Short U (Cyrillic)

Cyrillic letter short U
The Cyrillic script
Slavic letters
А Б В Г Ґ Д Ђ Ѓ Е Ѐ Ё Є Ж З З́ Ѕ И Ѝ І Ї Й Ј К Л Љ М Н Њ О П Р С С́ Т Ћ Ќ У Ў Ф Х Ц Ч Џ Ш Щ Ъ Ы Ь Э Ю Я
Non-Slavic letters
Ӑ А̄ А̊ А̃ Ӓ Ӓ̄ Ә Ә́ Ә̃ Ӛ Ӕ Ғ Г̧ Г̑ Г̄ Ҕ Ӻ Ӷ Ԁ Ԃ Ꚃ Ꚁ Ꚉ Ԫ Ԭ Ӗ Е̄ Е̃ Ё̄ Є̈ Ӂ Җ Ꚅ Ӝ Ԅ Ҙ Ӟ Ԑ Ԑ̈ Ӡ Ԇ Ӣ И̃ Ҋ Ӥ Қ Ӄ Ҡ Ҟ Ҝ Ԟ Ԛ Ӆ Ԯ Ԓ Ԡ Ԉ Ԕ Ӎ Ӊ Ң Ԩ Ӈ Ҥ Ԣ Ԋ О̆ О̃ О̄ Ӧ Ө Ө̄ Ӫ Ҩ Ԥ Ҧ Р̌ Ҏ Ԗ Ҫ Ԍ Ꚑ Ҭ Ꚋ Ꚍ Ԏ У̃ Ӯ Ӱ Ӱ́ Ӳ Ү Ү́ Ұ Х̑ Ҳ Ӽ Ӿ Һ Ԧ Ꚕ Ҵ Ꚏ Ҷ Ӵ Ӌ Ҹ Ꚓ Ꚗ Ꚇ Ҽ Ҿ Ы̆ Ы̄ Ӹ Ҍ Э̆ Э̄ Э̇ Ӭ Ӭ́ Ӭ̄ Ю̆ Ю̈ Ю̈́ Ю̄ Я̆ Я̄ Я̈ Ԙ Ԝ Ӏ
Archaic letters
Ꙁ Ꙃ Ꙅ Ꙇ Ꙉ Ҁ Ѻ ОУ Ꙋ Ѡ Ѽ Ꙍ Ѿ Ꙏ Ѣ Ꙑ Ꙓ Ꙕ Ꙗ Ѥ Ѧ Ꙙ Ѫ Ꙛ Ѩ Ꙝ Ѭ Ѯ Ѱ Ѳ Ѵ Ѷ Ꙟ Ꙡ Ꙣ Ꙥ Ꙧ Ꙩ Ꙫ Ꙭ ꙮ Ꚙ Ꚛ
List of Cyrillic letters Cyrillic digraphs

Short U (Ў ў; italics: Ў ў) is a letter of the Cyrillic script. The only Slavic language using this letter is the Belarusian Cyrillic script. Among the non-Slavic languages using Cyrillic alphabets, ў is used in the Dungan language and in the Siberian Yupik language. It was also used in Uzbek before the adoption of the Latin alphabet in 1992.

History

The letter originates from the letter izhitsa ⟨Ѵ ѵ⟩ with a breve (Іереѵ̆ская власть, пучина Егеѵ̆ская, etc.) used in certain Ukrainian books during the end of the 16th–beginning of the 17th centuries. Later, this character was probably in use in the Romanian Cyrillic script, from where it was borrowed in 1837 by the compilers of Ukrainian poetry book Rusalka Dnistrovaja (Русалка днѣстровая). The book's foreword reads “we have accepted Serbian џ . . . and Wallachian [Romanian] ў . . .”. In this book, ⟨ў⟩ is used mostly for etymological [l] transformed to [w]—modern Ukrainian spelling uses letter ⟨в⟩ ([v]) in this position.

