Ö, or ö, is a character that represents either a letter from several extended Latin alphabets, or the letter " o" modified with an umlaut or diaeresis. In many languages, the letter "ö", or the "o" modified with an umlaut, is used to denote the close- or open-mid front rounded vowels or . In languages without such vowels, the character is known as an "o with diaeresis" and denotes a syllable break, wherein its pronunciation remains an unmodified .

''O''-umlaut

The letter ''o'' with umlaut (''ö'') appears in the

German alphabet German orthography is the orthography used in writing the German language, which is largely phonemic. However, it shows many instances of spellings that are historic or analogous to other spellings rather than phonemic. The pronunciation of alm ...

. It represents the umlauted form of ''o'', resulting in or . The letter is often

collated Collation is the assembly of written information into a standard order. Many systems of collation are based on numerical order or alphabetical order, or extensions and combinations thereof. Collation is a fundamental element of most office filin ...

together with ''o'' in the German alphabet, but there are exceptions which collate it like ''oe'' or ''OE''. The letter also occurs in some languages that have adopted German names or spellings, but it is not normally a part of those alphabets. In Danish and Norwegian, ''ö'' was previously used in place of ''ø'' in older texts to distinguish between open and closed ö-sounds. It is also used when confusion with other symbols could occur, on maps for instance. The Dano-Norwegian '' ø'' is, like the German ''ö'', a development of '' oe'' and can be compared with the French '' œ''. In other languages that do not have the letter as part of the regular alphabet or in limited

character set Character encoding is the process of assigning numbers to graphical characters, especially the written characters of human language, allowing them to be stored, transmitted, and transformed using digital computers. The numerical values that ...

s such as

ASCII ASCII ( ), abbreviated from American Standard Code for Information Interchange, is a character encoding standard for electronic communication. ASCII codes represent text in computers, telecommunications equipment, and other devices. Because of ...

, ''o''-umlaut is frequently replaced with the digraph ''oe''. For example, in German (hear/listen) can be easily recognized even if spelled .

''Ö'' in other languages

The letter ''ö'' also occurs in two other

Germanic languages The Germanic languages are a branch of the Indo-European language family spoken natively by a population of about 515 million people mainly in Europe, North America, Oceania and Southern Africa. The most widely spoken Germanic language, Engli ...

Swedish Swedish or ' may refer to: Anything from or related to Sweden, a country in Northern Europe. Or, specifically: * Swedish language, a North Germanic language spoken primarily in Sweden and Finland ** Swedish alphabet, the official alphabet used by ...

and Icelandic, but it is regarded there as a separate letter, not as an orthographic variation of the letter ''o''. Apart from Germanic languages, it occurs in the

Uralic languages The Uralic languages (; sometimes called Uralian languages ) form a language family of 38 languages spoken by approximately 25million people, predominantly in Northern Eurasia. The Uralic languages with the most native speakers are Hungarian (w ...

such as

Finnish Finnish may refer to: * Something or someone from, or related to Finland * Culture of Finland * Finnish people or Finns, the primary ethnic group in Finland * Finnish language, the national language of the Finnish people * Finnish cuisine See also ...

, Karelian, Veps, Estonian,

Southern Sami Southern may refer to: Businesses * China Southern Airlines, airline based in Guangzhou, China * Southern Airways, defunct US airline * Southern Air, air cargo transportation company based in Norwalk, Connecticut, US * Southern Airways Express, M ...

, and Hungarian, in the

Turkic languages The Turkic languages are a language family of over 35 documented languages, spoken by the Turkic peoples of Eurasia from Eastern Europe and Southern Europe to Central Asia, East Asia, North Asia (Siberia), and Western Asia. The Turkic languag ...

such as

Azeri Azerbaijanis (; az, Azərbaycanlılar, ), Azeris ( az, Azərilər, ), or Azerbaijani Turks ( az, Azərbaycan Türkləri, ) are a Turkic peoples, Turkic people living mainly in Azerbaijan (Iran), northwestern Iran and the Azerbaijan, Republi ...

, Turkish, Turkmen, Uyghur (

Latin script The Latin script, also known as Roman script, is an alphabetic writing system based on the letters of the classical Latin alphabet, derived from a form of the Greek alphabet which was in use in the ancient Greek city of Cumae, in southern Italy ...

), Crimean Tatar, Kazakh, and in the

Uto-Aztecan language Uto-Aztecan, Uto-Aztekan or (rarely in English) Uto-Nahuatl is a family of indigenous languages of the Americas, consisting of over thirty languages. Uto-Aztecan languages are found almost entirely in the Western United States and Mexico. The na ...

