Circumflex
The circumflex is a diacritic in the Latin and Greek scripts that is used in the written forms of many languages and in various romanization and transcription schemes. It received its English name from Latin circumflexus "bent around"a translation of the Greek περισπωμένη. The circumflex in the Latin script is chevron-shaped, while the Greek circumflex may be displayed either like a tilde or like an inverted breve.
In English, the circumflex, like other diacritics, is sometimes retained on loanwords that used it in the original language.
A similar typographical symbol, the caret is used in proof-reading and in programming.
In mathematics and statistics, the circumflex is used to denote a function and is called a hat operator.
Uses
Phonetic marker
Pitch
The circumflex has its origins in the polytonic orthography of Ancient Greek, where it marked long vowels that were pronounced with high and then falling pitch. In a similar vein, the circumflex is today used to mark tone contour in the International Phonetic Alphabet.The shape of the circumflex was originally a combination of the acute and grave accents, as it marked a syllable contracted from two vowels: an acute-accented vowel and a non-accented vowel. Later a variant similar to the tilde was also used.
The term "circumflex" is also used to describe similar tonal accents that result from combining two vowels in related languages such as Sanskrit and Latin.
Since Modern Greek has a stress accent instead of a pitch accent, the circumflex has been replaced with an acute accent in the modern monotonic orthography.
Length
The circumflex accent marks a long vowel in the orthography or transliteration of several languages.- In Afrikaans, the circumflex marks a vowel with a lengthened pronunciation, often arising from compensatory lengthening due to the loss of from the original Dutch form. Examples of circumflex use in Afrikaans are sê "to say", wêreld "world", môre "tomorrow", brûe "bridges".
- Akkadian. In the transliteration of this language, the circumflex indicates a long vowel resulting from an aleph contraction.
- In western Cree, Sauk, and Saulteaux, the Algonquianist Standard Roman Orthography indicates long vowels either with a circumflex ⟨â ê î ô⟩ or with a macron ⟨ā ē ī ō⟩.
- The PDA orthography for Domari uses circumflex-bearing vowels for length.
- In Emilian, â î û are used to represent
- French. In some varieties, such as in Belgian French, Swiss French and Acadian French, vowels with a circumflex are long: fête is longer than faite. This length compensates for a deleted consonant, usually s.
- Standard Friulian.
- Japanese. In the Nihon-shiki system of romanization, the circumflex is used to indicate long vowels. The Kunrei-shiki system, which is based on Nihon-shiki system, also uses the circumflex. The Traditional and Modified forms of the Hepburn system use the macron for this purpose, though some users may use the circumflex as a substitute if there are difficulties inputting the macron, as the two diacritics are visually similar.
- Jèrriais.
- In Kurmanji Kurdish, ⟨ê î û⟩ are used to represent.
- Ligurian language.
- In Luxembourgish m̂ n̂ can be used to indicate nasalisation of a vowel. Also, the circumflex can be over the vowel to indicate nasalisation. In either case, the circumflex is rare.
- Old Malay
- In Serbo-Croatian the circumflex can be used to distinguish homographs, and it is called the "genitive sign" or "length sign". Examples include sam "am" versus sâm "alone". For example, the phrase "I am alone" may be written Ja sam sâm to improve clarity. Another example: da "yes", dâ "gives".
- Turkish. According to Turkish Language Association orthography, düzeltme işareti "correction mark" over a, i and u marks a long vowel to disambiguate similar words. For example, compare ama "but" and âmâ "blind", şura 'that place, there' and şûra "council". In general, circumflexes occur only in Arabic and Persian loanwords as vowel length in early Turkish was not phonemic. However, this standard was never applied entirely consistently and by the early 21st century many publications had stopped using circumflexes almost entirely.
