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A, or a, is the first letter and the first vowel letter of the modern
A
English alphabet and the ISO basic Latin alphabet.[1][2] Its name in
English is a (pronounced /ˈeɪ/), plural aes.[nb 1] It is similar in shape to
the Ancient Greek letter alpha, from which it derives.[3] The
uppercase version consists of the two slanting sides of a triangle,
crossed in the middle by a horizontal bar. The lowercase version can
Aa
(See below)
be written in two forms: the double-storey a and single-storey ɑ. The
latter is commonly used in handwriting and fonts based on it,
especially fonts intended to be read by children, and is also found in
italic type.
In the English grammar, "a", and its variant "an", are indefinite
articles.
Contents
History
Usage
Typographic variants
Writing system Latin script
Use in writing systems
English Type Alphabet
A
a
Latin/
Phoenician Greek Etruscan Boeotian Greek Latin 300 AD
Egyptian Semitic Cyrillic
aleph Alpha A 800–700 BC Uncial Uncial
A
The earliest certain ancestor of "A" is aleph (also written 'aleph), the first letter of the Phoenician alphabet,[4]
which consisted entirely of consonants (for that reason, it is also called an abjad to distinguish it from a true
alphabet). In turn, the ancestor of aleph may have been a pictogram of an ox head in proto-Sinaitic script[5]
influenced by Egyptian hieroglyphs, styled as a triangular head with two horns extended.
The Etruscans brought the Greek alphabet to their civilization in the Italian Peninsula and left the letter
unchanged. The Romans later adopted the Etruscan alphabet to write the Latin language, and the resulting
letter was preserved in the Latin alphabet that would come to be used to write many languages, including
English.
Typographic variants
During Roman times, there were many variant forms of the letter "A". First was the monumental or lapidary
style, which was used when inscribing on stone or other "permanent" media. There was also a cursive style
used for everyday or utilitarian writing, which was done on more perishable surfaces. Due to the "perishable"
nature of these surfaces, there are not as many examples of this style as there are of the monumental, but there
are still many surviving examples of different types of cursive, such as majuscule cursive, minuscule cursive,
and semicursive minuscule. Variants also existed that were intermediate between
the monumental and cursive styles. The known variants include the early semi-
uncial, the uncial, and the later semi-uncial.[6]
Italic type is commonly used to mark emphasis or more generally to distinguish one part of a text from the rest
(set in Roman type). There are some other cases aside from italic type where script a ("ɑ"), also called Latin
alpha, is used in contrast with Latin "a" (such as in the International Phonetic Alphabet).
English
In modern English orthography, the letter ⟨a⟩ represents at least seven different vowel sounds:
⟨a⟩ is the third-most-commonly used letter in English Pronunciation of the name of the letter ⟨a⟩ in
(after ⟨e⟩ and ⟨t⟩),[8] and the second most common in European languages, note that /a/ and /aː/ can
Spanish and French. In one study, on average, about differ phonetically between [a], [ä], [æ] and [ɑ]
3.68% of letters used in English texts tend to be ⟨a⟩, depending on the language.
while the number is 6.22% in Spanish and 3.95% in
French.[8]
Other languages
In most languages that use the Latin alphabet, ⟨a⟩ denotes an open unrounded vowel, such as /a/, /ä/, or /ɑ/.
An exception is Saanich, in which ⟨a⟩ (and the glyph Á) stands for a close-mid front unrounded vowel /e/.
Other systems
in the International Phonetic Alphabet, ⟨a⟩ is used for the open front unrounded vowel, ⟨ä⟩ is
used for the open central unrounded vowel, and ⟨ɑ⟩ is used for the open back unrounded
vowel.
in X-SAMPA, ⟨a⟩ is used for the open front unrounded vowel and ⟨A⟩ is used for the open back
unrounded vowel.
Other uses
In algebra, the letter a along with various other letters of the alphabet is often used to denote a variable, with
various conventional meanings in different areas of mathematics. Moreover, in 1637, René Descartes
"invented the convention of representing unknowns in equations by x, y, and z, and knowns by a, b, and c",[9]
and this convention is still often followed, especially in elementary algebra.
In geometry, capital A, B, C etc. are used to denote segments, lines, rays, etc.[6] A capital A is also typically
used as one of the letters to represent an angle in a triangle, the lowercase a representing the side opposite
angle A.[5]
"A" is often used to denote something or someone of a better or more prestigious quality or status: A-, A or
A+, the best grade that can be assigned by teachers for students' schoolwork; "A grade" for clean restaurants;
A-list celebrities, etc. Such associations can have a motivating effect, as exposure to the letter A has been
found to improve performance, when compared with other letters.[10]
"A" is used as a prefix on some words, such as asymmetry, to mean "not" or "without" (from Greek).
In English grammar, "a", and its variant "an", is an indefinite article, used to introduce noun phrases.
Finally, the letter A is used to denote size, as in a narrow size shoe,[5] or a small cup size in a brassiere.[11]
Related characters
ᚨ : Runic letter ansuz, which probably derives from old Italic A[23]
Computing codes
Character information
Preview A a
Unicode name LATIN CAPITAL LETTER A LATIN SMALL LETTER A
ASCII 1 65 41 97 61
1 Also for encodings based on ASCII, including the DOS, Windows, ISO-8859 and Macintosh
families of encodings.
Other representations
NATO phonetic Morse code
Alpha ▄ ▄▄▄
Footnotes
1. "Latin alphabet | Definition, Description, History, & Facts" (https://www.britannica.com/topic/Lati
n-alphabet). Encyclopedia Britannica.
2. Simpson & Weiner 1989, p. 1
3. McCarter 1974, p. 54
4. Hoiberg 2010, p. 1
5. Hall-Quest 1997, p. 1
6. Diringer 2000, p. 1
7. Gelb & Whiting 1998, p. 45
8. Trinity College 2006
9. Tom Sorell, Descartes: A Very Short Introduction, (2000). New York: Oxford University Press. p.
19.
10. Ciani & Sheldon 2010, pp. 99–100
11. Luciani, Jené (2009). The Bra Book: The Fashion Formula to Finding the Perfect Bra. Dallas,
TX: Benbella Books. p. 13. ISBN 9781933771946. OCLC 317453115 (https://www.worldcat.or
g/oclc/317453115).
12. Constable, Peter (19 April 2004), L2/04-132 Proposal to Add Additional Phonetic Characters to
the UCS (https://www.unicode.org/L2/L2004/04132-n2740-phonetic.pdf) (PDF), archived (http
s://web.archive.org/web/20171011014355/http://www.unicode.org/L2/L2004/04132-n2740-pho
netic.pdf) (PDF) from the original on 11 October 2017, retrieved 24 March 2018 – via
www.unicode.org
13. Everson, Michael; et al. (20 March 2002), L2/02-141: Uralic Phonetic Alphabet Characters for
the UCS (https://www.unicode.org/L2/L2002/02141-n2419-uralic-phonetic.pdf) (PDF), archived
(https://web.archive.org/web/20180219081033/http://www.unicode.org/L2/L2002/02141-n2419-
uralic-phonetic.pdf) (PDF) from the original on 19 February 2018, retrieved 24 March 2018 – via
www.unicode.org
14. Anderson, Deborah; Everson, Michael (7 June 2004), L2/04-191: Proposal to Encode Six Indo-
Europeanist Phonetic Characters in the UCS (https://www.unicode.org/L2/L2004/04191-n2788-
laryngeals.pdf) (PDF), archived (https://web.archive.org/web/20171011014402/http://www.unic
ode.org/L2/L2004/04191-n2788-laryngeals.pdf) (PDF) from the original on 11 October 2017,
retrieved 24 March 2018 – via www.unicode.org
15. Everson, Michael; Dicklberger, Alois; Pentzlin, Karl; Wandl-Vogt, Eveline (2 June 2011), L2/11-
202: Revised Proposal to Encode "Teuthonista" Phonetic Characters in the UCS (https://www.u
nicode.org/L2/L2011/11202-n4081-teuthonista.pdf) (PDF), archived (https://web.archive.org/we
b/20171011012426/http://www.unicode.org/L2/L2011/11202-n4081-teuthonista.pdf) (PDF) from
the original on 11 October 2017, retrieved 24 March 2018 – via www.unicode.org
16. Suignard, Michel (9 May 2017), L2/17-076R2: Revised Proposal for the Encoding of an
Egyptological YOD and Ugaritic Characters (https://www.unicode.org/L2/L2017/17076r2-n4792
r2-egyptological-yod.pdf) (PDF), archived (https://web.archive.org/web/20190330043926/http
s://www.unicode.org/L2/L2017/17076r2-n4792r2-egyptological-yod.pdf) (PDF) from the original
on 30 March 2019, retrieved 8 March 2019 – via www.unicode.org
17. Jensen, Hans (1969). Sign, Symbol, and Script. New York: G.P. Putman's Sons.
18. "Hebrew Lesson of the Week: The Letter Aleph" (https://www.timesofisrael.com/spotlight/hebre
w-lesson-of-the-week-letter-aleph/). 17 February 2013. Archived (https://web.archive.org/web/2
0180526113655/https://www.timesofisrael.com/spotlight/hebrew-lesson-of-the-week-letter-alep
h/) from the original on 26 May 2018. Retrieved 25 May 2018 – via The Times of Israel.
