U (У у; italics: ''У у'') is a letter of the Cyrillic script. It commonly represents the

close back rounded vowel The close back rounded vowel, or high back rounded vowel, is a type of vowel sound used in many spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is , and the equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is u. In ...

, somewhat like the pronunciation of in "boot" or rule. The forms of the Cyrillic letter U are similar to the lowercase of the Latin letter Y (Y y; ''Y y''), but like most other Cyrillic letters, the upper and lowercase forms are similar in shape and differ mainly in size and vertical placement.

History

Historically, Cyrillic U evolved as a specifically East Slavic short form of the digraph used in ancient Slavic texts to represent . The digraph was itself a direct loan from the Greek alphabet, where the combination ( omicron- upsilon) was also used to represent . Later, the o was removed, leaving the modern upsilon-only form. Consequently, the form of the letter is derived from Greek upsilon , which was parallelly also taken over into the Cyrillic alphabet in another form, as Izhitsa . (The letter Izhitsa was removed from the

Russian alphabet The Russian alphabet (russian: ру́сский алфави́т, russkiy alfavit, , label=none, or russian: ру́сская а́збука, russkaya azbuka, label=none, more traditionally) is the script used to write the Russian language. I ...

in the orthography reform of 1917/19.) It is normally romanised as "u", but in Kazakh, it is romanised as "w". In the Cyrillic numeral system, the Cyrillic letter U had a value of 400.

In other languages

In Tuvan the Cyrillic letter can be written as a double vowel.

Related letters and other similar characters

*Υ υ : Greek letter Upsilon *U u : Latin letter U *Y y : Latin letter Y *Ў ў : Cyrillic letter Short U, used in

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 ...

, Dungan, Siberian Eskimo (Yuit), Uzbek *Ӯ ӯ : Cyrillic letter U with macron, used in

Tajik Tajik, Tadjik, Tadzhik or Tajikistani may refer to: * Someone or something related to Tajikistan * Tajiks, an ethnic group in Tajikistan, Afghanistan and Uzbekistan * Tajik language, the official language of Tajikistan * Tajik (surname) * Tajik cu ...

and Carpatho-Rusyn *Ӱ ӱ : Cyrillic letter U with diaeresis, used in Altai (Oyrot), Khakas, Gagauz, Khanty, Mari *Ӳ ӳ : Cyrillic letter U with double acute, used in Chuvash *Ү ү : Cyrillic letter straight U, used in Mongolian,

Kazakh Kazakh, Qazaq or Kazakhstani may refer to: * Someone or something related to Kazakhstan *Kazakhs, an ethnic group *Kazakh language *The Kazakh Khanate * Kazakh cuisine * Qazakh Rayon, Azerbaijan *Qazax, Azerbaijan *Kazakh Uyezd, administrative dis ...

, Tatar, Bashkir, Dungan and other languages *Ұ ұ : Cyrillic letter Straight U with stroke, used in

However, many Dungan books are set using Ӯ, with macron, instead of Ў, with breve, like the Dungan-Russian dictionary (1968). There is no ambiguity since it is the only У-with-a-diacritic in Dungan. It is used in Dungan syllables for which pinyin would use ''-u'' except in those with labial consonants (in ''du'', ' ''nu'', ''lu'', ''gu'', ''hu'', ''zu'', ''ru'', etc. but not ''bu'' or ''mu'') *Ꭹ Ꮍ : The syllables ''gi'' and ''mu'' of the Cherokee syllabary; Ꭹ (''gi'') notably appearing in the Cherokee self-designation ᏣᎳᎩ (''Tsalagi'') *ע: The Hebrew letter Ayin

Computing codes

References

External links

* *{{Wiktionary-inline, у Vowel letters