T, or t, is the twentieth letter in the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is ''tee'' (pronounced ), plural ''tees''. It is derived from the Semitic

Taw Taw, tav, or taf is the twenty-second and last letter of the Semitic abjads, including Phoenician Tāw , Hebrew Tav , Aramaic Taw , Syriac Taw ܬ, and Arabic ت Tāʼ (22nd in abjadi order, 3rd in modern order). In Arabic, it is also gives ri ...

𐤕 of the Phoenician and

Paleo-Hebrew The Paleo-Hebrew script ( he, הכתב העברי הקדום), also Palaeo-Hebrew, Proto-Hebrew or Old Hebrew, is the writing system found in Canaanite inscriptions from the region of biblical Israel and Judah. It is considered to be the script ...

script ( Aramaic and Hebrew Taw ת/𐡕/ Taw

, Syriac Taw ܬ, and Arabic ت Tāʼ) via the Greek letter τ ( tau). In English, it is most commonly used to represent the voiceless alveolar plosive, a sound it also denotes in the

International Phonetic Alphabet The International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) is an alphabetic system of phonetic transcription, phonetic notation based primarily on the Latin script. It was devised by the International Phonetic Association in the late 19th century as a standa ...

. It is the most commonly used consonant and the second most commonly used letter in English-language texts.

History

'' was the last letter of the Western

Semitic Semitic most commonly refers to the Semitic languages, a name used since the 1770s to refer to the language family currently present in West Asia, North and East Africa, and Malta. Semitic may also refer to: Religions * Abrahamic religions ** ...

and Hebrew alphabets. The sound value of Semitic ''Taw'', Greek alphabet Tαυ (''Tau''), Old Italic and Latin T has remained fairly constant, representing in each of these; and it has also kept its original basic shape in most of these alphabets.

Use in writing systems

English

In English, usually denotes the voiceless alveolar plosive (

and X-SAMPA: ), as in ''tart'', ''tee'', or ''ties'', often with aspiration at the beginnings of words or before stressed vowels. The digraph often corresponds to the sound (a voiceless palato-alveolar sibilant) word-medially when followed by a vowel, as in ''nation'', ''ratio'', ''negotiation,'' and ''Croatia''. The letter corresponds to the affricate in some words as a result of

yod-coalescence The phonological history of the English language includes various changes in the phonology of consonant clusters. H-cluster reductions The H-cluster reductions are various consonant reductions that have occurred in the history of English, inv ...

(for example, in words ending in "-ture", such as ''future''). A common digraph is , which usually represents a dental fricative, but occasionally represents (as in ''Thomas'' and ''thyme''.) In a few words of modern French origin, the letter T is silent at the end of a word; these include ''croquet'' and ''debut''.

Other languages

In the orthographies of other languages, is often used for , the voiceless dental plosive , or similar sounds.

Other systems

In the

, denotes the voiceless alveolar plosive.

Related characters

Descendants and related characters in the Latin alphabet

*T with

diacritic A diacritic (also diacritical mark, diacritical point, diacritical sign, or accent) is a glyph added to a letter or to a basic glyph. The term derives from the Ancient Greek (, "distinguishing"), from (, "to distinguish"). The word ''diacriti ...

s: Ť ť Ṫ ṫ ẗ Ţ ţ Ṭ ṭ Ʈ ʈ Ț ț ƫ Ṱ ṱ Ṯ ṯ Ŧ ŧ Ⱦ ⱦ Ƭ ƭ ᵵ

ᶵ The palatal hook () is a type of hook diacritic formerly used in the International Phonetic Alphabet to represent palatalized consonants. It is a small, leftwards-facing hook joined to the bottom-right side of a letter, and is distinguished from ...

*Ꞇ ꞇ : Insular T, also used by William Pryce to designate the voiceless dental fricative �ref name=Insular> *ᫎ : Combining small insular t was used in the Ormulum * : Turned small t is used in the

(IPA) *𐞯 : Modifier letter small t with retroflex hook is a superscript IPA letter *𝼉 : Latin small letter t with hook and retroflex hook is a symbol for a voiceless retroflex implosive *𝼍 : Latin small turned t with curl is a click letter * Uralic Phonetic Alphabet-specific symbols related to T: ** ** ** ** *ₜ : Subscript small t was used in the Uralic Phonetic Alphabet prior to its formal standardization in 1902 * ȶ : T with curl is used in Sino-Tibetanist linguistics *Ʇ ʇ : Turned capital T and turned small t were used in transcriptions of the Dakota language in publications of the American Board of Ethnology in the late 19th century *𝼪 : Small t with mid-height left hook was used by the

British and Foreign Bible Society The British and Foreign Bible Society, often known in England and Wales as simply the Bible Society, is a non-denominational Christian Bible society with charity status whose purpose is to make the Bible available throughout the world. The Soc ...

in the early 20th century for romanization of the Malayalam language.

Ancestors and siblings in other alphabets

*𐤕 :

letter

, from which the following symbols originally derive **Τ τ : Greek letter Tau *** :

Coptic Coptic may refer to: Afro-Asia * Copts, an ethnoreligious group mainly in the area of modern Egypt but also in Sudan and Libya * Coptic language, a Northern Afro-Asiatic language spoken in Egypt until at least the 17th century * Coptic alphabet ...

letter Taw, which derives from Greek Tau ***Т т :

Cyrillic , bg, кирилица , mk, кирилица , russian: кириллица , sr, ћирилица, uk, кирилиця , fam1 = Egyptian hieroglyphs , fam2 = Proto-Sinaitic , fam3 = Phoenician , fam4 = G ...

letter Te, also derived from Tau *** :

Gothic Gothic or Gothics may refer to: People and languages *Goths or Gothic people, the ethnonym of a group of East Germanic tribes **Gothic language, an extinct East Germanic language spoken by the Goths **Crimean Gothic, the Gothic language spoken b ...

letter tius, which derives from Greek Tau ***𐌕 : Old Italic T, which derives from Greek Tau, and is the ancestor of modern Latin T **** : Runic letter teiwaz, which probably derives from old Italic T *ፐ : One of the 26 consonantal letters of Ge'ez script. The Ge'ez abugida developed under the influence of Christian scripture by adding obligatory vocalic diacritics to the consonantal letters. Pesa ፐ is based on Tawe ተ.

Derived signs, symbols and abbreviations

*™ :

Trademark symbol The trademark symbol is a symbol to indicate that the preceding mark is a trademark, specifically an unregistered trademark. It complements the registered trademark symbol which is reserved for trademarks registered with an appropriate gov ...

*₮ : Mongolian tögrög *₸ :

Kazakhstani tenge The tenge ( or ; kk, теңге, teñge, ; sign: ₸ ; code: KZT) is the currency of Kazakhstan. It is divided into 100 tiyn ( kk, тиын, tıyın also transliterated as ''tiyin''). History After the breakup of the Soviet Union in December ...

History

Use in writing systems

English

Other languages

Other systems

Related characters

Descendants and related characters in the Latin alphabet

Ancestors and siblings in other alphabets

Derived signs, symbols and abbreviations

Computing codes

Other representations

Explanatory notes

References

External links