Circumflex accent

The circumflex accent (of the Latin circumflexus , “bent around”) is a Diacritique of the Latin alphabet inherited the Greek circumflex accent. It is, graphically, the meeting of a Acute accent and a Grave accent. It makes its first appearances in the modern languages in French at the 16th century.

Of a frequent and complex use in French, a separate article is devoted to him for this language.

Use in the languages using the Latin alphabet

The circumflexe one is diacritic very much used. It is mainly of use in the following languages with Latin writing (this list is of course not exhaustive):

Afrikaans

E E , I I , O O , U U . The Afrikaans, in addition to in the loanwords, makes use of circumflexe on E and O to mark the long quantity as well as the open character. For example: wêreld , “world”, goeiemôre “hello”. Elsewhere, it notes the only long quantity: wîe , “fixes”, Brûe , “Bruges”.
The use of circumflexe is rare enough for E and O , very rare for I and U , the orthography envisaging of other more common C-Ws communication to note the same sounds.

Breton

E E . In opposition to E , which is worth, the circumflexe one can mark the character more closed of the vowel.

Chichewa

Ŵ ŵ . The W marked the circumflexe one is opposed to the simple letter, which is worth.

One can note that there does not exist yet in Unicode of nature precomposed for the X circumflexe . It is thus necessary for the moment to code with circumflexe with null hunting, which, for the capital letter in , proves not very readable with the majority of the police forces.

Esperanto

Ĉ ĉ , Ĝ ĝ , Ĥ ĥ , Ĵ ĵ , Ŝ ŝ . (There are not a U in Esperanto, but a ŭ .)

Frioulan

Â â E E I I O O U U .

According to the Faggin-Nazzi C-W communication, the circumflexe one is used on the vowel of a Syllabe of end of word when it is long. For example: wire , “wire”, clamâ , “to call”.

Welsh

Â â , E E , I I , O O , U U ,/ Ŵ ŵ , Ŷ ŷ /'.

Première value: at North, second: in Sud.
Circumflexe indicates that the vowel which is affected is long whereas the opposite was awaited, which arrives in particular in the words of loan. The long vowels are differently not distinguished, but can be largely deduced from the representation orthographical function of the surrounding consonants and the stressing, according to rather complex rules.

The circumflexe one also makes it possible to specify the pronunciation of the diphthong wy : ŵy = but wŷ =.

Hebrew

In a fine transcription of Hebrew, it is possible to note by circumflexe the long vowels written in the original text by means of the matres lectionis while the Macron striking the long vowels which are not written. For example: בְּעֵינֶיךָ (without the signs of vocalization: בעיניך) bəʿênêḵā , “in your eyes”.

In the more current transcriptions, just as for a very great number of languages, the circumflexe one replaces simply the macron and notes the long quantity, whatever its origin.

Japanese (Kunrei, Japanese-shiki, Hepburn)

In the romanisation kunrei , the long vowels (except I ) are normally marked by the circumflexe one: ローマ字 rômazi , “romanisation”. In the other systems, it is the Macron which is used: the same Japanese word romanize rōmadi (Japanese-shiki)/ rōmaji (Hepburn). However, for reasons of facility, the circumflexe one often replaces this macron.

Norwegian (bokmål)

O O , E E These two letters, in addition to in loans, are employed in very rare words resulting from the Vieux norrois (like their derived): fôr (norrois fóðr ), “food for animals”, worm , “time (which it makes)” (norrois veðr ), lêr , “skin” (norrois leðr ).

Dutch and English

The circumflex accent is mainly on vowels of borrowed words or cities, especially with French, like Nimes or role.

Portuguese

Â â , E E , O O . In Portuguese, the circumflex accent plays two parts: in addition to it indicates more closed quality of the vowel, it marks also the fact that it is tonic in the mot. It is opposed in that to the Acute accent, which strikes also only the tonic vowels but indicates an open quality. For example: will câmara “room”, that “(letter) Q ”, pôde “il/elle could”.

Rumanian

Â â , I I . Both Graphème S represent same the Phonème. Â gets busy that in medium of word, I with initial and the finale of radical (i.e. one can find I in medium of made up word). As follows: in română romɨnə, “in Rumanian”. Before a recent spelling reform, only the word român , “Rumanian”, and its derivatives used the â .

