Dalet
Dalet | |
---|---|
Phoenician | 𐤃 |
Hebrew | ד |
Aramaic | 𐡃 |
Syriac | ܕ |
Arabic | د |
Phonemic representation | d,(ð) |
Position in Alpha bet | 4 |
Numerical value | 4 |
Alphabetic derivatives of the Phoenician | |
Greek | Δ |
Latin | D |
Cyrillic | Д |
Dalet(dāleth,also spelledDalethorDaled) is the fourthletterof theSemitic abjads,includingPhoeniciandālt𐤃,Hebrewdāletד,Aramaicdālaṯ𐡃,Syriacdālaṯܕ, andArabicdālد (inabjadi order;8th in modern order). Its sound value is thevoiced alveolar plosive([d]).
The letter is based on a glyph of theProto-Sinaitic script,probably calleddalt"door" (doorin Modern Hebrew isdelet), ultimately based on ahieroglyphdepicting a door:
Arabic dāl
[edit]The letter is nameddālدَالْ, and is written in several ways depending on its position in the word:
Position in word | Isolated | Final | Medial | Initial |
---|---|---|---|---|
Glyph form: (Help) |
د | ـد | ـد | د |
The letter represents a/d/sound.
Phoenician
[edit]The Phoenician dālet gave rise to the Greekdelta(Δ), LatinD,and theCyrillicletterД.
Aramaic
[edit]Hebrew dalet
[edit]Orthographicvariants | ||||
---|---|---|---|---|
Various print fonts | Cursive Hebrew |
Rashi script | ||
Serif | Sans-serif | Monospaced | ||
ד | ד | ד |
Hebrew spelling:דָּלֶת
The letter isdaletin the modern Israeli Hebrew pronunciation (seeTav (letter).Dalesis still used by manyAshkenaziJews anddalethby someJewsofMiddle-Easternbackground, especially in theJewish diaspora.In some academic circles, it is calleddaleth,following theTiberian Hebrewpronunciation. It is also calleddaled.Theד like theEnglishDrepresents avoiced alveolar stop.Just as in English, there may be subtlevarietiesof the sound that are created when it is spoken.
Variations
[edit]Dalet can receive adagesh,being one of the six letters that can receive Dagesh Kal (see Gimel). There are minor variations to this letter's pronunciation, such as
In addition, in modern Hebrew, the combinationד׳ (dalet followed by ageresh) is used when transcribing foreign names to denote/ð/.
Significance
[edit]Ingematria,dalet symbolizes the number four.
The letter dalet, along with theHe(and very rarelyGimel) is used to represent theNames of God in Judaism.The letter He is used commonly, and the dalet is rarer. A good example is theketer(crown) of atallit,which has the blessing for donning thetallit,and has the name of God usually represented by a dalet. A reason for this is that He is used as an abbreviation for HaShem "The Name" and the dalet is used as a non-sacred way of referring to God.[citation needed]
Dalet as aprefixin Aramaic (the language of theTalmud) is a preposition meaning "that", or "which", or also "from" or "of"; since manyTalmudicterms have found their way into Hebrew, one can hear dalet as a prefix in many phrases (as inMitzvahDoraitah;a mitzvah from theTorah.)[citation needed]
In modern Hebrew the frequency of the usage of dalet, out of all the letters, is 2.59%.[1]
Syriac daled/dolath
[edit]Daled/Dolath |
---|
Madnḫayadaled |
Serṭodolath |
Esṭrangeladalath |
In theSyriac Alpha bet,the fourth letter isܕ—dolathin western pronunciation,dalathanddaledin eastern pronunciation (ܕܵܠܵܬ). It is one of six letters that represents two associated sounds (the others arebet,gimel,kaph,peandtaw). When daled/dolath has a hard pronunciation (qûššāyâ) it is a[d].When it has a soft pronunciation (rûkkāḵâ) it is traditionally pronounced as a[ð].The letter is very common in Syriac as it is often attached to the beginning of words as therelative pronoun.
Daled/dolath is always written with a point below it to distinguish it from the letterresh(ܪ), which is identical apart from having a point above. As a numeral, dalad/dolath stands for the number four. With various systems of dots and dashes, it can also stand for 4,000 and 40,000.
Other uses
[edit]Mathematics
[edit]Inset theory,the dalet symbolU+2138ℸDALET SYMBOLis sometimes used to reference the fourthtransfinite cardinal number.[2][3]
Character encodings
[edit]Preview | ד | د | ܕ | ࠃ | ℸ | |||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Unicode name | HEBREW LETTER DALET | ARABIC LETTER DAL | SYRIAC LETTER DALATH | SAMARITAN LETTER DALAT | DALET SYMBOL | |||||
Encodings | decimal | hex | dec | hex | dec | hex | dec | hex | dec | hex |
Unicode | 1491 | U+05D3 | 1583 | U+062F | 1813 | U+0715 | 2051 | U+0803 | 8504 | U+2138 |
UTF-8 | 215 147 | D7 93 | 216 175 | D8 AF | 220 149 | DC 95 | 224 160 131 | E0 A0 83 | 226 132 184 | E2 84 B8 |
Numeric character reference | ד |
ד |
د |
د |
ܕ |
ܕ |
ࠃ |
ࠃ |
ℸ |
ℸ |
Named character reference | ℸ |
Preview | 𐎄 | 𐡃 | 𐤃 | |||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Unicode name | UGARITIC LETTER DELTA | IMPERIAL ARAMAIC LETTER DALETH | PHOENICIAN LETTER DELT | |||
Encodings | decimal | hex | dec | hex | dec | hex |
Unicode | 66436 | U+10384 | 67651 | U+10843 | 67843 | U+10903 |
UTF-8 | 240 144 142 132 | F0 90 8E 84 | 240 144 161 131 | F0 90 A1 83 | 240 144 164 131 | F0 90 A4 83 |
UTF-16 | 55296 57220 | D800 DF84 | 55298 56387 | D802 DC43 | 55298 56579 | D802 DD03 |
Numeric character reference | 𐎄 |
𐎄 |
𐡃 |
𐡃 |
𐤃 |
𐤃 |
See also
[edit]References
[edit]- ^"Alphabet and Character Frequency: Hebrew (עברית)".Archivedfrom the original on 2023-02-14.Retrieved2023-02-13.
- ^"Letterlike Symbols"(PDF).The Unicode Standard.Retrieved10 June2024.
- ^"\[Dalet]".Wolfram Language & System Documentation Center.Wolfram.Retrieved10 June2024.