Gimel

"Gimmel" redirects here. For the music group, seeGimmel (music group).For other uses, seeGimel (disambiguation).

← Bet Gimel Dalet →
Phoenician	𐤂
Hebrew	ג
Aramaic	𐡂
Syriac	ܓ
Arabic	ج
Phonemic representation	d͡ʒ,ʒ,ɡ,ɟ,ɣ
Position in alphabet	3
Numerical value	3
Alphabetic derivatives of the Phoenician
Greek	Γ
Latin	C,G,Ȝ
Cyrillic	Г,Ґ

Gimelis the third (in alphabetical order; fifth in spelling order)letterof theSemitic abjads,includingPhoeniciangīml𐤂,Hebrewgīmelג,Aramaicgāmal𐡂,Syriacgāmalܓ, andArabicǧīmج. Its sound value in the original Phoenician and in all derived alphabets, except Arabic, is avoiced velar plosive[ɡ];inModern Standard Arabic,it represents either a/d͡ʒ/or/ʒ/for most Arabic speakers except inNorthern Egypt,the southern parts ofYemenand some parts ofOmanwhere it is pronounced as thevoiced velar plosive[ɡ](see below).

In itsProto-Canaaniteform, the letter may have been named after a weapon that was either astaff slingor athrowing stick(spear thrower), ultimately deriving from aProto-Sinaiticglyph based on thehieroglyphbelow:

ThePhoenicianletter gave rise to theGreekgamma(Γ), theLatinC,G,ƔandȜ,and theCyrillicГ,Ґ,andҒ.

Arabic ǧīm

Gīm
ج
Usage
Writing system	Arabic script
Type	Abjad
Language of origin	Arabic language
Sound values	/ʤ/,/ʒ/,/g/,/ɟ/,/j/
History
Development	𓌙 𐤂 𐡂 𐢄 ح ج
Other
Writing direction	Right-to-left

The Arabic letterجis namedجيمǧīmج [d͡ʒiːm,ʒiːm,ɡiːm,ɟiːm].It is written in several ways depending on its position in the word:

Position in word	Isolated	Final	Medial	Initial
Glyph form: (Help)	ج‎	ـج‎	ـجـ‎	جـ‎

Pronunciation

In allvarieties of Arabic,cognate words will have consistent differences in pronunciation of the letter. The standard pronunciation taught outside the Arabic speaking world is an affricate[d͡ʒ],which was the agreed-upon pronunciation by the end of the nineteenth century to recite theQur'an.It is pronounced as a fricative[ʒ]in most ofNorthern Africaand theLevant,and[ɡ]is theprestigiousand most common pronunciation inEgypt,which is also found in SouthernArabian Peninsula.Differences in pronunciation occur because readers of Modern Standard Arabic pronounce words following their native dialects.

Egyptians always use the letter to represent[ɡ]as well as in names and loanwords,such asجولف"golf". However,جmay be used in Egypt to transcribe/ʒ~d͡ʒ/(normally pronounced[ʒ]) or if there is a need to distinguish them completely, thenچis used to represent/ʒ/,which is also a proposal forMehriandSoqotrilanguages.

The literary standard pronunciations

• [d͡ʒ]:In most of theArabian Peninsula,parts ofAlgeria(Algiersdialect),Iraq,parts ofEgypt,parts of theLevant.This is also the commonly taught pronunciation outside the Arabic speaking countries when Literary Arabic is taught as a foreign language. It is the agreed-upon pronunciation to recite theQur'anand it also corresponds toġ/d͡ʒ/inMaltese(aSemiticlanguage derived fromSicilian Arabic) as inġar(neighbor)and Arabicجار(neighbor)both pronounced[d͡ʒaːr].
• [ʒ]:In theLevant(especially in the urban centers),Southern Iraqi Arabic,most of theMaghreb,and parts of Algeria (Orandialect).
• [g]:In Egypt, coastalYemen(WestandSouth), southwesternOman,and eastern Oman.
• [ɟ]:InSudan,parts ofSaudi Arabia,and hinterlandYemen,as well as being a common reconstruction of theClassical Arabicpronunciation.

