A

A, or a, is the first letter and the first vowel of the modern English
A
alphabet and the Latin alphabet.[1][2] Its name in English is a (pronounced

Aaɑ
/ˈeɪ/), plural aes.[nb 1] It is similar in shape to the Ancient Greek letter
alpha, from which it derives.[3] The uppercase version consists of the two
slanting sides of a triangle, crossed in the middle by a horizontal bar. The
lowercase version can be written in two forms: the double-storey a and
(See below)
single-storey ɑ. The latter is commonly used in handwriting and fonts
based on it, especially fonts intended to be read by children, and is also
found in italic type.

In English grammar, "a", and its variant "an", are indefinite articles.

Contents
History
Typographic variants
Use in writing systems Usage
English Writing Latin script
Other languages system
Other systems Type Alphabet
Other uses Language of Latin language
Related characters origin
Descendants and related characters in the Latin alphabet Phonetic [a] [ɑ] [ɒ]
Derived signs, symbols and abbreviations usage [æ] [ə] [ɛ]
Ancestors and siblings in other alphabets [oː] [ɔ] [e]
Code points [ʕ] [/ʌ/] /eɪ/
Other representations Unicode U+0041, U+0061
codepoint
Use as a number
Alphabetical 1
Notes
position
Footnotes
History
References
Development
External links

History

Αα
𐌀
 Aaɑ

Time period ~-700 to present

Descendants Æ Ä
 Ɑ
Ʌ Ɐ
ª Å
₳ @
Ⓐ ⓐ
⒜ 🅰
Sisters 𐌰 А
Я Ә
Ӑ ‫אاܐ‬
ࠀ 𐎀
ℵ አ
‫ء‬ Աա
અ अ
অ
Variations (See below)
Other
Other letters a(x), ae, eau
commonly
used with

Proto-Sinaitic Latin
Latin/

Proto- Phoenician Greek

Etruscan Greek 300
Egyptian Cyrillic
ʾalp Canaanite aleph Alpha A
A
Uncial AD

Uncial

The earliest certain ancestor of "A" is aleph (also written 'aleph), the first letter of the Phoenician alphabet,[4]
which consisted entirely of consonants (for that reason, it is also called an abjad to distinguish it from a true
alphabet). In turn, the ancestor of aleph may have been a pictogram of an ox head in proto-Sinaitic script[5]
influenced by Egyptian hieroglyphs, styled as a triangular head with two horns extended.

When the ancient Greeks adopted the alphabet, they had no use for a letter to represent the glottal stop—the
consonant sound that the letter denoted in Phoenician and other Semitic languages, and that was the first phoneme
of the Phoenician pronunciation of the letter—so they used their version of the sign to represent the vowel /a/, and
called it by the similar name of alpha. In the earliest Greek inscriptions after the Greek Dark Ages, dating to the
eighth century BC, the letter rests upon its side, but in the Greek alphabet of later times it generally resembles the
modern capital letter, although many local varieties can be distinguished by the shortening of one leg, or by the
angle at which the cross line is set.

The Etruscans brought the Greek alphabet to their civilization in the Italian Peninsula and left the letter unchanged.
The Romans later adopted the Etruscan alphabet to write the Latin language, and the resulting letter was preserved
in the Latin alphabet that would come to be used to write many languages, including English.

Typographic variants
During Roman times, there were many variant forms of the letter "A". First was the
monumental or lapidary style, which was used when inscribing on stone or other
"permanent" media. There was also a cursive style used for everyday or utilitarian
writing, which was done on more perishable surfaces. Due to the "perishable" nature
of these surfaces, there are not as many examples of this style as there are of the
monumental, but there are still many surviving examples of different types of cursive,
such as majuscule cursive, minuscule cursive, and semicursive minuscule. Variants also
existed that were intermediate between the monumental and cursive styles. The known
Different glyphs of the
variants include the early semi-uncial, the uncial, and the later semi-uncial.[6]
lowercase letter A.

Typographic variants include

a double-storey a and
single-storey ɑ.

