Kaph (also spelled kaf) is the eleventh
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
Semitic abjads, including
Phoenician kāp
,
Hebrew
Hebrew (; ; ) is a Northwest Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family. Historically, it is one of the spoken languages of the Israelites and their longest-surviving descendants, the Jews and Samaritans. It was largely preserved ...
kāf
,
Aramaic kāp
,
Syriac Syriac may refer to:
*Syriac language, an ancient dialect of Middle Aramaic
*Sureth, one of the modern dialects of Syriac spoken in the Nineveh Plains region
* Syriac alphabet
** Syriac (Unicode block)
** Syriac Supplement
* Neo-Aramaic languages ...
kāp̄
, and
Arabic
Arabic (, ' ; , ' or ) is a Semitic language spoken primarily across the Arab world.Semitic languages: an international handbook / edited by Stefan Weninger; in collaboration with Geoffrey Khan, Michael P. Streck, Janet C. E.Watson; Walte ...
kāf (in
abjadi order
The Abjad numerals, also called Hisab al-Jummal ( ar, حِسَاب ٱلْجُمَّل, ), are a decimal alphabetic numeral system/alphanumeric code, in which the 28 letters of the Arabic alphabet are assigned numerical values. They have been us ...
).
The Phoenician letter gave rise to the
Greek kappa
Kappa (uppercase Κ, lowercase κ or cursive ; el, κάππα, ''káppa'') is the 10th letter of the Greek alphabet, representing the voiceless velar plosive sound in Ancient and Modern Greek. In the system of Greek numerals, has a value o ...
(Κ),
Latin K, and
Cyrillic
, bg, кирилица , mk, кирилица , russian: кириллица , sr, ћирилица, uk, кирилиця
, fam1 = Egyptian hieroglyphs
, fam2 = Proto-Sinaitic
, fam3 = Phoenician
, fam4 = Gr ...
К.
Origin of kaph
Kaph is thought to be derived from a pictogram of a hand (in both modern
Arabic
Arabic (, ' ; , ' or ) is a Semitic language spoken primarily across the Arab world.Semitic languages: an international handbook / edited by Stefan Weninger; in collaboration with Geoffrey Khan, Michael P. Streck, Janet C. E.Watson; Walte ...
and
modern Hebrew, kaph כף means "palm" or "grip"), though in Arabic the ''a'' in the name of the letter (كاف) is pronounced longer than the ''a'' in the word meaning "palm" (كَف).
D46
Hebrew kaf
Hebrew spelling:
Hebrew pronunciation
The letter kaf is one of the six letters that can receive a
dagesh
The dagesh () is a diacritic used in the Hebrew alphabet. It was added to the Hebrew orthography at the same time as the Masoretic system of niqqud (vowel points). It takes the form of a dot placed inside a Hebrew letter and has the effect of mod ...
kal. The other five are
bet,
gimel,
daleth
Dalet (, also spelled Daleth or Daled) is the fourth letter of the Semitic abjads, including Phoenician Dālet 𐤃, Hebrew Dālet , Aramaic Dālath , Syriac Dālaṯ , and Arabic (in abjadi order; 8th in modern order). Its sound value is ...
,
pe, and
tav (see
Hebrew alphabet for more about these letters).
There are two orthographic variants of this letter that alter the pronunciation:
Kaf with the dagesh
When the kaph has a "dot" in its center, known as a
dagesh
The dagesh () is a diacritic used in the Hebrew alphabet. It was added to the Hebrew orthography at the same time as the Masoretic system of niqqud (vowel points). It takes the form of a dot placed inside a Hebrew letter and has the effect of mod ...
, it represents a
voiceless velar plosive (). There are various rules in
Hebrew grammar that stipulate when and why a dagesh is used.
Kaf without the dagesh (khaf)
When this letter appears as ''without'' the
dagesh
The dagesh () is a diacritic used in the Hebrew alphabet. It was added to the Hebrew orthography at the same time as the Masoretic system of niqqud (vowel points). It takes the form of a dot placed inside a Hebrew letter and has the effect of mod ...
("dot") in its center it represents , like the ''ch'' in German "Bach".
In
modern Israeli Hebrew
Modern Hebrew ( he, עברית חדשה, ''ʿivrít ḥadašá ', , '' lit.'' "Modern Hebrew" or "New Hebrew"), also known as Israeli Hebrew or Israeli, and generally referred to by speakers simply as Hebrew ( ), is the standard form of the He ...
the letter
heth
Heth, sometimes written Chet, but more accurately Ḥet, is the eighth letter of the Semitic abjads, including Phoenician Ḥēt 𐤇 , Hebrew Ḥēth , Aramaic Ḥēth , Syriac Ḥēṯ ܚ, Arabic Ḥā' , and Maltese Ħ, ħ.
