|
|
|
|
L
|
| |
|
| |
L or l, described in English as L with stroke, is a letter of the Polish, Kashubian, Sorbian, Lacinka (Latin Belarusian), Wilamowicean, Navajo, Dene Suline, Inupiaq and Dogrib alphabets, and of several proposed alphabets for the Venetian language. In Slavic languages, it represents the Lechitic–West Slavic continuation of Proto-Slavic non-palatal l (see dark L). In most non-European languages, it represents a voiceless alveolar lateral fricative or similar sound.
olish, L is used to distinguish historical dark (velarized) L from clear L.
In 1440 Jakub Pakoszowic proposed a letter resembling to represent clear L.
Discussion
Start a new discussion about 'L' Answer questions from other users |
Encyclopedia
L or l, described in English as L with stroke, is a letter of the Polish, Kashubian, Sorbian, Lacinka (Latin Belarusian), Wilamowicean, Navajo, Dene Suline, Inupiaq and Dogrib alphabets, and of several proposed alphabets for the Venetian language. In Slavic languages, it represents the Lechitic–West Slavic continuation of Proto-Slavic non-palatal l (see dark L). In most non-European languages, it represents a voiceless alveolar lateral fricative or similar sound.
Polish
In Polish, L is used to distinguish historical dark (velarized) L from clear L.
In 1440 Jakub Pakoszowic proposed a letter resembling to represent clear L. For dark L he suggested l with a stroke running in the opposite direction as the modern version. The latter was introduced in 1514-1515 by Stanislaw Zaborowski in his Orthographia seu modus recte scribendi et legendi Polonicum idioma quam ultissimus. L with stroke originally represented a velarized alveolar lateral approximant, a pronunciation which is preserved in the eastern part of Poland and among the Polish minority in Lithuania, Belarus, and Ukraine.
In modern Polish, L is normally pronounced (almost exactly as w in English as a consonant, as in were, will, firewall but not as in new or straw). This pronunciation first appeared among Polish lower classes in the 16th century. It was considered an uncultured accent by the upper classes (who pronounced L almost exactly as: ? in East Slavic languages or L in English pull) until the mid-20th century when this distinction gradually began to fade. The old pronunciation of L is still fully understandable but is considered theatrical in most regions.
Polish L usually corresponds to Russian unpalatalised ? in native words and grammar forms, although the pronunciation of L and ? are different in modern Polish and Russian. Polish final L also often corresponds to Ukrainian final/pre-consonant Cyrillic ? and Belarusian ?. Thus, "he gave" is "dal" in Polish, "???" in Ukrainian, "???" in Belarusian and "???" in Russian.
The shift from to in Polish has affected all instances of dark L, even word-initially or intervocalically, e.g.
ladny ("pretty, nice") is pronounced , slowo ("word") is , and cialo ("body") is .
In Polish L often alternates with clear L, such as the plural forms of adjectives and verbs in the past tense that are associated with masculine personal nouns, e.g. maly ? mali ( ? ). Alternation is also common in declension of nouns, e.g. from nominative to locative, tlo ? na tle ( ? ).
Other languages
In Belarusian Lacinka, L corresponds to Cyrillic ?, and is normally pronounced (almost exactly as l in English pull), both in the 1929 and 1962 versions.
The letter L is also used for non-Slavic languages, including languages that did not originally develop a writing system based on the Latin alphabet, such as Navajo and Ahtna.
In Navajo, L is used for a voiceless alveolar lateral fricative , like the Welsh Ll.
In Venetian L is used in substitution for L in many words in which the pronunciation of L has become different for several varieties of the language, such as becoming mute or becoming the sound of English a and the Venetian e. For example: "la gondola " can be pronounced as (in Venetian) "la gondola", or "la g̣ndoa", or "la g̣ndoea".
When writing Scandinavian dialects having the pronunciation of a retroflex flap for the standard languages' L, many authors employ L.
L is used in orthographic transcription of Ahtna, an Athabaskan language spoken in Alaska; it represents a breathy lateral fricative. It is also used in Tanacross, a related Athabaskan language.
Computer usage
The Unicode codepoints for the letter are U+0142 for the lower case, and U+0141 for the capital.
In the LaTeX typesetting system l with stroke may be typeset with the command \l.
See also
External links
- in Polish Diacritics: How to?, by Adam Twardoch, Polish country delegate at ATypI
|
| |
|
|
