Dze

For the Pashto letter, seeDze (Pashto).

For the Georgian surname suffix-dze,seeGeorgian surname.

Not to be confused with the Latin letterSor the Georgian Asomtavruli letterႽ.

Dze(Ѕ ѕ; italics:Ѕ ѕ) is a letter of theCyrillic script,used in theMacedonian Alpha betto represent thevoiced alveolar affricate/d͡z/,similar to the pronunciation of⟨ds⟩in "needs"or" kids"in English. It is derived from the letterdzeloorzeloof theEarly Cyrillic Alpha bet,and it was used historically in all Slavic languages that use Cyrillic.

Cyrillic letter Dze
Phonetic usage:	[d͡z], [z]
Name (Early Cyrillic Alpha bet):	ѕѣло
Numeric value:	6
Derived from:	Greek letter Stigma(Ϛ ϛ) orDigamma(Ϝ ϝ)
TheCyrillic script
Slavicletters
А А́ А̀ А̂ А̄ Ӓ Б В Г Ґ Д Ђ Ѓ Е Е́ Ѐ Е̂ Е̄ Ё Є Ж З З́ Ѕ И І Ї Ꙇ И́ Ѝ И̂ Ӣ Й Ӥ Ј К Л Љ М Н Њ О О́ О̀ О̂ Ō Ӧ П Р С С́ Т Ћ Ќ У У́ У̀ У̂ Ӯ Ў Ӱ Ф Х Ц Ч Џ Ш Щ Ꙏ Ъ Ъ̀ Ы Ы́ Ь Ѣ Э Э́ Ю Ю́ Ю̀ Я Я́ Я̀
Non-Slavic letters
Ӑ А̊ А̃ Ӓ̄ Ӕ Ә Ә́ Ә̃ Ӛ В̌ Ԝ Г̑ Г̇ Г̣ Г̌ Г̂ Г̆ Г̈ г̊ Ҕ Ғ Ӻ Ғ̌ ғ̊ Ӷ Г̡ Д́ Д̌ Д̈ Д̣ Д̆ Ӗ Е̃ Ё̄ Є̈ Ԑ Ԑ̈ Җ Ӝ Ӂ Ж̣ Ҙ Ӟ З̌ З̣ З̆ Ӡ И̃ Ҋ Қ Ӄ Ҡ Ҟ Ҝ К̣ к̊ қ̊ Ԛ ᴫ Л́ Ӆ Ԯ Ԓ Л̈ Ӎ ᵸ Н́ Ӊ Ң Ԩ Ӈ Ҥ О̆ О̃ Ӧ̄ Ө Ө̄ Ө́ Ө̆ Ӫ Ԥ П̈ Р̌ Ҏ С̌ Ҫ С̣ С̱ Т́ Т̈ Т̌ Т̇ Т̣ Ҭ Ᲊ У̃ Ӳ У̊ Ӱ̄ Ұ Ү Ү́ Х̣ Х̱ Х̮ Х̑ Х̌ Ҳ Ӽ х̊ Ӿ ӿ̊ Һ Һ̈ Ԧ Ц̌ Ц̈ Ҵ Ҷ Ҷ̣ Ӵ Ӌ Ҹ Ч̇ Ч̣ Ҽ Ҿ Ш̣ ꚜ Ы̆ Ы̄ Ӹ ꚝ Ҍ Ҩ Э̆ Э̄ Э̇ Ӭ Ӭ́ Ӭ̄ Ю̆ Ю̈ Ю̄ Я̆ Я̄ Я̈ Ӏ ʼ ˮ
Archaicor unused letters
А̨ Б̀ Б̣ Б̱ В̀ Г̀ Г̧ Г̄ Г̓ Ҕ̀ Ҕ̆ Ԁ Д̓ Д̀ Д̨ Ԃ Ꚁ Ꙣ Е̇ Е̨ Ж̀ Ж̑ Ꙃ Ꙅ Џ̆ Ꚅ Ꚅ̆ Ꙁ З̀ З̑ Ԅ Ԇ Ꚉ Ԫ Ꚃ Ꚕ І̂ І̣ І̨ Ј̵ Ј̃ Ꙉ К̓ К̀ К̆ Ӄ̆ К̑ К̇ К̈ К̄ Ԟ К̂ Л̀ Ԡ Ꙥ Ԉ Л̑ Л̇ Ԕ М̀ М̃ Ꙧ Н̀ Н̄ Н̧ Н̃ Ԋ Ԣ Н̡ Ѻ Ꙩ Ꙫ Ꙭ ꙮ Ꚙ Ꚛ П̓ П̀ П́ Ҧ П̧ П̑ Ҁ Ԛ̆ Р́ Р̀ Р̃ Ԗ С̀ С̈ Ԍ Ҫ̓ Т̓ Т̀ Ԏ Т̑ Ꚋ Т̧ Ꚍ Ꚍ̆ Ѹ Ꙋ У̇ У̨ ꙋ́ Ф̑ Ф̓ Х́ Х̀ Х̆ Х̇ Х̧ Х̾ Х̓ һ̱ Ѡ Ꙍ Ѽ Ѿ Ꙡ Ц̀ Ц́ Ц̓ Ꚏ Ꚏ̆ Ꚑ Ч́ Ч̀ Ч̆ Ч̑ Ч̓ Ԭ Ꚓ Ꚇ Ꚇ̆ Ҽ̆ Ш̀ Ш̆ Ш̑ Щ̆ Ꚗ Ꚗ̆ Ъ̄ Ъ̈ Ъ̈̄ Ꙑ Ы̂ Ы̃ Ѣ́ Ѣ̈ Ѣ̆ Ꙓ Э̨ Э̂ Ꙕ Ю̂ Ꙗ Я̂ Я̨ Ԙ Ѥ Ѧ Ꙙ Ѫ Ꙛ Ѩ Ꙝ Ѭ Ѯ Ѱ Ѳ Ѵ Ѷ Ꙟ
List of Cyrillic letters List of Cyrillic multigraphs