Hopi The Hopi are a Native American ethnic group who primarily live on the Hopi Reservation in northeastern Arizona, United States. As of the 2010 census, there are 19,338 Hopi in the country. The Hopi Tribe is a sovereign nation within the Unite ...

, where it represents the

vowel A vowel is a syllabic speech sound pronounced without any stricture in the vocal tract. Vowels are one of the two principal classes of speech sounds, the other being the consonant. Vowels vary in quality, in loudness and also in quantity (leng ...

sounds . Its name in

, Icelandic, Estonian,

, Turkish, Turkmen, Uyghur, Crimean Tatar, Hungarian,

Votic Votic, or Votian (''vaďďa tšeeli'', ''maatšeeli'') �vɑːdʔda ˈtʃɨlɨ, mɑːt.ʃɨlɨ is the language spoken by the Votes of Ingria, belonging to the Finnic branch of the Uralic languages. Votic is spoken only in Krakolye and Luzhits ...

and

Volapük Volapük (; , "Language of the World", or lit. "World Speak") is a constructed language created between 1879 and 1880 by Johann Martin Schleyer, a Catholic priest in Baden, Germany, who believed that God had told him in a dream to create an i ...

is ''Öö'' , not "O with two dots" since is not a variant of the vowel but a distinct phoneme. In the Germanic language of

Limburgish Limburgish ( li, Limburgs or ; nl, Limburgs ; german: Limburgisch ; french: Limbourgeois ), also called Limburgan, Limburgian, or Limburgic, is a West Germanic language spoken in the Dutch and Belgian provinces of Limburg (Netherlands), L ...

, the (ö) is used in the same way as in

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany (of or related to) **Germania (historical use) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law **Ger ...

. In certain languages, the letter ''ö'' cannot be written as "oe" because

minimal pair In phonology, minimal pairs are pairs of words or phrases in a particular language, spoken or signed, that differ in only one phonological element, such as a phoneme, toneme or chroneme, and have distinct meanings. They are used to demonstrate th ...

s exist between ''ö'' and ''oe'' (and also with ''oo'', ''öö'' and ''öe''), as in Finnish ''eläinkö'' "animal?" (interrogative) vs. ''eläinkoe'' "animal test" (cf.

Germanic umlaut The Germanic umlaut (sometimes called i-umlaut or i-mutation) is a type of linguistic umlaut in which a back vowel changes to the associated front vowel ( fronting) or a front vowel becomes closer to (raising) when the following syllable conta ...

). If the character ''ö'' is unavailable, ''o'' is substituted and context is relied upon for inference of the intended meaning. In Volapük, ''ö'' can be written as ''oy'', but never as ''oe''. In Romagnol, ''ö'' is used to represent , e.g. ''cöt'' "cooked". In mountain dialects of Emilian, it is used to represent , e.g. ''tött'' "all". In the

Seneca language Seneca (; in Seneca, or ) is the language of the Seneca people, one of the Six Nations of the Iroquois League; it is an Iroquoian language, spoken at the time of contact in the western portion of New York. While the name ''Seneca'', attested as ...

, ''ö'' is used to represent , a back mid rounded nasalized vowel. In Swedish, the letter ''ö'' is also used as the one-letter word for an

island An island (or isle) is an isolated piece of habitat that is surrounded by a dramatically different habitat, such as water. Very small islands such as emergent land features on atolls can be called islets, skerries, cays or keys. An island ...

, which is not to be mixed with the actual letter. ''Ö'' in this sense is also a Swedish-language surname. In the

Seri language Seri ( sei, cmiique iitom, link=no) is an indigenous language spoken by between 716La situación sociolingüística de la lengua seri en 2006. and 900 Seri people in Punta Chueca and El Desemboque, two villages on the coast of Sonora, Mexico. T ...

, ''ö'' indicates the

labialization Labialization is a secondary articulatory feature of sounds in some languages. Labialized sounds involve the lips while the remainder of the oral cavity produces another sound. The term is normally restricted to consonants. When vowels involve ...

of the previous consonant, e.g. ''cöihiin'' "

sanderling The sanderling (''Calidris alba'') is a small wading bird. The name derives from Old English ''sand-yrðling'', "sand-ploughman". The genus name is from Ancient Greek ''kalidris'' or ''skalidris'', a term used by Aristotle for some grey-colou ...

Alphabetical position

In some alphabets it is

as an independent letter, sometimes by placing it at or near the end of the alphabet, such as after '' Z'', '' Å'' and '' Ä'' in Swedish and Finnish, after '' Ý'', ('' Z''), '' Þ'' and '' Æ'' in Icelandic, and after '' V'', ('' W''), '' Õ'' and '' Ä'' in Estonian ( thus fulfilling the place of

omega Omega (; capital: Ω, lowercase: ω; Ancient Greek ὦ, later ὦ μέγα, Modern Greek ωμέγα) is the twenty-fourth and final letter in the Greek alphabet. In the Greek numeric system/isopsephy (gematria), it has a value of 800. The wo ...

, for example in the Finnish expression ''aasta ööhön'' "from A to Z", literally "from A to Ö". However, in Hungarian, and in the

Turkish alphabet The Turkish alphabet ( tr, ) is a Latin-script alphabet used for writing the Turkish language, consisting of 29 letters, seven of which (Ç, Ğ, Dotless I, I, İ, Ö, Ş and Ü) have been modified from their Latin originals for the phonetic requ ...

and other

Turkic alphabets There exist several alphabets used by Turkic languages, i.e. alphabets used to write Turkic languages: * The New Turkic Alphabet (Yañalif) in use in the 1930s USSR (Latin) * The Common Turkic Alphabet, proposed by Turkic Council to unify scripts i ...

that have ''ö'', it is an independent letter between ''o'' and ''p''.

''O''-diaeresis

''O'' with diaeresis occurs in several languages that use diaereses. In these languages the letter represents a normal ''o'', and the pronunciation does not change (e.g. in the Dutch/Afrikaans word ''coöperatief'' ooperative.

In English

Some writers and publications, such as ''

The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...

'', use it in English words such as ''zoölogy'' and ''coöperate'' to indicate that the second vowel is pronounced separately. It is also employed in names such as ''

Laocoön Laocoön (; grc, , Laokóōn, , gen.: ), is a figure in Greek and Roman mythology and the Epic Cycle. Laocoon was a Trojan priest. He and his two young sons were attacked by giant serpents, sent by the gods. The story of Laocoön has been the s ...

'', Coös County, and the

constellation A constellation is an area on the celestial sphere in which a group of visible stars forms Asterism (astronomy), a perceived pattern or outline, typically representing an animal, mythological subject, or inanimate object. The origins of the e ...

Boötes Boötes ( ) is a constellation in the northern sky, located between 0° and +60° declination, and 13 and 16 hours of right ascension on the celestial sphere. The name comes from la, Boōtēs, which comes from grc-gre, Βοώτης, Boṓtēs ...

''. This is also done in

Dutch Dutch commonly refers to: * Something of, from, or related to the Netherlands * Dutch people () * Dutch language () Dutch may also refer to: Places * Dutch, West Virginia, a community in the United States * Pennsylvania Dutch Country People E ...

Usage in phonetic alphabets

In the

Rheinische Dokumenta The Rheinische Dokumenta () is a phonetic writing system developed in the early 1980s by a working group of academics, linguists, local language experts, and local language speakers of the Rhineland. It was presented to the public in 1986 by the L ...

, a phonetic alphabet for many

West Central German West Central German (german: Westmitteldeutsch) belongs to the Central, High German dialect family of German. Its dialects are Franconian and comprise the parts of the Rhinelandic continuum located south of the Benrath line isogloss, including ...

, the

Low Rhenish Meuse-Rhenish (German: ''Rheinmaasländisch'', Dutch: ''Maas-Rijnlands'', and French: ''francique rhéno-mosan'') is the modern term for literature written in the Middle Ages in the greater Meuse-Rhine area, in a literary language that is eff ...

, and few related

vernacular A vernacular or vernacular language is in contrast with a "standard language". It refers to the language or dialect that is spoken by people that are inhabiting a particular country or region. The vernacular is typically the native language, n ...

languages, ''ö'' represents the

close-mid front rounded vowel The close-mid front rounded vowel, or high-mid front rounded vowel, is a type of vowel sound used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents the sound is , a lowercase letter o with a diagonal s ...

with the

IPA IPA commonly refers to: * India pale ale, a style of beer * International Phonetic Alphabet, a system of phonetic notation * Isopropyl alcohol, a chemical compound IPA may also refer to: Organizations International * Insolvency Practitioners ...

notation . The

Uralic phonetic alphabet The Uralic Phonetic Alphabet (UPA) or Finno-Ugric transcription system is a phonetic transcription or notational system used predominantly for the transcription and reconstruction of Uralic languages. It was first published in 1901 by Eemil Nesto ...

uses as in Finnish to denote the front vowel .

