Nun (letter)
Nun is the fourteenth letter of the Semitic abjads, including Phoenician nūn ?, Hebrew nūn, Aramaic nūn ?, Syriac nūn ܢ, and Arabic nūn . Its numerical value is 50. It is the third letter in Thaana, pronounced as "noonu". In all languages, it represents the alveolar nasal /n/. It is related to the Ancient North Arabian ?, South Arabian ?, and Ge'ez ነ.
The Phoenician letter gave rise to the Greek nu, Etruscan, Latin N, and Cyrillic Н.
Origins
Nun is believed to descend from an Egyptian hieroglyph of a snake or eel. Some have hypothesized a hieroglyph of fish in water as its origin. The Phoenician letter was also named "fish", but this name has been suggested to descend from a hypothetical Proto-Canaanite word "snake", based on the letter name in Ethiopic, ultimately from a hieroglyph representing a snake,Arabic nūn
The letter is named , and is written is several ways depending on its position in the word:Some examples on its uses in Modern Standard Arabic:Nūn is used as a suffix indicating feminine plural verb conjugations; for example هِيَ تَكْتُب hiya taktub becomes هُنَّ يَكْتُبْنَ hunna yaktubna.
Nūn is also used as the prefix for first-person plural imperfective/present tense verbs. Thus هُوَ يَكْتُب huwa yaktub → نَحْنُ نَكْتُب naḥnu naktub.
Punjabi/Saraiki nūn
It is retroflex nasal consonantal sound in some languages. Its symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet is, formed by adding a rightward hook to the bottom of, the symbol for the corresponding alveolar consonant.IIt is similar to ݨ, combining nūn and rre ڑ: for example کݨ مݨ، چھݨ چھݨ، ونڄݨ۔, which is the velar nasal.
Social media campaign (2014)
After the fall of Mosul, ISIL demanded Assyrian Christians in the city to convert to Islam, pay tribute, or face execution. ISIL troops begun spray painting homes of Christian residents with the letter nūn for , a disparaging Arabic term for Christians. Thousands were forced to abandon their homes and land, including Christians, Yazidis, Shi'a Muslims, and Muslims loyal to other Islamic nations considered apostates by ISIL.In response to the persecution of Christians and Yazidis by ISIL, an international social media campaign was launched to raise global awareness, symbolized by the letter ن —the mark painted by ISIL. Some Christians changed their profile pictures to the letter ن as a symbol of support, calling it the "Mark of the Nazarene".
Naṣārā/''nosrim designates Christians in Arabic, Aramaic and Hebrew, although the more common term for Christians in Modern Standard Arabic is masihi''.
Jawi ''nya''
In the Jawi alphabet, the letter nya is a modified form of the letter nūn with two additional dots. However, if nya is initial or medial, its dots will be three dots below instead of three dots above, similarly how the Persian letter pe works on medial or initial form due to its similar looking. This letter also looks like tsa in general. This letter is thus written as:The letter nya is also a suffix for indirect object belonging to him/her/it. The example is رومهڽ, which means his/her/its house.
Hebrew nun
Hebrew spelling: נוּן;The letter in its final position appears with or without a top hook on different sans-serif fonts, for example:
- Arial, DejaVu Sans, Arimo, Open Sans: ן
- Tahoma, Noto Sans Hebrew, Alef, Heebo: ן
Pronunciation
Variations
Nun, like Kaph, Mem, Pe, and Tzadi, has a final form, used at the end of words. Its shape changes from to.There are also nine instances of an inverted nun in the Tanakh.
Significance
In gematria, Nun represents the number 50. Its final form represents 700 but this is rarely used, Tav and Shin being used instead.As in Arabic, nun as an abbreviation can stand for neqevah, feminine.
In medieval Rabbinic writings, Nun Sophit stood for "Son of".
Nun is also one of the seven letters which receive a special crown when written in a Sefer Torah. See Tag, Shin, Ayin, Teth, Gimmel, Zayin, and Tzadi.
In the game of dreidel, a rolled Nun passes play to the next player with no other action.