ; in script: , , ) is an Indic script used in the Indian subcontinent. It is a left-to-right abugida (a type of segmental writing system), based on the ancient '' Brāhmī'' script. It is one of the official scripts of India an ...
, where it is called nukta.


Raised dot and middle dot

* In
Canadian Aboriginal Syllabics Canadian syllabic writing, or simply syllabics, is a family of writing systems used in a number of indigenous Canadian languages of the Algonquian languages, Algonquian, Eskimo–Aleut languages, Inuit, and (formerly) Athabaskan languages, A ...
, in addition to the middle dot as a letter, centred dot diacritic, and dot above diacritic, there also is a two-dot diacritic in the Naskapi language representing /_w_V/ which depending on the placement on the specific Syllabic letter may resemble a colon when placed vertically, diaeresis when placed horizontally, or a combination of middle dot and dot above diacritic when placed either at an angle or enveloping a small raised letter . Additionally, in Northwestern Ojibwe, a small raised /wi/ as /w/, the middle dot is raised farther up as either or ; there also is a raised dot "Final" (), which represents /w/ in some Swampy Cree and /y/ in some Northwestern Ojibwe.


Side dot

The diacritics 〮 and 〯 , known as Bangjeom (), were used to mark pitch accents in
Hangul The Korean alphabet is the modern writing system for the Korean language. In North Korea, the alphabet is known as (), and in South Korea, it is known as (). The letters for the five basic consonants reflect the shape of the speech organs ...
for Middle Korean. They were written to the left of a syllable in vertical writing and above a syllable in horizontal writing.


Letters with dot


Encoding

In Unicode, the dot is encoded at: * and at: * * * There is also: * * Pre-composed characters: * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * , * * * * * * * * * * * * * * , , , , , , , , , * , , , , , , , , * , , , , , , , , * , , , , , , , , * , , , , , , , , * , , , , , , , , * , , , , , , , , * , , , , , , , , * , , , , , , , , * , , , , , , , , * , , , , , , , , * , , , , * , , , , * , , , , , * , , * , , * , , * , , * , , , , , * , , * , , , * , * * * * , *


See also

* * * () * * ** ** *
Arabic alphabet The Arabic alphabet, or the Arabic abjad, is the Arabic script as specifically codified for writing the Arabic language. It is a unicase, unicameral script written from right-to-left in a cursive style, and includes 28 letters, of which most ...
* Hebrew diacritics * Dot (disambiguation) * Two dots (disambiguation) * Three dots (disambiguation)


References


External links


Diacritics Project — All you need to design a font with correct accents
{{Latin script, , dot Latin-script diacritics Diakrytyka Vietnamese alphabets