| Ŋ | |
|---|---|
| Ŋ ŋ | |
.svg) | |
| Usage | |
| Writing system | Latin script |
| Type | Alphabetic andLogographic |
| Language of origin | Avokaya language,Dagbani language,Ewe language,Fula language,Inari Sami language,Inupiaq language,Lakota language,Mandarin language,Northern Sami language,Nuer language,Nǁng language,Skolt Sami language,Tuareg language,Washo language |
| Sound values | |
| In Unicode | U+014A, U+014B |
| History | |
| Development | |
| Time period | 1619 to present |
| Descendants | ʩ |
| Sisters | Ꞑ ꞑ |
| Transliterations | ng |
| Other | |
| Associated graphs | n(x),ng |
| Writing direction | Left-to-Right |
| This article containsphonetic transcriptions in theInternational Phonetic Alphabet (IPA). For an introductory guide on IPA symbols, seeHelp:IPA. For the distinction between[ ],/ / and ⟨ ⟩, seeIPA § Brackets and transcription delimiters. | |
Eng,agma, orengma (capital:Ŋ,lowercase:ŋ) is a letter of theLatin alphabet, used to represent avoiced velar nasal (as in Englishsinging) in the written form of some languages and in theInternational Phonetic Alphabet.
InWasho, lower-case⟨ŋ⟩ represents a typical[ŋ] sound, while upper-case⟨Ŋ⟩ represents avoiceless[ŋ̊] sound. This convention comes fromAmericanist phonetic notation.
TheFirst Grammatical Treatise, a 12th-century work on thephonology of the Old Icelandic language, uses a singlegrapheme for the eng sound, shaped like a g with a stroke⟨ǥ⟩.Alexander Gill the Elder uses an uppercase G with a hooked tail and a lowercase n with the hooked tail of ascript g⟨ŋ⟩ for the same sound inLogonomia Anglica in 1619.[1]William Holder uses the letter inElements of Speech: An Essay of Inquiry into the Natural Production of Letters, published in 1669, but it was not printed as intended; he indicates in hiserrata that “there was intended a character for Ng,viz., n with a tail like that of g, which must be understood where the Printer has imitated it by n or y”.[2]It was later used inBenjamin Franklin'sphonetic alphabet, with its current phonetic value. It was supposed to be in English but failed[citation needed].
Lowercase eng is derived fromn, with the addition of a hook to the right leg, somewhat like that ofj or ag. Nowadays, the uppercase has two main variants: it can be based on the usual uppercase N, with a hook added (or "N-form"); or it can be an enlarged version of the lowercase (or "n-form"). The former is preferred inSami languages that use it, the latter inAfrican languages,[3] such as inShona from 1931 to 1955, and several in west and central Africa currently. InIsaac Pitman’sPhonotypic Alphabet, the uppercase had a reversed-N form.
Early printers, lacking a specific glyph for eng, sometimes approximated it byrotating a capital G, or by substituting aGreek letterη (eta) before modified to present form⟨ŋ⟩ for it (encoded in Unicode as the Latin letter n with long leg:Ƞ ƞ).
In most languages eng is absent in the Latin alphabet but its sound can be present in the letter n in words. In English, it is heard in the potential digraphs nc (hard c), ng (hard g), nk, nq and nx, often at the end of words. For the pronunciation of ng with eng, it can be/ŋ/ in words such assinger andhanged and when it is in final position or/ŋg/ in words such asfinger andangle.
In British English, n is pronounced eng in the prefixes en- and in- when they are followed by c, g and q, as inencroachment,engagement,enquiry,incursion,ingredient,inquiry and others. In other English dialects, the n is pronounced/n/ instead. In many British dialects, the ng instrength andlength is simply pronounced/n/, with g a silent letter, and the ng is otherwise pronounced/ŋ/ in those words.
Languages marked † no longer use eng, but formerly did.
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Eng is encoded in Unicode as U+014ALATIN CAPITAL LETTER ENG and U+014BLATIN SMALL LETTER ENG, part of theLatin Extended-A range. InISO 8859-4 (Latin-4) it's located at BD (uppercase) and BF (lowercase).
In African languages such asBemba,ng' (with an apostrophe) is widely used as a substitute in media where eng is hard to reproduce.
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Similar Latin letters:
Similar Cyrillic letters:
Similar Greek letters:
