A pentagraph (from the el, πέντε, ''pénte'', "five" and γράφω, ''gráphō'', "write") is a sequence of five letters used to represent a single sound (phoneme), or a combination of sounds, that do not correspond to the individual values of the letters. In
German
German(s) may refer to:
* Germany (of or related to)
**Germania (historical use)
* Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language
** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law
**Ger ...
, for example, the pentagraph ''tzsch'' represents the sound of the English
digraph ''ch,'' and indeed is found in the English word ''
Nietzschean''.
Irish
Irish may refer to:
Common meanings
* Someone or something of, from, or related to:
** Ireland, an island situated off the north-western coast of continental Europe
***Éire, Irish language name for the isle
** Northern Ireland, a constituent unit ...
has several pentagraphs.
Latin-script pentagraphs
For Latin-script pentagraphs see
List of Latin-script pentagraphs.
Cyrillic-script pentagraphs
In
Cyrillic
, bg, кирилица , mk, кирилица , russian: кириллица , sr, ћирилица, uk, кирилиця
, fam1 = Egyptian hieroglyphs
, fam2 = Proto-Sinaitic
, fam3 = Phoenician
, fam4 = G ...
used for
languages of the Caucasus
The Caucasian languages comprise a large and extremely varied array of languages spoken by more than ten million people in and around the Caucasus Mountains, which lie between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea.
Linguistic comparison allows th ...
, there are a couple five-letter sequences used for 'strong' (typically transcribed in the IPA as geminate, and doubled in Cyrillic) labialized consonants. Since both features are predictable from the orthography, their pentagraph status is dubious.
The pentagraph is used in
Archi for : a
labialized
Labialization is a secondary articulatory feature of sounds in some languages. Labialized sounds involve the lips while the remainder of the oral cavity produces another sound. The term is normally restricted to consonants. When vowels involve ...
, which is the '
strong' counterpart of the
pharyngealized
Pharyngealization is a secondary articulation of consonants or vowels by which the pharynx or epiglottis is constricted during the articulation of the sound.
IPA symbols
In the International Phonetic Alphabet, pharyngealization can be indicated ...
voiceless uvular fricative
The voiceless uvular fricative is a type of consonantal sound used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is , the Greek chi. The sound is represented by (ex with underdot) in Ame ...
(), written using the trigraph , whose graph is in turn an unpredictable derivation of () and thus a true trigraph. It occurs, for example, in an Archi word ''ххьIвелтIбос'' meaning ''rummage through someone else's things''.
See also
*
Trigraph
*
Tetragraph
A tetragraph (from the el, τετρα-, ''tetra-'', "four" and γράφω, ''gráphō'', "write") is a sequence of four letters used to represent a single sound (phoneme), or a combination of sounds, that do not necessarily correspond to the indi ...
*
Hexagraph
A hexagraph (from the el, ἕξ, ''héx'', "six" and γράφω, ''gráphō'', "write") is a sequence of six letters used to represent a single sound (phoneme), or a combination of sounds that do not correspond to the individual values of the lett ...
*
Heptagraph
A heptagraph is a sequence of seven letters used to represent a single sound (phoneme), or a combination of sounds, that do not correspond to the individual values of the letters.
Heptagraphs are extremely rare. Morse code uses 2 heptagraph: , for ...
References
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