А (А а; italics: ''А а'') is a letter of the

Cyrillic script The Cyrillic script ( ) is a writing system used for various languages across Eurasia. It is the designated national script in various Slavic languages, Slavic, Turkic languages, Turkic, Mongolic languages, Mongolic, Uralic languages, Uralic, C ...

. It commonly represents an

open central unrounded vowel The open central unrounded vowel, or low central unrounded vowel, is a type of vowel sound, used in several spoken languages. While the International Phonetic Alphabet officially has no dedicated letter for this sound between front and back , ...

, halfway between the pronunciation of in "cat" and "father". The Cyrillic letter А is

romanized In linguistics, romanization is the conversion of text from a different writing system to the Roman (Latin) script, or a system for doing so. Methods of romanization include transliteration, for representing written text, and transcription, ...

using the Latin letter A.

History

The Cyrillic letter А was derived directly from the Greek letter Alpha (). In the

Early Cyrillic alphabet The Early Cyrillic alphabet, also called classical Cyrillic or paleo-Cyrillic, is an alphabetic writing system that was developed in Medieval Bulgaria in the Preslav Literary School during the late 9th century. It is used to write the Chur ...

its name was (azǔ), meaning the

personal pronoun Personal pronouns are pronouns that are associated primarily with a particular grammatical person – first person (as ''I''), second person (as ''you''), or third person (as ''he'', ''she'', ''it''). Personal pronouns may also take different f ...

"I". In the

Cyrillic numeral system Cyrillic numerals are a numeral system derived from the Cyrillic script, developed in the First Bulgarian Empire in the late 10th century. It was used in the First Bulgarian Empire and by South and East Slavic peoples. The system was used in R ...

, the Cyrillic letter А has a value of 1.

Form

Throughout history, the Cyrillic letter А has had various shapes, but today is standardized on one that looks exactly like the Latin letter A, including the italic and

lower case Letter case is the distinction between the letters that are in larger uppercase or capitals (more formally ''majuscule'') and smaller lowercase (more formally '' minuscule'') in the written representation of certain languages. The writing system ...

forms.

Usage

In most languages that use the Cyrillic alphabet – such as Bulgarian, Ukrainian,

Belarusian Belarusian may refer to: * Something of, or related to Belarus * Belarusians, people from Belarus, or of Belarusian descent * A citizen of Belarus, see Demographics of Belarus * Belarusian language * Belarusian culture * Belarusian cuisine * Byelor ...

Russian Russian(s) may refer to: *Russians (), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries *A citizen of Russia *Russian language, the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages *''The Russians'', a b ...

, Rusyn,

Serbian Serbian may refer to: * Pertaining to Serbia in Southeast Europe; in particular **Serbs, a South Slavic ethnic group native to the Balkans ** Serbian language ** Serbian culture **Demographics of Serbia, includes other ethnic groups within the co ...

Macedonian Macedonian most often refers to someone or something from or related to Macedonia. Macedonian(s) may refer to: People Modern * Macedonians (ethnic group), a nation and a South Slavic ethnic group primarily associated with North Macedonia * Mac ...

and Montenegrin – the Cyrillic letter А represents the

. In

Ingush Ingush may refer to: * Ingush language, Northeast Caucasian language * Ingush people, an ethnic group of the North Caucasus See also *Ingushetia (disambiguation) Ingushetia is a federal republic and subject of Russia. Ingushetia may also refer ...

and Chechen the Cyrillic letter А represents both the

open back unrounded vowel The open back unrounded vowel, or low back unrounded vowel, is a type of vowel sound, used in some Speech, spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is , and the equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is A ...

and the mid-central vowel . In Tuvan the letter can be written as a

double vowel Double letter may refer to: *Digraph (orthography)#Homogeneous digraph - a type of digraph * Gemination#Double letters that are not long consonants {{disambiguation ...

Related letters and other similar characters

*A a : Latin letter A *Á á :

Latin letter A with acute Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area around Rome, Italy. Through the expansion of ...

*Α α : Greek letter Alpha *Ă ă :

Latin letter A with breve Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area around Rome, Italy. Through the expansion of ...

*Â â :

Latin letter A with Circumflex Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area around Rome, Italy. Through the expansion of ...

*Ā ā : Latin letter A with Macron *Æ æ : Latin letter Ash *À à :

Latin letter A with grave Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...

Computing codes

References

External links

* * {{Authority control Vowel letters Cyrillic script