19. "Cyrillic Alphabet" (https://www.britannica.com/topic/Cyrillic-alphabet). Encyclopedia
Britannica. Archived (https://web.archive.org/web/20180526114423/https://www.britannica.co
m/topic/Cyrillic-alphabet) from the original on 26 May 2018. Retrieved 25 May 2018.
20. Silvestre, M. J. B. (1850). Universal Palaeography (https://books.google.com/books?id=n2QWA
AAAYAAJ&q=coptic+alphabet&pg=PA123). Translated by Madden, Frederic. London: Henry G.
Bohn.
21. Frothingham, A. L., Jr. (1891). "Italic Studies" (https://books.google.com/books?id=fwAoAQAAI
AAJ&q=old+italic+greek+alphabet&pg=PA534). Archaeological News. American Journal of
Archaeology. 7 (4): 534. JSTOR 496497 (https://www.jstor.org/stable/496497).
22. Steele, Philippa M., ed. (2017). Understanding Relations Between Scripts: The Aegean Writing
Systems (https://books.google.com/books?id=Lv4sDwAAQBAJ&q=old+italic+script+greek&pg
=PA96). Oxford: Oxbow Books. ISBN 9781785706479.
23. Fortson, Benjamin W. (2010). Indo-European Language and Culture: An Introduction (https://bo
oks.google.com/books?id=bSxHgej4tKMC&q=Runic+developed+from+old+italic&pg=PA349)
(second ed.). John Wiley & Sons. ISBN 9781444359688.
24. "𐌰" (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/%F0%90%8C%B0). Wiktionary.
References
"English Letter Frequency" (http://www.math.cornell.edu/~mec/2003-2004/cryptography/subs/fr
equencies.html). Math Explorer's Club. Cornell University. 2004. Archived (https://web.archive.
org/web/20140422040328/http://www.math.cornell.edu/~mec/2003-2004/cryptography/subs/fre
quencies.html) from the original on 22 April 2014. Retrieved 28 May 2014.
"Percentages of Letter Frequencies per Thousand Words" (https://web.archive.org/web/200701
25220315/http://starbase.trincoll.edu/~crypto/resources/LetFreq.html). Trinity College. 2006.
Archived from the original (http://starbase.trincoll.edu/~crypto/resources/LetFreq.html) on 25
January 2007. Retrieved 11 May 2015.
Ciani, Keith D.; Sheldon, Kennon M. (2010). "A Versus F: The Effects of Implicit Letter Priming
on Cognitive Performance". British Journal of Educational Psychology. 80 (1): 99–119.
doi:10.1348/000709909X466479 (https://doi.org/10.1348%2F000709909X466479).
PMID 19622200 (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/19622200).
Diringer, David (2000). "A". In Bayer, Patricia (ed.). Encyclopedia Americana. I: A-Anjou
(First ed.). Danbury, CT: Grolier. ISBN 978-0-7172-0133-4.
Gelb, I. J.; Whiting, R. M. (1998). "A". In Ranson, K. Anne (ed.). Academic American
Encyclopedia. I: A–Ang (First ed.). Danbury, CT: Grolier. ISBN 978-0-7172-2068-7.
Hall-Quest, Olga Wilbourne (1997). "A". In Johnston, Bernard (ed.). Collier's Encyclopedia. I: A
to Ameland (First ed.). New York, NY: P.F. Collier.
Hoiberg, Dale H., ed. (2010). "A" (https://archive.org/details/newencyclopaedia2009ency).
Encyclopædia Britannica. 1: A-ak–Bayes. Chicago, IL: Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
ISBN 978-1-59339-837-8.
McCarter, P. Kyle (1974). "The Early Diffusion of the Alphabet". The Biblical Archaeologist. 37
(3): 54–68. doi:10.2307/3210965 (https://doi.org/10.2307%2F3210965). JSTOR 3210965 (http
s://www.jstor.org/stable/3210965). S2CID 126182369 (https://api.semanticscholar.org/CorpusI
D:126182369).
Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E.S.C., eds. (1989). "A" (https://archive.org/details/oxfordenglishdic01o
xfo). The Oxford English Dictionary. I: A–Bazouki (2nd ed.). Oxford, UK: Oxford University
Press. ISBN 978-0-19-861213-1.
External links
History of the Alphabet (http://members.peak.org/~jeremy/dictionaryclassic/chapters/pix/alphab
et.gif)
Texts on Wikisource:
"A" in A Dictionary of the English Language by Samuel Johnson
"A". The American Cyclopædia. 1879.
"A". Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). 1911.
"A". The New Student's Reference Work. 1914.
"A". Collier's New Encyclopedia. 1921.
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