Heth origina ...
is often pronounced as a , but many communities (particularly those of Mizrahi and Sephardi origins, as well as immigrants to Israel from Arab countries and Arab Israelis) have differentiated between these letters as in other Semitic languages.
Final form of kaf
If the letter is at the end of a word the symbol is drawn differently. However, it does not change the pronunciation or
transliteration in any way. The name for the letter is ''final kaf'' (). Four additional Hebrew letters take final forms:
tsadi
Tsade (also spelled , , , , tzadi, sadhe, tzaddik) is the eighteenth letter of the Semitic abjads, including Phoenician ṣādē , Hebrew ṣādi , Aramaic ṣāḏē , Syriac ṣāḏē ܨ, Ge'ez ṣädäy ጸ, and Arabic . Its oldest phonet ...
,
mem,
nun, and
pei. Kaf/khaf is the only Hebrew letter that can take a vowel in its word-final form, which is pronounced after the consonant, that vowel being the
qamatz.
Significance of kaph in Hebrew
In
gematria
Gematria (; he, גמטריא or gimatria , plural or , ''gimatriot'') is the practice of assigning a numerical value to a name, word or phrase according to an alphanumerical cipher. A single word can yield several values depending on the cipher w ...
, kaph represents the number 20. Its final form represents 500, but this is rarely used,
tav and
qoph (400+100) being used instead.
As a
prefix, kaph is a
preposition:
*It can mean "like" or "as", as in literary Arabic (see below).
*In colloquial Hebrew, kaph and
shin together have the meaning of "when". This is a contraction of , ''ka'asher'' (when).
Arabic kāf
The letter is named ''kāf'', and it is written in several ways depending on its position in the word.
There are three variants of the letter:
* the basic form is used for the Arabic language and many other languages:
* the cross-barred form, notably or , is used predominantly as an alternative form of the version above in all forms of Arabic and in the languages that use the
Perso-Arabic script.
* the long s-shaped variant form, ,
which is used in Arabic texts and for writing the Qur'an. It has a particular use in the
Sindhi language of Pakistan, where it represents the unaspirated /k/, in contrast to the
aspirated /kʰ/, which is written using the "normal" kāf (called ''
keheh'').
In
varieties of Arabic ''kāf'' is almost universally pronounced as the
voiceless velar plosive , but in
rural Palestinian and
Iraqi, it is pronounced as a
voiceless postalveolar affricate
The voiceless palato-alveolar sibilant affricate or voiceless domed postalveolar sibilant affricate is a type of consonantal sound used in some spoken languages. The sound is transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet with , (formerly ...
.
Use in literary Arabic
In
Literary Arabic
Literary Arabic (Arabic: ' ) may refer to:
* Classical Arabic
* Modern Standard Arabic
Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) or Modern Written Arabic (MWA), terms used mostly by linguists, is the variety of standardized, literary Arabic that develo ...
, ''kāf'', when used as a prefix ', is one of the Arabic words for ''"like"'', ''"as"'', or ''"as though"'' (the other, , is unrelated). For example, (), means "like a bird" or "as though a bird" (as in Hebrew, above) and attached to "this, that" forms the fixed expression "like so, likewise."
''kāf'' is used as a
possessive suffix for second-person singular nouns (feminine taking ' , and masculine ' ); for instance, ' ("book") becomes ' ("your book", where the person spoken to is masculine) ' ("your book", where the person spoken to is feminine). At the ends of sentences and often in conversation the final vowel is suppressed, and thus ' ("your book"). In several varieties of vernacular Arabic, however, the ''kāf'' with no
harakat is the standard second-person possessive, with the literary Arabic harakah shifted to the letter ''before'' the ''kāf'': thus masculine "your book" in these varieties is ' and feminine "your book" '.
Character encodings
See also
*
Ca (Indic)
Ca is the sixth consonant of Indic abugidas. In modern Brahmic scripts, Indic scripts, ca is derived from the early "Ashoka" Brahmi letter , which is probably derived from the North Semitic letter tsade (reflected in the Aramaic , "ts"), with an ...
*
Gaf
GAF may refer to:
Military
* General of the Air Force, US
* Ghana Armed Forces
* Guardia alla Frontiera, Italy
Other uses
* Gaf, a Perso-Arabic letter
* Gaf (Mandaeism), a demon of the Mandaean underworld
* GAF Materials Corporation, an Ame ...
*
Ka (Indic)
Ka is the first consonant of the Indic abugidas. In modern Indic scripts, ka is derived from the Brāhmī letter , which is (according to the Semitic hypothesis) derived from the Aramaic ("K").
Mathematics Āryabhaṭa numeration
Aryabhata us ...
*
Ngaph
References
{{Northwest Semitic abjad
Phoenician alphabet
Arabic letters
Hebrew letters
Letters with final form