- Welsh. The circumflex is known as hirnod "long sign" or acen grom "crooked accent", but more usually and colloquially as to bach "little roof". It lengthens a stressed vowel, and is used particularly to differentiate between homographs; e.g. tan and tân, ffon and ffôn, gem and gêm, cyn and cŷn, or gwn and gŵn. However the circumflex is only required on elongated vowels if the same word exists without the circumflex - "nos", for example, has an elongated "o" sound but a circumflex is not required as the same word with a shortened "o" doesn't exist.
- In Adûnaic, the Black Speech, and Khuzdul, constructed languages of J. R. R. Tolkien, all long vowels are transcribed with the circumflex. In Sindarin, another of Tolkien's languages, long vowels in polysyllabic words take the acute, but a circumflex in monosyllables, to mark a non-phonemic extra lengthening.
Stress
- Portuguese â, ê, and ô are stressed "closed" vowels, opposed to their open counterparts á, é, and ó.
- Welsh: the circumflex, due to its function as a disambiguating lengthening sign, is used in polysyllabic words with word-final long vowels. The circumflex thus indicates the stressed syllable, since in Welsh, non-stressed vowels may not normally be long. This happens notably where the singular ends in an a, to, e.g. singular camera, drama, opera, sinema → plural camerâu, dramâu, operâu, sinemâu; however, it also occurs in singular nominal forms, e.g. arwyddocâd; in verbal forms, e.g. deffrônt, cryffânt; etc.
Vowel quality
- In Bamanankan, it marks a falling tone, as opposed to a háček which signifies that on this syllable, the tone is rising.
- In Breton, it is used on an e to show that the letter is pronounced open instead of closed.
- In Bulgarian, the sound represented in Bulgarian by the Cyrillic letter ъ is usually transliterated as â in systems used prior to 1989. Although called a schwa, it is more accurately described as a mid back unrounded vowel. Unlike English or French, but similar to Romanian and Afrikaans, it can be stressed.
- In Pinyin romanized Mandarin Chinese, ê is used to represent the sound in isolation, which occurs sometimes as an exclamation.
- In French, the letter ê is normally pronounced open, like è. In the usual pronunciations of central and northern France, ô is pronounced close, like eau; in Southern France, no distinction is made between close and open o.
- Portuguese â, ê, and ô are stressed high vowels, in opposition to á, é, and ó, which are stressed low vowels.
- In Romanian, the circumflex is used on the vowels â and î to mark the vowel, similar to Russian yery. The names of these accented letters are â din a and î din i, respectively.
- In Slovak, the circumflex turns the letter o into a diphthong: ô.
- In Swedish dialect and folklore literature the circumflex is used to indicate the phonemes or , or and in dialects and regional accents where these are distinct from , or and respectively, unlike Standard Swedish where and, and are short and long allophones of the phonemes and respectively, and where Old Swedish short has merged with from Old Swedish instead of centralizing to or fronting to and remaining a distinct phoneme as in the dialects in question. Different methods can be found in different literature, so some author may use æ instead of â, or use â where others use å̂.
- Vietnamese â, ê, and ô are higher vowels than a, e, and o. The circumflex can appear together with a tone mark on the same vowel, as in the word Việt. Vowels with circumflex are considered separate letters from the base vowels.
Other articulatory features
- In Emilian, ê ô denote both length and height. In Romagnol, they are used to represent the diphthongs /eə, oə/, whose specific articulation varies between dialects, e.g. sêl "salt".
- In Chichewa, ŵ used to denote the voiced bilabial fricative ; nowadays, however, most Chichewa-speakers pronounce it as a regular.
- In Pinyin, the romanized writing of Mandarin Chinese, ẑ, ĉ, and ŝ are, albeit rarely, used to represent zh, ch, and sh, respectively.
- In Esperanto, the circumflex is used on ĉ, ĝ, ĥ, ĵ, ŝ. Each indicates a different consonant from the unaccented form, and is considered a separate letter for purposes of collation.
- In Nsenga, ŵ denotes the labiodental approximant.
- In Philippine languages, the circumflex is used to represent the simultaneous occurrence of a stress and a glottal stop in the last vowel of the word.