Uncial A Another Blackletter A 

Blackletter A

Modern Roman A Modern Italic A Modern script A

At the end of the Roman Empire (5th century AD), several variants of the cursive minuscule developed through
Western Europe. Among these were the semicursive minuscule of Italy, the Merovingian script in France, the
Visigothic script in Spain, and the Insular or Anglo-Irish semi-uncial or Anglo-Saxon majuscule of Great Britain.
By the ninth century, the Caroline script, which was very similar to the present-day form, was the principal form
used in book-making, before the advent of the printing press. This form was derived through a combining of prior
forms.[6]

15th-century Italy saw the formation of the two main variants that are known today. These variants, the Italic and
Roman forms, were derived from the Caroline Script version. The Italic form, also called script a, is used in most
current handwriting; it consists of a circle and vertical stroke on the right ("ɑ"). This slowly developed from the
fifth-century form resembling the Greek letter tau in the hands of medieval Irish and English writers.[4] The
Roman form is used in most printed material; it consists of a small loop with an arc over it ("a").[6] Both derive
from the majuscule (capital) form. In Greek handwriting, it was common to join the left leg and horizontal stroke
into a single loop, as demonstrated by the uncial version shown. Many fonts then made the right leg vertical. In
some of these, the serif that began the right leg stroke developed into an arc, resulting in the printed form, while in
others it was dropped, resulting in the modern handwritten form. Graphic designers refer to the Italic and Roman
forms as "single decker a" and "double decker a" respectively.
Italic type is commonly used to mark emphasis or more generally to
distinguish one part of a text from the rest (set in Roman type). There are
some other cases aside from italic type where script a ("ɑ"), also called
Latin alpha, is used in contrast with Latin "a" (such as in the International
Phonetic Alphabet).

Use in writing systems

English Road sign in Ireland, showing the

Irish "Latin alpha" form of "a" in lower
In modern English orthography, the letter ⟨a⟩ represents at least seven and upper case forms.
different vowel sounds:

the near-open front unrounded vowel /æ/ as in pad;

the open back unrounded vowel /ɑː/ as in father,
which is closer to its original Latin and Greek
sound;[5]
the diphthong /eɪ/ as in ace and major (usually
when ⟨a⟩ is followed by one, or occasionally two,
consonants and then another vowel letter) – this
results from Middle English lengthening followed by
the Great Vowel Shift;
the modified form of the above sound that occurs
before ⟨r⟩, as in square and Mary;
the rounded vowel of water;
the shorter rounded vowel (not present in General
American) in was and what;[4]
a schwa, in many unstressed syllables, as in about,
comma, solar. Pronunciation of the name of the letter ⟨a⟩ in
European languages, note that /a/ and /aː/ can
The double ⟨aa⟩ sequence does not occur in native English differ phonetically between [a], [ä], [æ] and [ɑ]
words, but is found in some words derived from foreign depending on the language.
languages such as Aaron and aardvark.[7] However, ⟨a⟩
occurs in many common digraphs, all with their own sound or
sounds, particularly ⟨ai⟩, ⟨au⟩, ⟨aw⟩, ⟨ay⟩, ⟨ea⟩ and ⟨oa⟩.

⟨a⟩ is the third-most-commonly used letter in English (after ⟨e⟩ and ⟨t⟩) and French, the second most common in
Spanish, and the most common in Portuguese. About 8.167% of letters used in English texts tend to be ⟨a⟩;[8] the
number is around 7.636% in French,[9] 11.525% in Spanish,[10] and 14.634% for Portuguese.[11]

Other languages

In most languages that use the Latin alphabet, ⟨a⟩ denotes an open unrounded vowel, such as /a/, /ä/, or /ɑ/. An
exception is Saanich, in which ⟨a⟩ (and the glyph Á) stands for a close-mid front unrounded vowel /e/.

Other systems

In phonetic and phonemic notation:

in the International Phonetic Alphabet, ⟨a⟩ is used for the open front unrounded vowel, ⟨ä⟩ is used
for the open central unrounded vowel, and ⟨ɑ⟩ is used for the open back unrounded vowel.
 in X-SAMPA, ⟨a⟩ is used for the open front unrounded vowel and ⟨A⟩ is used for the open back
unrounded vowel.

Other uses
In algebra, the letter a along with various other letters of the alphabet is often used to denote a variable, with
various conventional meanings in different areas of mathematics. Moreover, in 1637, René Descartes "invented
the convention of representing unknowns in equations by x, y, and z, and knowns by a, b, and c",[12] and this
convention is still often followed, especially in elementary algebra.

In geometry, capital A, B, C etc. are used to denote segments, lines, rays, etc.[6] A capital A is also typically used
as one of the letters to represent an angle in a triangle, the lowercase a representing the side opposite angle A.[5]

"A" is often used to denote something or someone of a better or more prestigious quality or status: A−, A or A+,
the best grade that can be assigned by teachers for students' schoolwork; "A grade" for clean restaurants; A-list
celebrities, etc. Such associations can have a motivating effect, as exposure to the letter A has been found to
improve performance, when compared with other letters.[13]

"A" is used as a prefix on some words, such as asymmetry, to mean "not" or "without" (from Greek).