Typography

Historically ''O''-diaeresis was written as an ''o'' with two dots above the letter. O-umlaut was written as an ''o'' with a small ''e'' written above in cursive old German (Gothic) script (Oͤ oͤ): this minute ''e'' is represented by two vertical bars connected by a slanted line, which then degenerated to two vertical bars in early modern

handwriting Handwriting is the writing done with a writing instrument, such as a pen or pencil, in the hand. Handwriting includes both printing and cursive styles and is separate from formal calligraphy or typeface A typeface (or font family) is ...

s. In most later handwritings these bars in turn nearly became dots. The origin of the letter ''ö'' was a similar

ligature Ligature may refer to: * Ligature (medicine), a piece of suture used to shut off a blood vessel or other anatomical structure ** Ligature (orthodontic), used in dentistry * Ligature (music), an element of musical notation used especially in the me ...

for the digraph OE: ''e'' was written above ''o'' and degenerated into two small dots. In some inscriptions and display typefaces, ''ö'' may be represented as an ''o'' with a small letter ''e'' inside. In

modern typography Modern typography was a reaction against the perceived decadence of typography and design of the late 19th century. It is mostly associated with the works of Jan Tschichold and Bauhaus typographers Herbert Bayer, László Moholy-Nagy, El Lissitzky ...

there was insufficient space on

typewriter A typewriter is a mechanical or electromechanical machine for typing characters. Typically, a typewriter has an array of keys, and each one causes a different single character to be produced on paper by striking an inked ribbon selectivel ...

s and later

computer keyboard A computer keyboard is a peripheral input device modeled after the typewriter keyboard which uses an arrangement of buttons or keys to act as mechanical levers or electronic switches. Replacing early punched cards and paper tape technology ...

s to allow for both an O-with-dots (also representing ''ö'') and an ''o''-with-bars. Since they looked nearly identical, the two glyphs were combined, which was also done in computer

character encoding Character encoding is the process of assigning numbers to Graphics, graphical character (computing), characters, especially the written characters of Language, human language, allowing them to be Data storage, stored, Data communication, transmi ...

s such as ISO 8859-1. As a result, there was no way to differentiate between the different characters. Other alphabets containing ''o''-diaerisis include the

Welsh alphabet Welsh may refer to: Related to Wales * Welsh, referring or related to Wales * Welsh language, a Brittonic Celtic language spoken in Wales * Welsh people People * Welsh (surname) * Sometimes used as a synonym for the ancient Britons (Celtic peopl ...

. Other alphabets containing ''o''-umlaut include: the

Turkmen alphabet The Turkmen alphabet ( tk, Türkmen elipbiýi / / ) refers to variants of the Latin alphabet, Cyrillic alphabet, or Arabic alphabet used for writing of the Turkmen language. The modified variant of the Latin alphabet currently has an official ...

(for the vowel �, the

Azerbaijani alphabet The Azerbaijani alphabet ( az, Azərbaycan əlifbası, , ) has three versions which includes the Arabic alphabet, Perso-Arabic, Latin alphabet, Latin, and Cyrillic alphabet, Cyrillic alphabets. Azerbaijani language, North Azerbaijani, the offic ...

(for the vowel �, the Yapese alphabet (for �, the Luxembourgian alphabet (when writing loanwords from Standard German), the

Slovenian alphabet The Slovene alphabet ( sl, slovenska abeceda, or ''slovenska gajica'' ) is an extension of the Latin script used to write Slovene. The standard language uses a Latin alphabet which is a slight modification of the Croatian Gaj's Latin alphabet, ...

(when writing loanwords from German, Hungarian and Turkish), and the

Dinka alphabet The Dinka alphabet is used by South Sudanese Dinka people. The written Dinka language is based on the ISO basic Latin alphabet, but with some added letters adapted from the International Phonetic Alphabet. The current orthography is derived from the ...

. The

Hungarian alphabet The Hungarian alphabet () is an extension of the Latin alphabet used for writing the Hungarian language. The alphabet is based on the Latin alphabet, with several added variations of letters. The alphabet consists of the 26 letters of the ISO b ...

contains both ''ö'' and ''ő'': ''double acute o'' is the longer pair of ''ö''. See

double acute accent The double acute accent ( ˝ ) is a diacritic mark of the Latin and Cyrillic scripts. It is used primarily in Hungarian or Chuvash, and consequently it is sometimes referred to by typographers as hungarumlaut. The signs formed with a regular um ...

Encoding

References

External links

The IstroRomanians in Croatia: Alphabet

{{DEFAULTSORT:O O umlaut O umlaut Vowel letters