For the Belarusian language, the combination of the Cyrillic letter U with a breve ⟨ў⟩ was proposed by P.A. Bessonov in 1870. Before that, various ad hoc adaptations of the Latin U were used, for example, italicized in some publications of Vintsent Dunin-Martsinkyevich, with acute accent ⟨ú⟩ in Jan Czeczot's Da milykh mužyczkoú (To dear peasants, 1846 edition), W with breve ⟨w̆⟩ in Epimakh-Shypila, 1889, or just the letter ⟨u⟩ itself (e.g., in publications of Kalinowski, 1862–1863). A U with haček ⟨ǔ⟩ was also used.

After 1870, both the distinction for the phoneme and the new shape of the letter still were not consistently used until the mid-1900s. Among the first publications using it were folklore collections published by Michał Federowski and the first edition of Francišak Bahuševič's Dudka Biełaruskaja (Belarusian flute, published in Kraków, 1891). Also, for quite a while other kinds of renderings (plain ⟨u⟩, or with added accent, haček, or caret) were still being used, sometimes within a single publication (Bahushevich, 1891, Pachobka, 1915).

Usage

Belarusian

The letter is called non-syllabic u or short u (Belarusian: у нескладовае, u nieskladovaje or у кароткае, u karotkaje) in Belarusian because, while resembling the vowel у (u), it does not form syllables. Its equivalent in the Belarusian Latin alphabet is ⟨ŭ⟩, although it is also sometimes transcribed as ⟨w⟩.

In native Belarusian words, ⟨ў⟩ represents the sonorant bilabial fricative consonant, as in хлеў, pronounced [xlʲeʊ] (chleŭ, ‘shed’) or воўк [vɔʊk] (voŭk, ‘wolf’). This is similar to the ⟨w⟩ in English cow /kaʊ/.

The letter ⟨ў⟩ cannot occur before a vowel; when grammar would require this, ⟨ў⟩ is replaced by ⟨в⟩ /v/. Compare хлеў ([xlʲeʊ] chleŭ) with за хлявом ([za xlʲaˈvom] za chlavóm, ‘behind the shed’). Also, when a word beginning with ⟨у⟩ /u/ follows a vowel, so that it forms a diphthong through liaison, it is usually, but not necessary, written with ⟨ў⟩ instead. For example, у хляве ([u xlʲaˈvʲe] u chlavié, ‘in the shed’) but увайшлі яны ў хлеў ([uvajʃˈlʲi jaˈnɨ ʊ xlʲeʊ] uvajšlí janý ŭ chleŭ, ‘they went into the shed’).

The letter ⟨ў⟩ is also used to represent the labial-velar approximant /w/ in foreign loanwords.

Monument

In September 2003, during the tenth Days of Belarusian Literacy celebrations, the authorities in Polatsk, the oldest Belarusian city, made a monument to honor the unique Cyrillic Belarusian letter ⟨ў⟩. The original idea for the monument came from professor Paval Siemčanka, a scholar of Cyrillic calligraphy and type.

Related letters and other similar characters

• Ѵ ѵ : Cyrillic letter Izhitsa
• У у : Cyrillic letter U
• Ŭ ŭ : Latin letter U with breve
• Ł ł : Latin letter L with stroke
• W w : Latin letter W
• Ӯ ӯ : Cyrillic letter U with macron
• Ԝ ԝ : Cyrillic letter We
• Й й : Cyrillic letter Short I

Computing codes

Character	Ў		ў
Unicode name	CYRILLIC CAPITAL LETTER SHORT U		CYRILLIC SMALL LETTER SHORT U
Encodings	decimal	hex	decimal	hex
Unicode	1038	U+040E	1118	U+045E
UTF-8	208 142	D0 8E	209 158	D1 9E
Numeric character reference	Ў	Ў	ў	ў
Code page 855	153	99	152	98
Code page 866	246	F6	247	F7
Windows-1251	161	A1	162	A2
ISO-8859-5	174	AE	254	FE
Macintosh Cyrillic	216	D8	217	D9

See also

• Breve

External links

• The dictionary definition of Ў at Wiktionary
• The dictionary definition of ў at Wiktionary