Although fully obsolete everywhere in the Cyrillic world by the 19th century, the letterzelowas revived in 1944 by the designers of the Alpha bet of the then-codifiedMacedonian language.The phoneme is also present inGreek(ΤΖτζ) andAlbanian(Xx), both non-Slavic neighbours to the Macedonian language; all are a part of theBalkan linguistic area.In the early 21st century, the same letter also appeared inVojislav Nikčević's proposal for the new Alpha bet for the modernMontenegrin language.

The most common early letterform (Ѕ ѕ) resembles theLatinletterS(S s), but it is also seen reversed (Ꙅ ꙅ) like the Latin letterReversed S(Ƨ ƨ), or Z with a tail and a tick (Ꙃ ꙃ).

AbkhazhasAbkhazian Dze(Ӡ ӡ), with an identical function and name but a different shape.

Church Slavonic

The seven root words commencing with the letter dze (aka, dzelo).

The letter is descended from ѕѣло (pronounceddzělo;) in theEarly Cyrillic Alpha bet,where it had the numerical value 6. The letter Dzělo was itself based on the letter Dzelo in theGlagolitic Alpha bet.In the Glagolitic Alpha bet, it was written⟨Ⰷ⟩,and had the numerical value of 8. InOld Church Slavonicit was called ѕѣло (pronounceddzeló), and inChurch Slavonicit is called ѕѣлѡ (pronouncedzeló).

The origin ofGlagoliticletter Dzelo is unclear, but the Cyrillic Ѕ may have been influenced by theGreekstigma⟨Ϛ⟩,the medieval form of the archaic letterdigamma,which had the same form and numerical value (6). Thus the visual similarity of the Cyrillic⟨Ѕ⟩and Latin⟨S⟩is largely coincidental.

The initial sound of⟨Ѕ⟩inOld Church Slavonicwas a soft/d͡z/or/z/,which usually came from a historically palatalised *g (ноѕѣ, ѕвѣзда, etc.). In almost all Slavic dialects this sound was pronounced as a simple /z/; however, as the Old Church Slavonic language was based on the Bulgaro-Macedonian dialects, the sound remained distinct.

In the Old Slavic period the difference between⟨Ѕ⟩and⟨З⟩had already begun to be blurred, and in the writtenChurch Slavonic languagefrom the middle of the 17th century⟨Ѕ⟩was used only formally. The letter's distinguishing features from⟨З⟩are:

• ⟨Ѕ⟩is used in root derived from these seven words beginning with⟨Ѕ⟩:ѕвѣзда, ѕвѣрь, ѕеліе, ѕлакъ, ѕлый, ѕмій, ѕѣлѡ ( "star, beast, vegetable, herb, angry, dragon, very" );
• ⟨З⟩is used in all remaining cases.
• ⟨Ѕ⟩has the numerical value of 6, whereas⟨З⟩has the numerical value of 7;

East Slavic Languages

See alsoReforms of Russian orthography.

InRussianit was known as зѣло orzelo[zʲɪˈɫo]and had the phonetic value of/z/or/zʲ/.In the initial version of Russian civil script ofTsar Peter I(1708), the⟨Ѕ⟩was assigned the sound/z/,and the letter⟨З⟩was removed. However, in the second version of the civil script (1710),⟨З⟩was restored, and⟨Ѕ⟩was abolished. Both versions of the Alpha bet were used until 1735, which is considered the date of the final elimination of⟨Ѕ⟩in Russian.

InUkrainian,the sound/d͡z/is integrated as part of the language's phonology, but it mainly occurs in loanwords rather than in words of native Ukrainian origin. As such, thedigraph⟨дз⟩is used to represent both the phoneme/d͡z/and the separately occurring consonant cluster/d.z/whichUkrainian phonotacticsassimilate as/d͡z.z/.