- In Old Tupi, the circumflex changed a vowel into a semivowel: î, û, and ŷ.
- In Rusyn, the letter ŷ is sometimes used to transliterate the Cyrillic ы.
- In Turkish, the circumflex over a and u is sometimes used in words of Arabic or Persian derivation to indicate when a preceding consonant is to be pronounced as a palatal plosive;, . The circumflex over i is used to indicate a nisba suffix.
- In the African language Venda, a circumflex below d, l, n, and t is used to represent dental consonants: ḓ, ḽ, ṋ, ṱ.
- In Pinyin, according to Scheme for the Chinese Phonetic Alphabet, ĉ, ŝ, and ẑ are used as abbreviations for ch, sh, and zh, which represent retroflex consonants.
- In the 18th century, the Real Academia Española introduced the circumflex accent in Spanish to mark that a ch or x were pronounced and respectively : châracteres, exâcto. This usage was quickly abandoned during the same century, once the RAE decided to use ch and x with one assigned pronunciation only: and respectively.
- In Domari, the circumflex is used on the letters <ĉ ĝ ĵ ŝ ẑ> to represent the sounds of /t͡ʃ ɣ d͡ʒ ʃ ʒ/. It is also used above vowels to indicate length.
Abbreviation, contraction, and disambiguation
English
In 18th century British English, before the cheap Penny Post and while paper was taxed, the combination ough was occasionally shortened to ô when the gh was not pronounced, to save space: thô for though, thorô for thorough, and brôt for brought.French
In French, the circumflex generally marks the former presence of a consonant that was deleted and is no longer pronounced. For example:- ancêtre "ancestor"
- hôpital "hospital"
- hôtel "hostel"
- forêt "forest"
- rôtir "to roast"
- côte "rib, coast, slope"
- pâté "paste"
- août "August"
- dépôt
In handwritten French, for example in taking notes, an m with a circumflex is an informal abbreviation for même "same".
In February 2016, the Académie française decided to remove the circumflex from about 2000 words, a plan that had been outlined since 1990. However, usage of the circumflex would not be considered incorrect.
Italian
In Italian, î is occasionally used in the plural of nouns and adjectives ending with -io as a crasis mark. Other possible spellings are -ii and obsolete -j or -ij. For example, the plural of vario "various" can be spelt vari, varî, varii; the pronunciation will usually stay with only one. The plural forms of principe "prince" and of principio "principle, beginning" can be confusing. In pronunciation, they are distinguished by whether the stress is on the first or on the second syllable, but principi would be a correct spelling of both. When necessary to avoid ambiguity, it is advised to write the plural of principio as principî or as principii.Norwegian
In Norwegian, the circumflex differentiates fôr "lining, fodder" from the preposition for. From a historical point of view, the circumflex also indicates that the word used to be spelled with the letter ð in Old Norsefor example, fôr is derived from fóðr, lêr 'leather' from leðr, and vêr "weather, ram" from veðr. After the ð disappeared, it was replaced by a d.Mathematics
In mathematics, the circumflex is used to modify variable names; it is usually read "hat", e.g., î is "i hat". The Fourier transform of a function ƒ is often denoted by.In the notation of sets, a hat above an element signifies that the element was removed from the set, such as in, the set containing all elements except.
In geometry, a hat is sometimes used for an angle. For instance, the angles or.
In vector notation, a hat above a letter indicates a unit vector. For instance,,, or stands for a unit vector in the direction of the x-axis of a Cartesian coordinate system.
In statistics, the hat is used to denote an estimator or an estimated value, as opposed to its theoretical counterpart. For example, in errors and residuals, the hat in indicates an observable estimate of an unobservable quantity called . It is read x-hat or x-roof, where x represents the character under the hat.
Music
In music theory and musicology, a circumflex above a numeral is used to make reference to a particular scale degree.In music notation, a chevron-shaped symbol placed above a note indicates marcato, a special form of emphasis or accent. In music for string instruments, a narrow inverted chevron indicates that a note should be performed up-bow.