Editing Ge with upturn

{{Cyrillic alphabet navbox|
Heading=Cyrillic letter <br>Ghe with upturn|
Image=[[Image:Cyrillic letter Ghe with upturn.png]]|
uuc=0490|ulc=0491}}
'''Ge with upturn''' (Ґ,&nbsp;ґ; italics: <span style="font-family: times, 'Times New Roman', serif; font-size: larger">''Ґ'',&nbsp;''ґ''</span>) is a letter of the [[Cyrillic alphabet]] mainly used in [[Ukrainian alphabet|Ukrainian]], [[Urum language|Urum]] and [[Rusyn language|Rusyn]]. In these languages it is called Ge. It is also called Ghe, or by its [[Unicode]] name, <small>CYRILLIC CAPITAL/SMALL LETTER GHE WITH UPTURN</small>.

It represents the [[voiced velar plosive]] /ɡ/, like the English pronunciation of ‹g› in "go".

The [[letterform]] of Ge with upturn is based on the [[Ge (Cyrillic)|Cyrillic letter Ge]] (Г,&nbsp;г), called He in Ukrainian, but its handwritten and italic lowercase forms do not follow the italic modification of Ge (<span style="font-family: times, 'Times New Roman', serif;">''г''</span>).

== History ==
The common Slavic [[voiced velar plosive]]  [ɡ] is represented in most Cyrillic orthographies by the letter ‹[[Ge (Cyrillic)|Г]]›, called Ge in most languages.  In Ukrainian, however, sometime around the early thirteenth century, this sound lenited to the [[voiced velar fricative]] [ɣ] (except in the cluster *zg),<sup>[]</sup> and around the sixteenth century debuccalized to the [[voiced glottal fricative]] [ɦ]<sup>[]</sup> (pronounced like the ‹h› in English "behind").  The [[phoneme]] continued to be represented by ‹Г›, called He in Ukrainian.

Within a century after this sound change began, /ɡ/ was reintroduced from Western European loanwords.  Since then, it has been represented by several different notations in writing. 

In early Belarusian and Ukrainian orthographies, Latin ‹g› or the [[Digraph (orthography)|digraph]] ‹кг› (''kh'') were sometimes used to denote the sound of Latin ‹g› in assimilated words. Later the practice of distinguishing this sound and using the digraph disappeared from Belarusian orthography.<!-- Needs expanding with Old Ukrainian practice, Smotritsky's grammar etc. --> In the nineteenth century, the letter ‹ґ›,<!-- invented by Smotritsky? --> serving an identical purpose, was introduced into the orthographies of [[Ukrainian language|Ukrainian]] and [[Rusyn language]].

The letter ‹ґ› was eliminated from the [[Ukrainian alphabet]] in the Soviet orthographic reforms of 1933, its function subsumed into that of the letter ‹г›, pronounced /ɦ/ in Ukrainian. However, ‹ґ› continued to be used by Ukrainians in [[Galicia (Central Europe)|Galicia]] (under Poland until 1939) and in the Ukrainian [[diaspora]] worldwide.  It was reintroduced to Soviet Ukraine in a 1990 orthographic reform under [[Glasnost]].

During the twentieth century, some Belarusian linguists, notably [[Yan Stankyevich]], promoted both the reintroduction of the practice of pronouncing Latin ‹g› in, at least, newly assimilated words, and the adoption of letter ‹ґ› to represent it. However, consensus on this has never been reached, and this letter has never been part of standard [[Belarusian alphabet]], seeing only sporadic periods of use. For example, a code of alternative Belarusian orthography rules, based on the proposal of [[V. Vyachorka]] and published in 2005, has the optional letter ‹ґ› included in the alphabet, but not obligatory to be used and in any case it could be replaced by ‹г›.

==Code positions==
{| class="wikitable"
! [[Character encoding]] !! [[Case (orthography)|Case]] !! [[Decimal]] !! [[Hexadecimal]] !! [[Octal]] !! [[Binary numeral system|Binary]]
|-
|rowspan=2|[[Unicode]]||[[Majuscule|Capital]]||align="right"|1168||align="right"|0490||align="right"|002220||align="right"|0000010010010000
|-
| |[[Lower case|Small]]||align="right"|1169||align="right"|0491||align="right"|002221||align="right"|0000010010010001
|-
|rowspan=2|[[Windows-1251]]||Capital||align="right"|165||align="right"|a5||align="right"|245||align="right"|10100101
|-
| |Small||align="right"|180||align="right"|b4||align="right"|264||align="right"|10110100
|-
|rowspan=2|[[KOI8-U]]||Capital||align="right"|189||align="right"|bd||align="right"|275||align="right"|10111101
|-
| |Small||align="right"|173||align="right"|ad||align="right"|255||align="right"|10101101
|}

== See also ==
*[[G|G, g (Latin)]]
*[[Ge (Cyrillic)|Г, г - Ge (Cyrillic)]]

== Notes ==
* 1. Shevelov (1977:145) 
* 2. Shevelov (1977:148)

== References ==
* George Y. Shevelov (1977). “[http://140.247.132.248/huri/pdf/hus_volumes/vI_n2june1977.pdf On the Chronology of ''H'' and the New ''G'' in Ukrainian]”, in ''Harvard Ukrainian Studies'', vol 1, no 2 (June 1977), pp 137–52. Cambridge: Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute.
*Да рэформы беларускай азбукі. // Пасяджэньні Беларускае Акадэмічнае Конфэрэнцыі па рэформе правапісу і азбукі. - Мн.: [б. м.], [1927?].
*Ян Станкевіч. Гук «ґ» у беларускай мове // Ян Станкевіч. Збор твораў у двух тамах. Т. 2. - Мн.: Энцыклапедыкс, 2002. ISBN 985-6599-46-6

{{Donate}}