Eth

:For the Croatian, Serbian and Vietnamese letter that looks similar to Ð see D with stroke

Related Topics:
Croatian - Serbian - Vietnamese - D with stroke

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Eth (Ð, ð), also spelled edh or eð, is a letter used in Old English (Anglo-Saxon) and present-day Icelandic, and in Faroese language which call the letter edd. It was also used in medieval Scandinavia, but was later replaced with dh. The letter had its origin as a d with a cross-stroke added. The lowercase version has retained the curved shape of a medieval scribe's d, which d itself has not.

Related Topics:
Letter - Old English - Icelandic - Faroese language - Medieval - Scandinavia

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In Icelandic, ð represents a voiced dental fricative, as in th in English "them". (As a point of curiosity, however, the name of the letter is pronounced eþ, i.e., voiceless, unless followed by a vowel.) In Faroese, ð is never pronounced, except ð before r as in a few words. In the Icelandic and Faroese alphabets, ð follows d. In Anglo-Saxon, ð may represent the same sound as in Icelandic, or the voiceless th of "thread", both of which were also represented by þ (thorn). In Middle English, ð was no longer used; the Normans did not like characters in English which did not exist in the Latin alphabet. Ð and þ were replaced with th.

Related Topics:
Fricative - Alphabet - þ - Middle English - Normans

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Lower-case eth is used as a symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet, again for a voiced dental fricative, and in IPA usage, the name of the symbol is pronounced with the same voiced sound, as {{IPA|}}. In HTML, Ð is rendered as Ð, and ð, ð.

Related Topics:
International Phonetic Alphabet - Voiced dental fricative - HTML

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