In English grammar, "a", and its variant "an", is an indefinite article, used to introduce noun phrases.

Finally, the letter A is used to denote size, as in a narrow size shoe,[5] or a small cup size in a brassiere.[14]

Related characters

Descendants and related characters in the Latin alphabet

Æ æ : Latin AE ligature
A with diacritics: Å å Ǻ ǻ Ḁ ḁ ẚ Ă ă Ặ ặ Ắ ắ Ằ ằ Ẳ ẳ Ẵ ẵ Ȃ ȃ Â â Ậ ậ Ấ ấ Ầ ầ Ẫ ẫ Ẩ ẩ Ả ả Ǎ ǎ Ⱥ ⱥ Ȧ
ȧ Ǡ ǡ Ạ ạ Ä ä Ǟ ǟ À à Ȁ ȁ Á á Ā ā Ā̀ ā̀ Ã ã Ą ą Ą́ ą́ Ą̃ ą̃ A̲ a̲ ᶏ[15]
Phonetic alphabet symbols related to A (the International Phonetic Alphabet only uses lowercase,
but uppercase forms are used in some other writing systems):
Ɑ ɑ : Latin letter alpha / script A, which represents an open back unrounded vowel in the IPA
ᶐ : Latin small letter alpha with retroflex hook[15]
Ɐ ɐ : Turned A, which represents a near-open central vowel in the IPA
Λ ʌ : Turned V (also called a wedge, a caret, or a hat), which represents an open-mid back
unrounded vowel in the IPA
Ɒ ɒ : Turned alpha / script A, which represents an open back rounded vowel in the IPA
ᶛ : Modifier letter small turned alpha[15]
ᴀ : Small capital A, an obsolete or non-standard symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet
used to represent various sounds (mainly open vowels)
Aa ᵄ : Modifier letters are used in the Uralic Phonetic Alphabet (UPA)[16] (sometimes encoded
with Unicode subscripts and superscripts)
a : Subscript small a is used in Indo-European studies[17]
ꬱ : Small letter a reversed-schwa is used in the Teuthonista phonetic transcription system[18]
Ꞻ ꞻ : Glottal A, used in the transliteration of Ugaritic[19]

Derived signs, symbols and abbreviations

 ª : an ordinal indicator
Å : Ångström sign
∀ : a turned capital letter A, used in predicate logic to specify universal quantification ("for all")
@ : At sign
₳ : Argentine austral
Ⓐ : anarchy symbol
Ancestors and siblings in other alphabets
𐤀 : Semitic letter Aleph, from which the following symbols originally derive[20]

Α α : Greek letter Alpha, from which the following letters derive[21]

А а : Cyrillic letter A[22]

Ⲁ ⲁ : Coptic letter Alpha[23]
𐌀 : Old Italic A, which is the ancestor of modern Latin A[24][25]

ᚨ : Runic letter ansuz, which probably derives from old Italic A[26]
𐌰 : Gothic letter aza/asks[27]
Ա ա : Armenian letter Ayb

Code points
These are the code points for the forms of the letter in various systems

Character information

Preview A a
Unicode name LATIN CAPITAL LETTER A LATIN SMALL LETTER A

Encodings decimal hex dec hex

Unicode 65 U+0041 97 U+0061
UTF-8 65 41 97 61
Numeric character reference A A a a
EBCDIC family 193 C1 129 81

ASCII 1 65 41 97 61

1 Also for encodings based on ASCII, including the DOS, Windows, ISO-8859 and Macintosh families of
encodings.

Other representations
NATO phonetic Morse code

Alpha
  ▄ ▄▄▄ 
 American Braille dots-1
British manual
Signal flag manual Unified
Flag semaphore alphabet (BSL
alphabet (ASL English
fingerspelling)
fingerspelling) Braille

Use as a number
In the hexadecimal (base 16) numbering system, A is a number that corresponds to the number 10 in decimal (base
10) counting.