Belarusiancommonly features⟨дз⟩,but it usually comes from *d from a similar development toPolish.As such,⟨ѕ⟩had never been used for it.

South Slavic Languages

Reflexes of Old Church Slavonicѕacross Eastern South Slavic.

⟨ѕ⟩is now only used in theMacedonian Alpha bet.A commission formed to standardise theMacedonian languageandorthographydecided to adopt the letter on December 4, 1944, after a vote of 10-1. Despite the letter originally being found between⟨ж⟩and⟨з⟩,in the new Alpha bet it was placed after⟨з⟩instead. The letter represents/dz/(examples including: ѕид/dzid,'wall' and ѕвезда/dzvezda,'star'). The corresponding sound is used in all dialects ofMacedonian.

⟨ѕ⟩was also used to the middle of the 19th century in theSerbiancivil script, whose orthography was closer toChurch Slavonic(compared toRussian).Vuk Karadžić'sSerbian Cyrillic Alpha bet(1868) did not include⟨ѕ⟩,instead favouring a simpledigraph⟨дз⟩to represent the sound, as it was non-native.⟨Ѕ⟩is also included in Microsoft's Serbian Cyrillic keyboard layout, although it is not used in theSerbian Cyrillic Alphabet.The Serbian keyboard in Ubuntu replaces Ѕ with a second Ж.

Modern Bulgarian,apart from when explicitly written with the Church Slavonic Alpha bet, has never used⟨ѕ⟩.Although most dialects feature it, it is found in neither the Tărnovo dialect, theprestige dialectof the time of codification, nor in theChurch Slavonic language(despite being written independently there). A few eastern dialects, including the Tărnovo dialect, have, however, independently developed both /dz/ and /dʒ/ phonemes not found in the standard language due toaffrication.Marin Drinov,one of the most important players in the establishment of Standard Bulgarian, floated the idea of using⟨ѕ⟩as it was found in most dialects, however chose not to as he considered the letter all but forgotten.

TheBanat Bulgarian dialect,being based on thePaulician dialect,retains⟨ѕ⟩.However, as it is written with theLatin script,the sound is instead notated as⟨dz⟩.

Romanian

⟨ѕ⟩was used in theRomanian Cyrillic Alpha bet(where it represented/d͡z/) until the Alpha bet was abolished in favour of aLatin-basedAlpha betin 1860-62.

Related letters and other similar characters

• З з:Cyrillic letter Ze
• S s:Latin letter S
• Ƨ ƨ:Latin letter Reversed S
• X x:Latin letter X,anAlbanian Alpha betletter
• Ꚃ ꚃ:Cyrillic letter Dzwe
• Ḑ ḑ:Latin letter Ḑ,aLivonian Alpha betletter
• D̦ d̦:Latin letter D̦,an obsoleteRomanianletter
• Dz:Digraph Dz

Computing codes

Character information

Preview	Ѕ		ѕ		Ꙅ		ꙅ		Ꙃ		ꙃ
Unicode name	CYRILLIC CAPITAL LETTER DZE		CYRILLIC SMALL LETTER DZE		CYRILLIC CAPITAL LETTER REVERSED DZE		CYRILLIC SMALL LETTER REVERSED DZE		CYRILLIC CAPITAL LETTER DZELO		CYRILLIC SMALL LETTER DZELO
Encodings	decimal	hex	dec	hex	dec	hex	dec	hex	dec	hex	dec	hex
Unicode	1029	U+0405	1109	U+0455	42564	U+A644	42565	U+A645	42562	U+A642	42563	U+A643
UTF-8	208 133	D0 85	209 149	D1 95	234 153 132	EA 99 84	234 153 133	EA 99 85	234 153 130	EA 99 82	234 153 131	EA 99 83
Numeric character reference	Ѕ	Ѕ	ѕ	ѕ	Ꙅ	Ꙅ	ꙅ	ꙅ	Ꙃ	Ꙃ	ꙃ	ꙃ
Named character reference	Ѕ		ѕ
Code page 855	137	89	136	88
Windows-1251	189	BD	190	BE
ISO-8859-5	165	A5	245	F5
Macintosh Cyrillic	193	C1	207	CF

See also

• Glagolitic Alpha bet
• Early Cyrillic Alpha bet
• Cyrillic script
• Russian Alpha bet
• Reforms of Russian orthography
• Romanian Cyrillic Alpha bet
• Macedonian Alpha bet

External links

• The dictionary definition ofЅat Wiktionary
• The dictionary definition ofѕat Wiktionary
• A Berdnikov and O Lapko, "Old Slavonic and Church Slavonic in TEX and Unicode", EuroTEX ’99 Proceedings,September 1999 (PDF)