Ž (Letter)

Overview

The letter Ž (minuscule: ž) is formed from a Latin Z with the addition of a caron (ˇ), and is used to represent the postalveolar sound friction, similar to the sound of J in French and Portuguese, or in some English words.

Representation

In the International Phonetic Alphabet, this sound is represented by the symbol ʒ. However, the minuscule ž is also used in the American phonetic notation as well as in the Uralic Phonetic Alphabet. Additionally, ž is used as a romanization of the Cyrillic letter Ž (Ž) in ISO 9 and in scientific transliteration.

Unicode

The characters ê (Ž) and ž are located in Unicode at code points U+017D and U+017E, respectively. On Windows computers, they can be typed using the Alt + 0142 and Alt + 0158 combinations, respectively.

Usage

Ž is usually the final letter of most alphabets that contain it, with exceptions including Estonian and Turkmen.

History

The character Ž originates from the Czech alphabet, where it first appeared in printed books at the end of the 15th century. It was introduced as part of Jan Hus' reforms to the Czech language. From there, it was adopted into the Slovak language and later into Croatian.

Computing Systems

Ž and ž are used in various computing systems, including those using the Uralic Phonetic Alphabet and American phonetic notation.