Tse (Cyrillic)

History

Tse is thought to have come from the Hebrew letter Tsadi ⟨צ⟩ or the Arabic letter ص, via the Glagolitic letter Tsi (Ⱌ ⱌ). It is unclear what Egyptian hieroglyph originated the letter Tse, possibly derived from an image of a fish hook or a papyrus plant.

The name of Tse in the Early Cyrillic alphabet is (tsi). New Church Slavonic and Russian (archaic name) spelling of the name is . In modern Russian, Ukrainian, and Belarusian, the name of the letter is pronounced [tsɛ] and spelled (sometimes ) in Russian, in Ukrainian, and in Belarusian.

In the Cyrillic numeral system, Tse has a value of 900. Tse may also have been derived from Sampi (based on numerical relationship) or Fai (based on shape and numerical relationship).

Usage

Russian

It is the 24th (if Yo is included) letter of the Russian alphabet. It is used both in native Slavic words (and corresponds to Proto-Indo-European *k in certain positions) and in borrowed words:

• as a match for the Latin in words of Latin origin, such as цирк (circus), центр (centre),
• for the German and (which in turn both came from the High German consonant shift), in words borrowed from German, such as цинк (Zink), плац (Platz),
• may correspond to Latin (before vowels), such as сцинтилляция (scintillation).

Unlike most other consonants (but like and ), never represents a palatalised consonant in Russian (except occasionally in foreign proper names with or ). Since /i/ after unpalatalised consonants becomes [ɨ], the combinations and are pronounced identically: [tsɨ]. A notable rule of Russian orthography is that is rarely followed by , with the following exceptions:

• the ending - of the plural number or the genitive case (птица nominative singular → птицы nominative plural or genitive singular),
• possessive suffix - is spelled - after and only then: троицын, курицын,
  • the suffix is very popular in Russian last names, but spelling varies and both - and - are possible, Ельцин is an example,
• the ending of adjectives - (that becomes -, -, -, - in declension) such as куцый or бледнолицый,
• conjugation of a vulgar verb сцать (сцы, сцым, сцыт, сцыте, сцышь) and its prefixed derivatives,
• a few other word roots: цыган, цык- (цыкать, цыкнуть), цып- (цыплёнок, цыпки, цыпочки, цып-цып), цыц, цыркать,
  • pre-1956 lists contain words such as цыбик, цыбуля, цыгарка, цыдулка, цыкля, цымбалы, цымес, цынга, цыновка, цынубель, цырюльня, цытварный, цыфирь, панцырь, etc. (examples taken from Ya. S. Khomutov's spelling dictionary, 1927 but now all those words are spelled with -ци-),
• Pinyin's becomes , and becomes .

Related letters and other similar characters

• Reversed Tse (Ꙡ ꙡ)
• Tse with long left leg ([[File:Cyrillic_capital_letter_Tse_with_long_left_leg.svg|17x17px]] [[File:Cyrillic_capital_letter_Tse_with_long_left_leg.svg|11x11px]]) was used in Old Uslar's Caucasian Alphabets as is derived from Cyrillic letter Tse (Ц ц), with a longer left leg.
• צ : Hebrew letter Tsadi
• C c : Latin letter C
• С с : Cyrillic letter С
• Ț ț : Latin letter T with comma below, used in Romanian to represent the [ts] sound
• Ţ ţ : Latin letter T with cedilla, used in Gagauz to represent that very sound
• Ŧ ŧ : Latin letter T with stroke
• Ts ts ʦ: Digraph Ts
• Z z: Latin letter Z - same sound in German and Italian

Computing codes

References

References

1. (July 2018). "Evolution of Ancient Alphabet to Modern Greek, Latin and Cyrillic Alphabets and Transcription between Them". Atlantis Press.
2. Kamusella, Tomasz. (2019). "The New Polish Cyrillic in Independent Belarus". Colloquia Humanistica.
3. Unicode. "22262-cyrillic-caucasian-langs.pdf".
4. (3 May 2012). "Baron Pyotr Karlovich Uslar: Inventor of the First Abkhaz Alphabet, by Stephen D. Shenfield".