I (い in hiragana or イ in katakana) is one of the Japanese kana each of which represents one

mora Mora may refer to: People * Mora (surname) Places Sweden * Mora, Säter, Sweden * Mora, Sweden, the seat of Mora Municipality * Mora Municipality, Sweden United States * Mora, Louisiana, an unincorporated community * Mora, Minnesota, a city * M ...

. い is based on the sōsho style of the kanji character 以, and イ is from the

radical Radical may refer to: Politics and ideology Politics *Radical politics, the political intent of fundamental societal change *Radicalism (historical), the Radical Movement that began in late 18th century Britain and spread to continental Europe and ...

(left part) of the kanji character 伊. In the modern Japanese system of sound order, it occupies the second position of the syllable chart, between

あ A ( hiragana: あ, katakana: ア) is a Japanese kana that represents the mora consisting of single vowel . The hiragana character あ is based on the sōsho style of kanji , while the katakana ア is from the radical of kanji . In the modern ...

and

う U (う in hiragana or ウ in katakana) is one of the Japanese kana, each of which represents one mora. In the modern Japanese system of alphabetical order, they occupy the third place in the modern Gojūon (五十音) system of collating kana. ...

. Additionally, it is the first letter in Iroha, before ろ. Both represent the sound . In the

Ainu language Ainu (, ), or more precisely Hokkaido Ainu, is a language spoken by a few elderly members of the Ainu people on the northern Japanese island of Hokkaido. It is a member of the Ainu language family, itself considered a language family isolate ...

, katakana イ is written as ''y'' in their Latin-based syllable chart, and a small ィ after another katakana represents a

diphthong A diphthong ( ; , ), also known as a gliding vowel, is a combination of two adjacent vowel sounds within the same syllable. Technically, a diphthong is a vowel with two different targets: that is, the tongue (and/or other parts of the speech o ...

Variant forms

Like other vowels, scaled-down versions of the kana (ぃ, ィ) are used to express sounds foreign to the Japanese language, such as フィ (fi). In some

Okinawan writing system Okinawan, spoken in Okinawa Island, was once the official language of the Ryukyu Kingdom. At the time, documents were written in kanji and hiragana, derived from Japan. Although generally agreed among linguists to be a distinct language, most ...

s, a small ぃ is also combined with the kana く (''ku'') and ふ to form the digraphs くぃ ''kwi'' and ふぃ ''hwi'' respectively, although the Ryukyu University system uses the kana ゐ/ヰ instead.

Origin

い comes from the left part of the Kanji 以, while イ originates from the left part of the Kanji 伊.Where do the kana come from
/ref> An alternate form - 𛀆, based on the full cursive form of 以 is one of the most common hentaigana, as it merged with い late in the development of modern Japanese writing.

Stroke order

The Hiragana い is made in two strokes: #At the top left, a curved vertical stroke, ending with a hook at the bottom. #At the top right, a shorter stroke, slightly curving in the opposite direction. The Katakana イ is made in two strokes: #At the top, a curved diagonal line going from right to left. #In the center of the last stroke, a vertical line going down.

Other communicative representations

* Full Braille representation When lengthening "-i" or "-e" syllables in Japanese braille, a chōon is always used, as is standard in katakana orthography, instead of adding the い / イ kana. * Computer encodings

Footnotes

{{DEFAULTSORT:I (Kana) Specific kana