Nun is the fourteenth letter of many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician, Aramaic, Hebrew × and Arabic alphabet nÅ«n Ù† (in abjadi order). It is the third letter in Thaana (Þ‚), pronounced as "noon". Its sound value is [n].
The Phoenician letter gave rise to the Greek nu (Î), Etruscan ðŒ, Latin N, and Cyrillic Ð.
Origins
Nun is thought to have come from a pictogram of a snake (the Hebrew word for snake, nachash begins with a Nun and snake in Aramaic is nun) or eel. Some have hypothesized a hieroglyph of a fish in water for its origin (in Arabic, nūn means large fish or whale). The Phoenician letter was named nūn "fish", but the glyph has been suggested to descend from a hypothetical Proto-Canaanite naḥš "snake", based on the name in Ethiopic, ultimately from a hieroglyph representing a snake,
(see Middle Bronze Age alphabets). Naḥš in modern Arabic literally means "bad luck". The cognate letter in Ge'ez and descended Semitic languages of Ethiopia is nehas, which also means "brass".
Hebrew Nun
Hebrew spelling: × ×•Ö¼×Ÿ
Pronunciation
Nun represents an alveolar nasal, (IPA: /n/), like the English letter N.
Variations
Nun, like Kaph, Mem, Pe, and Tzadi, has a final form, used at the end of words. Its shape changes from × to ן. 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 (400+300) being used instead.
As in Arabic, nun as an abbreviation can stand for neqevah, feminine. In medieval Rabbinic writings, Nun Sophit (Final Nun) stood for "Son of" (Hebrew ben or ibn).
Nun is also one of the seven letters which receive a special crown (called a tagin) when written in a Sefer Torah. See 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.
Arabic nūn
The letter is named nūn, and is written is several ways depending in its position in the word:
Some examples on its uses in Modern Standard Arabic:
NÅ«n is used as a suffix indicating present-tense plural feminine nouns; for example Ù‡ÙÙŠÙŽ تَكÙ'تÙب hiya taktub ("she writes") becomes Ù‡ÙÙ†ÙŽÙ' تَكÙ'تَبÙ'Ù†ÙŽ hunna taktabna ("they [feminine] write").
NÅ«n is also used as the prefix for first-person plural imperfective/present tense verbs. Thus Ù‡ÙÙˆÙŽ ÙŠÙŽÙƒÙ'تÙب huwwa yaktub ("he writes") â†' Ù†ÙŽØÙ'Ù†Ù Ù†ÙŽÙƒÙ'تÙب naḥnu naktub ("we write").
Saraiki nūn
It is retroflex nasal consonantal sound symbol, used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is ⟨ɳ⟩, and the equivalent X-SAMPA symbol is n`. Like all the retroflex consonants, the IPA symbol is formed by adding a rightward-pointing hook extending from the bottom of an en (the letter used for the corresponding alveolar consonant). It is similar to ⟨ɲ⟩, the letter for the palatal nasal, which has a leftward-pointing hook extending from the bottom of the left stem, and to ⟨ŋ⟩, the letter for the velar nasal, which has a leftward-pointing hook extending from the bottom of the right stem. Saraiki uses the letter ⟨ݨ⟩ for /ɳ/. It is a compound of nÅ«n and rre (⟨Ú'⟩). For example:
- کݨ مݨ، چھݨ چھݨ، ونڄݨÛ"
Social Media Campaign (2014)
In August 2014, with the rapid and brutal advance of Islamic State (IS) in northern Iraq, a genocidal persecution of Iraqi Christians and Yazidis has begun. As IS seized control of Mosul, Christians were given the choice of converting to Islam (pledging allegiance to the rule of IS and paying jizya or tax); to flee their homes, shops and belongings; or suffer death by sword. Thousands of Christians, Yazidis (who were given only the choices of conversion or death) and other, mostly Shi'a Muslims (whom IS consider to be apostate) have abandoned their longtime homes and land.
As a result, an international social media campaign has been launched to raise global awareness of the plight of the Mosul Christians making use of the letter Ù† (nun)â€"the mark that IS members spray painted on deserted Christian properties. Some Christians have changed their profile pictures on Facebook and Twitter to pictures of the letter Ù† as a symbol of support. The letter Ù†, in relation to this social media campaign, is being called the "Mark of the Nazarene" from naá¹£rÄnÄ« (نصراني; plural naá¹£ÄrÄ Ù†ØµØ§Ø±Ù‰), a normative Arabic term disparagingly used by IS to brand Christians.
Character encodings
See also
- Nunation
- Setaceous Hebrew Character (Xestia c-nigrum) - a moth of the family Noctuidae.
Notes
