Ll (digraph)

Ll/ll is a digraph that occurs in several languages

English

In English, often represents the same sound as single : . The doubling is used to indicate that the preceding vowel is (historically) short, or that the "l" sound is to be extended longer than a single would provide (etymologically, in latinisms coming from a gemination). It is worth noting that different English language traditions use and in different words: for example the past tense form of "travel" is spelt "" in British English but "" in American English. See also: American and British English spelling differences#Doubled consonants.

Welsh

In Welsh, stands for a voiceless alveolar lateral fricative sound (IPA: ). This sound is very common in place names in Wales because it occurs in the word , for example, , where the appears twice, or , where (in the full name) the appears five times – with two instances of .

In Welsh, is a separate ''digraph letter'' from (e.g., sorts before ). In modern Welsh this, and other digraph letters, are written with two symbols but count as one letter. In Middle Welsh it was written with a tied ligature; this ligature is included in the Latin Extended Additional Unicode block as and . This ligature is seldom used in Modern Welsh, but equivalent ligatures may be included in modern fonts, for example the three fonts commissioned by the Welsh Government in 2020.

Romance languages

Catalan

In Catalan, represents the phoneme , as in (language, tongue), (linkage, connection), or (knife).

L with middle dot

In order to not confuse with a geminated , Catalan uses a middle dot (interpunct or in Catalan) in between . For example ("excellent"). The first character in the digraph, and , is included in the Latin Extended-A Unicode block at U+013F (uppercase) and U+140 (lowercase) respectively.

In Catalan typography, is intended to fill two spaces, not three, so the interpunct is placed in the narrow space between the two s: and . However, it is common to write and , occupying three spaces. and , although sometimes seen, are incorrect.

Galician

In official Galician spelling the combination stands for the phoneme (palatal lateral approximant, a palatal counterpart of ).

Spanish

In Spanish, was considered from 1754 to 2010 the fourteenth letter of the Spanish alphabet because of its representation of a palatal lateral articulation consonant phoneme (as defined by the Royal Academy of the Spanish Language).
* This single letter was called pronounced "elye", but often losing the /l/ sound and simplifying to "eh-ye".
* The letter was collation, collated after as a separate entry from 1803 until April 1994 when the X Congress of the Association of Spanish Language Academies adopted standard Latin alphabet collation rules. Since then, the digraph has been considered a sequence of two characters. (A similar situation occurred with the Spanish-language digraph ch (digraph), ch.)
* Hypercorrection leads some to wrongly capitalize as a single letter, as with the Dutch language, Dutch IJ (letter), IJ, for example * instead of . In handwriting, is written as a Typographic ligature, ligature of two s, with distinct uppercase and lowercase forms.
* Today, most Spanish speakers outside Spain pronounce with virtually the same sound as , a phenomenon called yeísmo. In much of the Spanish-speaking Americas, and in many regions of Spain, is produced (voiced palatal fricative); in Colombian Spanish, Colombia and Tabasco, Mexico, as well as Rioplatense Spanish, Rioplatense speakers in both Argentina and Uruguay, pronounce ll as (voiced postalveolar fricative) or (voiceless postalveolar fricative).

Philippine languages

While languages of the Philippines, Philippine languages like Tagalog language, Tagalog and Ilocano language, Ilocano write or when spelling Spanish loanwords, still survives in proper nouns. However, the pronunciation of is simply rather than . Hence the surnames ''Llamzon'', ''Llamas'', ''Padilla'', ''Bellen'', ''Basallote'' and ''Villanueva'' are respectively pronounced /, , , , and /.

Furthermore, in Ilocano represents a geminate alveolar lateral approximant , like in Italian language, Italian.

Albanian

In Albanian language, Albanian, stands for the sound , while is pronounced as the velarization, ''velarized'' sound .

Icelandic

In Icelandic language, Icelandic, the can represent (similar to a voiceless alveolar lateral affricate), or depending on which letters surround it. appears in ("full", masculine), appears in ("full", neuter), and appears in ("full", neuter genitive). The geographical name Eyjafjallajökull includes the sound twice.

Broken L

In Old Norse#Old Icelandic, Old Icelandic, the broken L ligature appears in some instances, such as (field) and (all). It takes the form of a lowercase with the top half shifted to the left, connected to the lower half with a thin horizontal stroke. This ligature is encoded in the Latin Extended-D Unicode block at U+A746 (uppercase) and U+A747 (lowercase), displaying as Ꝇ and ꝇ respectively.

Inuit-Yupik languages

In Central Alaskan Yupʼik language, Central Alaskan Yupʼik and the Greenlandic language, stands for .

Other languages

In the Gwoyeu Romatzyh romanization of Standard Chinese, Mandarin Chinese, final indicates a falling tone on a syllable ending in , which is otherwise spelled .

In Haida language, Haida (Bringhurst orthography), is glottalized .

See also

* Lh (digraph)
* Lj (digraph)
* Hungarian ly

References

{{Latin script
Latin-script digraphs