Non-literary pronunciation

• [j]:In eastern Arabian Peninsula in the most colloquial speech, though sometimes[d͡ʒ]or[ʒ]in Literary Arabic loan words.
• [ɟʝ]:attested among some bedouin dialects in Saudi Arabia.

Historical pronunciation

While in most Semitic languages, e.g.Aramaic,Hebrew,Ge'ez,Old South Arabianthe equivalent letter represents a[ɡ],Arabic is considered unique among them where theJīm⟨ج⟩waspalatalizedto an affricate[d͡ʒ]or a fricative[ʒ]in most dialects from classical times. While there is variation in Modern Arabic varieties, most of them reflect this palatalized pronunciation except in coastalYemeniandOmanidialects as well as in Egypt, where it is pronounced[g].

It is not well known when palatalization occurred or the probability of it being connected to the pronunciation ofQāf⟨ق⟩as a[ɡ],but in most of theArabian peninsula(Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain, UAE and parts of Yemen and Oman), the⟨ج⟩represents a[d͡ʒ]and⟨ق⟩represents a[ɡ],except in coastalYemenand southernOmanwhere⟨ج⟩represents a[ɡ]and⟨ق⟩represents a[q],which shows a strong correlation between the palatalization of⟨ج⟩to[d͡ʒ]and the pronunciation of the⟨ق⟩as a[ɡ]as shown in the table below:

Languages - Dialects	Pronunciation of the letters
	ج	ق
Proto-Semitic	[ɡ]	[kʼ]
Dialects in parts of Oman and Yemen1		[q]
Modern Standard Arabic2	[d͡ʒ]
Dialects in most of theArabian Peninsula		[ɡ]

Notes:

1. Western and southern Yemen:Taʽizzi, AdeniandTihamiyyadialects (coastal Yemen), in addition to southwestern (Salalahregion) and eastern Oman, includingMuscat,the capital.
2. As used in theArabian Peninsula:inSanaa;قis[ɡ]inSanʽani dialectand also in the literary standard (local MSA), whereas the literary standard pronunciation inSudanis[ɢ]or[ɡ].For the pronunciation ofجin Modern Standard Arabic, checkJīm.

Pronunciation across other languages

Language	Alphabet name	Pronunciation (IPA)
Azeri	Arabic script	/d͡ʒ/
Balochi
Brahui
Hindko
Kashmiri
Kurdish	Sorani
Malay	Jawi
Pashto
Persian
Punjabi	Shahmukhi
Saraiki
Sindhi	Arabic script
Urdu
Uyghur

Variant

Main article:Che (Persian letter)

A variant letter namedcheis used in Persian, with three dots below instead having just one dot below. However, it is not included on one of the 28 letters on the Arabic alphabet. It is thus written as:

Position in word	Isolated	Final	Medial	Initial
Glyph form: (Help)	چ‎	ـچ‎	ـچـ‎	چـ‎

This form is used to denote four letters, the other three beingخxe,جjim, andحhe.

Hebrew gimel

Variations

Orthographicvariants
Various print fonts			Cursive Hebrew	Rashi script
Serif	Sans-serif	Monospaced
ג	ג	ג

Hebrew spelling:גִּימֶל

Bertrand Russellposits that the letter's form is a conventionalized image of a camel.The letter may be the shape of the walking animal's head, neck, and forelegs.Barry B. Powell,a specialist in the history of writing, states “It is hard to imagine how gimel = ‘camel’ can be derived from the picture of a camel (it may show his hump, or his head and neck!)”.

