We (kana)
 | This article needs additional citations for verification. (April 2016) |
 | You can help expand this article with text translated from the corresponding article in Japanese. (September 2011) Click [show] for important translation instructions.
|
| we | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| |||
| transliteration | e, we | ||
| hiragana origin | 恵 | ||
| katakana origin | 恵 | ||
| unicode | U+3091, U+30F1 | ||
| braille |  | ||
| kana gojūon | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Kana modifiers and marks | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Multi-syllabic kana | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
ゑ, in hiragana or ヱ in katakana, is a nearly obsolete Japanese kana.
It is presumed that ゑ represented [ɰe] ⓘ and that ゑ and え indicated different pronunciations until somewhere between the Kamakura period and the Taishō period when they both came to be pronounced as イェ [je] ⓘ, later shifting to the modern エ [e][citation needed]. Along with the kana for wi (ゐ in hiragana, ヰ in katakana), this kana was deemed obsolete in Japanese in 1946 and replaced with え and エ. It is now rare in everyday usage; in onomatopoeia or foreign words, the katakana form ウェ (U-[small-e]) is preferred, as in "ウェスト" for "west".
The kana still sees some modern-day usage. Ebisu is usually written "えびす", but sometimes "ゑびす" like Kyōto Ebisu Shrine (京都ゑびす神社, Kyōto Ebisu Jinja),[1] and name of the beer Yebisu (ヱビス), which is actually pronounced "Ebisu". The Japanese title of the Rebuild of Evangelion series is Evangelion: New Theatrical Edition (ヱヴァンゲリヲン新劇場版, Evangerion Shin Gekijōban). Katakana ヱ is sometimes written with a dakuten, ヹ, to represent a /ve/ sound in foreign words; however, most IMEs lack a convenient way to write this and the combination ヴェ is far more common.
Hiragana ゑ is still used in several Okinawan orthographies for the syllable /we/. In the Ryūkyū University system, ゑ is also combined with a small ぃ, ゑぃ/ヱィ, to represent the sound /wi/. Katakana ヱ is used in Ainu for /we/.
"Not to be confused with"... info
While being confused with E (kana) and We (kana) because their katakana are similar.
Stroke order
 |
 |
The Hiragana ゑ is made with one stroke. It resembles a Hiragana る that continues with a double-humped ん shape underneath.
The Katakana ヱ is made with three strokes:
- A horizontal line that hooks down and to the left.
- A vertical line, just grazing the end of the first stroke.
- A long horizontal line across the bottom.
Other communicative representations
| Japanese radiotelephony alphabet | Wabun code |
| かぎのあるヱ Kagi no aru "We" |
ⓘ |
|
|
| ||
| Japanese Navy Signal Flag | Japanese semaphore | Japanese manual syllabary (fingerspelling) | Braille dots-235 Japanese Braille |
- Full Braille representation
| ゑ / ヱ in Japanese Braille | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| ゑ / ヱ we |
ヹ ve |
ゑい / ヱー wē/wei |
ヹー vē/vei |
|
|
|
|
|
| Preview | ゑ | ヱ | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Unicode name | HIRAGANA LETTER WE | KATAKANA LETTER WE | ||
| Encodings | decimal | hex | dec | hex |
| Unicode | 12433 | U+3091 | 12529 | U+30F1 |
| UTF-8 | 227 130 145 | E3 82 91 | 227 131 177 | E3 83 B1 |
| Numeric character reference | ゑ |
ゑ |
ヱ |
ヱ |
| Shift JIS | 130 239 | 82 EF | 131 145 | 83 91 |
References
See also
