En-ghe (Ҥ ҥ; italics: ''Ҥ ҥ'') is a letter of the

Cyrillic script The Cyrillic script ( ), Slavonic script or the Slavic script, is a writing system used for various languages across Eurasia. It is the designated national script in various Slavic, Turkic, Mongolic, Uralic, Caucasian and Iranic-speaking co ...

used only in non-Slavic languages. The shape of the letter originated as a

ligature Ligature may refer to: * Ligature (medicine), a piece of suture used to shut off a blood vessel or other anatomical structure ** Ligature (orthodontic), used in dentistry * Ligature (music), an element of musical notation used especially in the me ...

of the Cyrillic letters en (Н н) and ghe (Г г), but en-ghe is used as a separate letter in alphabets. It represents the

velar nasal The voiced velar nasal, also known as agma, from the Greek word for 'fragment', is a type of consonantal sound used in some spoken languages. It is the sound of ''ng'' in English ''sing'' as well as ''n'' before velar consonants as in ''Englis ...

, like the pronunciation of ⟨ng⟩ in "sing". Ҥ is romanized using Ṅ, Ng, or even Ŋ. En-ghe is used in the alphabets of the

Aleut The Aleuts ( ; russian: Алеуты, Aleuty) are the indigenous people of the Aleutian Islands, which are located between the North Pacific Ocean and the Bering Sea. Both the Aleut people and the islands are politically divided between the ...

, Altai, Meadow Mari, and Yakut languages. In certain

Old Slavonic Old Church Slavonic or Old Slavonic () was the first Slavic literary language. Historians credit the 9th-century Byzantine missionaries Saints Cyril and Methodius with standardizing the language and using it in translating the Bible and other ...

manuscripts, a character of the same shape could be used to represent palatalized , a role similar to modern Serbian/Macedonian letter nje (Њ њ). These manuscripts also may contain similarly built characters for palatalized Д, З, Л and Р.

Computing codes

Related letters and other similar characters

* Ң ң : Cyrillic letter en with descender * Ӈ ӈ : Cyrillic letter en with hook * Ŋ ŋ : Latin letter eng * U+A790 LATIN CAPITAL LETTER N WITH DESCENDER

U+A791 LATIN SMALL LETTER N WITH DESCENDER

: Latin letter n with descender *𝆦:

Hauptstimme In music, (German for ''primary voice'') or is the main voice, chief part; i.e., the contrapuntal or melodic line of primary importance, in opposition to . (German for ''secondary voice'') or is the secondary part; i.e., a secondary contr ...

Cyrillic ligatures {{Cyrillic-alphabet-stub