In
Japanese writing, the
kana え (
hiragana
is a Japanese language, Japanese syllabary, part of the Japanese writing system, along with ''katakana'' as well as ''kanji''.
It is a phonetic lettering system. The word ''hiragana'' means "common" or "plain" kana (originally also "easy", ...
) and エ (
katakana
is a Japanese syllabary, one component of the Japanese writing system along with hiragana, kanji and in some cases the Latin script (known as rōmaji).
The word ''katakana'' means "fragmentary kana", as the katakana characters are derived fr ...
) (
romanised ''e'') occupy the fourth place, between
う and
お, in the modern
Gojūon (五十音) system of
collating kana. In the
Iroha, they occupy the 34th, between
こ and
て. In the table at right (ordered by columns, from right to left), え lies in the first column (あ行, "column A") and the fourth row (え段, "row E"). Both represent
.
Derivation
え and エ originate, via
man'yōgana, from the
kanji
are logographic Chinese characters, adapted from Chinese family of scripts, Chinese script, used in the writing of Japanese language, Japanese. They were made a major part of the Japanese writing system during the time of Old Japanese and are ...
衣 and
江, respectively.
The archaic kana
ゑ (we), as well as many non-initial occurrences of the character
へ (he), have entered the modern
Japanese language
is the principal language of the Japonic languages, Japonic language family spoken by the Japanese people. It has around 123 million speakers, primarily in Japan, the only country where it is the national language, and within the Japanese dia ...
as え. The
directional particle へ is today pronounced "e", though not written as え. Compare this to
は (ha) and
を
を, in hiragana, or ヲ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, each of which represents one Mora (linguistics), mora. Historically, both are phonemically , reflected in the Nihon-shiki romanization, Nihon-shiki wo, although the contemporary ...
(wo), which are pronounced "wa" and "o" when used as grammatical particles.
For the kana romanized sometimes as "e", see
we (kana).
Variant forms
Scaled-down versions of the kana (ぇ, ェ) are used to express morae foreign to the Japanese language, such as ヴェ (ve). In several
Okinawan writing systems, a small ぇ is also combined with the kana く(''ku'') and ふ (''fu'' or ''hu'') to form the digraphs くぇ ''kwe'' and ふぇ ''hwe''.
Transliteration
In the
Hepburn,
Kunrei-shiki and
Nihon-shiki systems of
romanization
In linguistics, romanization is the conversion of text from a different writing system to the Latin script, Roman (Latin) script, or a system for doing so. Methods of romanization include transliteration, for representing written text, and tra ...
, both え and エ are
transliterated
Transliteration is a type of conversion of a text from one writing system, script to another that involves swapping Letter (alphabet), letters (thus ''wikt:trans-#Prefix, trans-'' + ''wikt:littera#Latin, liter-'') in predictable ways, such as ...
as "
e". In the
Polivanov system of
cyrillization, the kana are transliterated as "
э".
Stroke order
The hiragana え is made with two
stroke
Stroke is a medical condition in which poor cerebral circulation, blood flow to a part of the brain causes cell death. There are two main types of stroke: brain ischemia, ischemic, due to lack of blood flow, and intracranial hemorrhage, hemor ...
s:
#At the top, a short diagonal stroke proceeding downward and to the right.
#At the bottom, a stroke composed of a horizontal line, a diagonal proceeding downward and to the left, and a rightward stroke resembling a
tilde (~).
The katakana エ is made with three strokes:
# At the top, a horizontal stroke from left to right.
# A downward vertical stroke starting in the center of the first stroke.
# At the bottom, a horizontal stroke parallel to the first stroke, and touching the second. This stroke is usually slightly longer than the first.
This is also the way to make the Latin letter "I" (although the correct
upper case
Letter case is the distinction between the letters that are in larger uppercase or capitals (more formally ''#Majuscule, majuscule'') and smaller lowercase (more formally ''#Minuscule, minuscule'') in the written representation of certain langua ...
form does not look like the
lower case
Letter case is the distinction between the letters that are in larger uppercase or capitals (more formally ''majuscule'') and smaller lowercase (more formally '' minuscule'') in the written representation of certain languages. The writing system ...
Latin letter "l")
Other communicative representations
* Full Braille representation
*
Computer encodings
:* Archaic and
Hentaigana
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:E (Kana)
Specific kana