Gimel is one of the six letters which can receive adageshqal. The two functions of dagesh are distinguished as either qal (light) or hazaq (strong). The six letters that can receive a dagesh qal arebet,gimel,daled,kaph,pe,andtaf.Three of them (bet, kaph, and pe) have their sound value changed in modern Hebrew from the fricative to the plosive by adding a dagesh. The other three represent the same pronunciation in modern Hebrew, but have had alternate pronunciations at other times and places. They are essentially pronounced in the fricative as ג gh غ, dh ذ and th ث. In theTemanipronunciation, gimel represents/ɡ/,/ʒ/,or/d͡ʒ/when with a dagesh, and/ɣ/without a dagesh. In modern Hebrew, the combinationג׳‎(gimel followed by ageresh) is used in loanwords and foreign names to denote[d͡ʒ].

Significance

Ingematria,gimel represents the number three.

It is written like avavwith ayudas a "foot", and is traditionally believed to resemble a person in motion; symbolically, a rich man running after a poor man to give him charity. In theHebrew alphabetgimeldirectly precedesdalet,which signifies a poor or lowly man, given its similarity to the Hebrew worddal(b.Shabbat,104a).

Gimel is also one of the seven letters which receive special crowns (calledtagin) when written in aSefer Torah.Seeshin,ayin,teth,nun,zayin,andtsadi.

The letter gimel is theelectoral symbolfor theUnited Torah Judaismparty, and the party is often nicknamedGimmel.

In Modern Hebrew, the frequency of usage of gimel, out of all the letters, is 1.26%.

Syriac gamal/gomal

Gamal/Gomal
MadnḫayaGamal
SerṭoGomal
EsṭrangelaGamal

In theSyriac alphabet,the third letter isܓ— Gamal in eastern pronunciation, Gomal in western pronunciation (ܓܵܡܵܠ). It is one of six letters that represent two associated sounds (the others areBet,Dalet,Kaph,PeandTaw). When Gamal/Gomal has a hard pronunciation (qûššāyâ) it represents[ɡ],like "goat ". When Gamal/Gomal has a soft pronunciation (rûkkāḵâ) it traditionally represents[ɣ](ܓ݂ܵܡܵܠ), orGhamal/Ghomal.The letter, renamedJamal/Jomal,is written with atilde/tie either below or within it to represent the borrowedphoneme[d͡ʒ](ܓ̰ܡܵܠ), which is used inGarshuniand someNeo-Aramaic languagesto write loan and foreign words from Arabic or Persian.

Other uses

Mathematics

The serif form$\gimel$of the Hebrew letter gimel is occasionally used for thegimel functionin mathematics.

Character encodings

Character information

Preview	ג		ج		گ		ܓ		ࠂ		ℷ
Unicode name	HEBREW LETTER GIMEL		ARABIC LETTER JEEM		ARABIC LETTER GAF		SYRIAC LETTER GAMAL		SAMARITAN LETTER GAMAN		GIMEL SYMBOL
Encodings	decimal	hex	dec	hex	dec	hex	dec	hex	dec	hex	dec	hex
Unicode	1490	U+05D2	1580	U+062C	1711	U+06AF	1811	U+0713	2050	U+0802	8503	U+2137
UTF-8	215 146	D7 92	216 172	D8 AC	218 175	DA AF	220 147	DC 93	224 160 130	E0 A0 82	226 132 183	E2 84 B7
Numeric character reference	ג	ג	ج	ج	گ	گ	ܓ	ܓ	ࠂ	ࠂ	ℷ	ℷ
Named character reference											ℷ

Character information

Preview	𐎂		𐡂		𐤂
Unicode name	UGARITIC LETTER GAMLA		IMPERIAL ARAMAIC LETTER GIMEL		PHOENICIAN LETTER GAML
Encodings	decimal	hex	dec	hex	dec	hex
Unicode	66434	U+10382	67650	U+10842	67842	U+10902
UTF-8	240 144 142 130	F0 90 8E 82	240 144 161 130	F0 90 A1 82	240 144 164 130	F0 90 A4 82
UTF-16	55296 57218	D800 DF82	55298 56386	D802 DC42	55298 56578	D802 DD02
Numeric character reference	𐎂	𐎂	𐡂	𐡂	𐤂	𐤂

External links

• The Mystical Significance of the Hebrew Letters: Gimel