Ly is a digraph of the

Latin alphabet The Latin alphabet or Roman alphabet is the collection of letters originally used by the ancient Romans to write the Latin language. Largely unaltered with the exception of extensions (such as diacritics), it used to write English and th ...

, used in Hungarian.

Usage

''Ly'' is the twentieth

letter Letter, letters, or literature may refer to: Characters typeface * Letter (alphabet), a character representing one or more of the sounds used in speech; any of the symbols of an alphabet. * Letterform, the graphic form of a letter of the alphabe ...

of the Hungarian alphabet. Its Hungarian name is ''elipszilon'' . Now, it can represent the same phoneme ( palatal approximant) as the Hungarian letter ''j'', but historically, it represented the different phoneme ( palatal lateral approximant). It is used this way only in Hungarian. In Hungarian, even if two characters are put together to make a different sound, they are considered one letter, and even

acronym An acronym is a word or name formed from the initial components of a longer name or phrase. Acronyms are usually formed from the initial letters of words, as in ''NATO'' (''North Atlantic Treaty Organization''), but sometimes use syllables, as ...

s keep the letter intact. The combination ''lj'' (considered two separate letters, L and J) is also common in Hungarian and is even pronounced by many speakers. However, even it is sometimes subject to the same reduction to that ''ly'' has been, mainly if it is at the end of a word.

History

Originally, the digraph letter ''ly'' was used to represent the palatal lateral , just as the digraph letter '' ny'' is still used to represent the palatal nasal . However, in the eastern dialects as well as in the standard dialect, the phoneme lost its lateral feature and merged with (akin to

Spanish Spanish might refer to: * Items from or related to Spain: **Spaniards are a nation and ethnic group indigenous to Spain **Spanish language, spoken in Spain and many Latin American countries **Spanish cuisine Other places * Spanish, Ontario, Can ...

yeísmo ''Yeísmo'' (; literally "Y-ism") is a distinctive feature of certain dialects of the Spanish language, characterized by the loss of the traditional palatal lateral approximant phoneme (written ) and its merger into the phoneme (written ), ...

''). The Hungarian letter ''ly'' came to be pronounced the same as the Hungarian letter ''j''. In the western dialects, lost its palatal feature and merged with ( alveolar lateral approximant). In the northern dialects, the phoneme has been preserved. The digraph ''ly'' was also used for the sound in Croatian alphabet before

Gaj's Latin Alphabet Gaj's Latin alphabet ( sh-Latn-Cyrl, Gajeva latinica, separator=" / ", Гајева латиница}, ), also known as ( sh-Cyrl, абецеда, ) or ( sh-Cyrl, гајица, link=no, ), is the form of the Latin script used for writing Serb ...

was introduced.Alphabeti Serborum
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Examples

These examples are Hungarian words that use the letter ly, with the English translation following: * furulya = ''flute'' * amely = ''which'' *helyi = ''local'' *golyó = ''ball'' *lyuk = ''hole'' *kehely = ''goblet'' *folyó = ''river''

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ly Latin-script digraphs Hungarian language