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Ѕ is a letter of the Cyrillic alphabet used in the Macedonian alphabet, and formerly used in the Russian and Romanian Cyrillic alphabets. The letter is known as "Dze" in Macedonian, and has the IPA value /dz/.

Origin

The letter is based on Dzělo ( ) in the Early Cyrillic alphabet, where it had the numerical value 6. The letter Dzělo was itself based on the letter Dzelo in the Glagolitic alphabet. In the Glagolitic alphabet it was written , and had the numerical value of 8. In Old Church Slavonic it was called "ѕѣло" (pronounced dzeló), and in Church Slavonic it was called "ѕѣлѡ" (pronounced zeló).

The origin of Glagolitic letter "dzelo" is unclear, however, the Cyrillic Ѕ is probably derived in some way from the Greek letter "Ϛ" (stigma), which had the same numerical value (6), and was similar in pronunciation (/st/ in Greek, /dz/ in Slavic). Thus the homoglyphic traits of the Cyrillic Ѕ and Latin S are largely coincidental, although the letters are distantly related: the Latin letter originates directly from the Greek sigma (Σ), whereas the Cyrillic letter originates from the pair of letters Στ (upper case) στ (lower case).

Development

The initial sound of the letter S in Old Church Slavonic was a soft /dz/ or /z/, which often became a /g/ sound in modern Russian, as in мъноѕи (Russian: мъногъ), по ноѕѣ (Russian: нога), and растрьѕати (Russian: растръгати). However, already in the Old Slavic period the difference between S and З began to be blurred, and in the written Church Slavonic language from the middle of the 17th century the letter Ѕ was used only formally. The letter's distinguishing features from З were

S had the numerical value of 6, whereas З had the numerical value of 7;
S was used at the beginning of words (for example ѕвѣзда, ѕвѣрь, ѕеліе, ѕлакъ, ѕлый, ѕмій, ѕѣлѡ and their derivatives);
З was used in all remaining cases.

In Russian it was known as зѣло ('zʲɛ.lə) and had the IPA values /dz/, /z/ or /zʲ/.

In the initial version of Russian civil script of Tsar Peter I (1708), the letter S was assigned the sound /z/, and the letter З was abolished. However, in the second version of the civil script (1710), З was restored, and S was abolished. Both versions of alphabet were used until 1735, which is considered the date of the final cancellation of letter S.

See also Reforms of Russian orthography.

S was used in the Romanian Cyrillic alphabet (where it had the IPA value /dz/) until the alphabet was abolished in favor of a Latin-based alphabet in 1860-62. S was also used -- albeit rarely -- to the middle of the 19th century in the Serbian civil script, whose orthography was closer to Church Slavonic (compared to Russian). Vuk Karadžić's Serbian Cyrillic alphabet (1868) did not include S, instead favoring the digraph ДЗ (/dz/), as in the word "надзирати" (nadzirati, superintendent).

Current Usage

S is now only used in the Macedonian alphabet. A commission formed to standardize the Macedonian language and orthography decided on December 4, 1944 -- after a vote of 10-1 -- to adopt the letter. The letter has the IPA value /dz/ [examples: ѕид (dzid, wall); ѕвезда (dzvezda, star)].

References

Cyrillic S (Russian Wikipedia) (in Russian)