One will find more details in the article devoted to with this language.

Turkish

Â â ,/ I I , U U ,/. The circumflex accent is used mainly for two uses. First of all, it indicates the vocalic long quantity in loanwords arabo - Persan S: âdet , “habit”, ilmî , “scientist”, sükût , “silence”. Its employment is not obligatory but it is often preserved when it makes it possible to distinguish from the homographs: tarihî , “history” but tarihi , “its history”.

In addition, â and U are useful to indicate that a /k/, /g/ or /l/ precedents in a loanword are palatalized (or, for the /l/ phoneme, that it is not not velarized), which is normally reserved for the same consonants in front of the graphèmes E , I , ö and U . In this case, the vowel is not lengthened: gâvur , “infidel”, mahkûm , “condemned”, plâj , “beach”. Once again, the circumflexe one is not obligatory but is preserved especially when it avoids confusions due to a potential homography: kâr , “profit” but kar , “snow”.

Its two roles, long quantity of /a/ and /u/ and palatalization of the preceding consonant, prevent it from allowing the notation of not palatalized consonants followed by a /a/ or /u/ long: katil decides when the word means “killing” (out of Arabic '' qatl '') but [kɑːtil when the word means “killer” (of Arabic qātil ). The C-W communication kâtil for this last form would be false: /k/ is not palatalized.

Twi

Ĉ ĉ , Ĝ ĝ .

Vietnamese

Â â , E E , O O . In quốc ngữ, the circumflexe one indicates that the vowel is closed than its not diacritée alternative. In fact, they are the same uses as in Portuguese, which is explained when it is known that Alexandre of Rhodos took as a starting point the work of missionaries of Portuguese origin to develop the romanisation of Vietnamese.

With circumflexe can be added diacritic the tonaux:

â → ấ , ầ , ẩ , ẫ , ậ ;
E → ế , ề , ể , ễ , ệ ;
O → ố , ồ , ổ , ỗ , ộ .

International Phonetic Alphabet

Into API, the circumflex accent marks the downward Tonème S melody or modulated. It can place on any vocalic or consonant symbol vocalized. For example, in Ngbaka, “sheet”, in Mandarin 四 sì (/s/ vocalized descendant), “four”.

Romanisation S recent, transcriptions and transliterations

The circumflexe one is often used, in the transcriptions, to replace the Macron to note, on the vowels, the long quantity. It is the case in the transcription, for example, of the Arab or the Sanskrit.

Unicode

Unicode envisages a great number of precomposed natures including/understanding a circumflex accent. All those of this page, except the X circumflex accent of the unangam tunuu are precomposed. For this last character, it is necessary to use a circumflex accent without hunting (block of characters of diacritic), which will combine with any other Latin character: it is located at the U+0302 site. For example, =̂ is a composition using this character above the equal sign . There exists also a circumflex accent driving out, ˆ U+02C6 (block of the modifying letters with hunting). This last should not be confused with the arrowhead directed upwards, ˄ U+02C4, present in the same block.

Let us mention also the existence of the circumflexe accent driving out in ASCII, ^ (U+005E), also called reel (in Latin “it is private of”), which announces in Informatique a replacement or insertion point. The reel is also present in the block of the various technical signs, ‸ U+2038 (reel). The typographical sign correspondent is the lambda of insertion, ⁁ U+2041 (even block).

Transcription in ASCII

The ASCII basic (characters 0 to 127) does not contain an accented accentuated letter. At the time where it was only the Page of code available, some simulated the circumflex accent while placing a Apostrophe in front of the letter and an apostrophe reversed behind: for example, they wrote “' E `tre” “to be”. For VIQR, the adopted solution is to put a virgin circumflex accent behind the letter, for example to write “ e^” for “E”.

In sciences

the circumflex accent can indicate the Exponentiation: 2^3 = 8
In certain computer programming languages, it corresponds to a XOR (Fonction OR exclusive): 2^3=1
In vectorial notation, it indicates an unit vector

See too

Explicatoin de Bernard Cerquiglini in images

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