Notes
1. Aes is the plural of the name of the letter. The plural of the letter itself is rendered As, A's, as, or
a's.[2]

Footnotes
1. "Latin alphabet | Definition, Description, History, & Facts" (https://www.britannica.com/topic/Latin-al
phabet). Encyclopedia Britannica. Archived (https://web.archive.org/web/20210309055637/https://
www.britannica.com/topic/Latin-alphabet) from the original on 9 March 2021. Retrieved 3 March
2021.
2. Simpson & Weiner 1989, p. 1
3. McCarter 1974, p. 54
4. Hoiberg 2010, p. 1
5. Hall-Quest 1997, p. 1
6. Diringer 2000, p. 1
7. Gelb & Whiting 1998, p. 45
8. "Letter frequency (English)" (http://en.algoritmy.net/article/40379/Letter-frequency-English).
en.algoritmy.net. Archived (https://web.archive.org/web/20210304152631/http://en.algoritmy.net/arti
cle/40379/Letter-frequency-English) from the original on 4 March 2021. Retrieved 3 January 2022.
9. "Corpus de Thomas Tempé" (https://web.archive.org/web/20070930194046/http://gpl.insa-lyon.fr/D
vorak-Fr/CorpusDeThomasTemp%C3%A9) (in French). Archived from the original (http://gpl.insa-l
yon.fr/Dvorak-Fr/CorpusDeThomasTemp%C3%A9) on 30 September 2007. Retrieved 15 June
2007.
10. Pratt, Fletcher (1942). Secret and Urgent: The story of codes and ciphers. Garden City, NY: Blue
Ribbon Books. pp. 254–5. OCLC 795065 (https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/795065).
11. "Frequência da ocorrência de letras no Português" (https://web.archive.org/web/20090803182254/
http://www.numaboa.com/criptografia/criptoanalise/310-Frequencia-no-Portugues) (in
Portuguese). Archived from the original (http://www.numaboa.com/criptografia/criptoanalise/310-Fr
equencia-no-Portugues) on 3 August 2009. Retrieved 16 June 2009.
12. Tom Sorell, Descartes: A Very Short Introduction, (2000). New York: Oxford University Press. p. 19.
13. Ciani & Sheldon 2010, pp. 99–100
14. Luciani, Jené (2009). The Bra Book: The Fashion Formula to Finding the Perfect Bra. Dallas, TX:
Benbella Books. p. 13. ISBN 9781933771946. OCLC 317453115 (https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/3
17453115).
15. Constable, Peter (19 April 2004), L2/04-132 Proposal to Add Additional Phonetic Characters to the
UCS (https://www.unicode.org/L2/L2004/04132-n2740-phonetic.pdf) (PDF), archived (https://web.a
rchive.org/web/20171011014355/http://www.unicode.org/L2/L2004/04132-n2740-phonetic.pdf)
(PDF) from the original on 11 October 2017, retrieved 24 March 2018 – via www.unicode.org
16. Everson, Michael; et al. (20 March 2002), L2/02-141: Uralic Phonetic Alphabet Characters for the
UCS (https://www.unicode.org/L2/L2002/02141-n2419-uralic-phonetic.pdf) (PDF), archived (https://
web.archive.org/web/20180219081033/http://www.unicode.org/L2/L2002/02141-n2419-uralic-pho
netic.pdf) (PDF) from the original on 19 February 2018, retrieved 24 March 2018 – via
www.unicode.org
17. Anderson, Deborah; Everson, Michael (7 June 2004), L2/04-191: Proposal to Encode Six Indo-
Europeanist Phonetic Characters in the UCS (https://www.unicode.org/L2/L2004/04191-n2788-lar
yngeals.pdf) (PDF), archived (https://web.archive.org/web/20171011014402/http://www.unicode.or
g/L2/L2004/04191-n2788-laryngeals.pdf) (PDF) from the original on 11 October 2017, retrieved
24 March 2018 – via www.unicode.org
18. Everson, Michael; Dicklberger, Alois; Pentzlin, Karl; Wandl-Vogt, Eveline (2 June 2011), L2/11-
202: Revised Proposal to Encode "Teuthonista" Phonetic Characters in the UCS (https://www.unic
ode.org/L2/L2011/11202-n4081-teuthonista.pdf) (PDF), archived (https://web.archive.org/web/201
71011012426/http://www.unicode.org/L2/L2011/11202-n4081-teuthonista.pdf) (PDF) from the
original on 11 October 2017, retrieved 24 March 2018 – via www.unicode.org
19. Suignard, Michel (9 May 2017), L2/17-076R2: Revised Proposal for the Encoding of an
Egyptological YOD and Ugaritic Characters (https://www.unicode.org/L2/L2017/17076r2-n4792r2-
egyptological-yod.pdf) (PDF), archived (https://web.archive.org/web/20190330043926/https://www.
unicode.org/L2/L2017/17076r2-n4792r2-egyptological-yod.pdf) (PDF) from the original on 30
March 2019, retrieved 8 March 2019 – via www.unicode.org
20. Jensen, Hans (1969). Sign, Symbol, and Script. New York: G.P. Putman's Sons.
21. "Hebrew Lesson of the Week: The Letter Aleph" (https://www.timesofisrael.com/spotlight/hebrew-le
sson-of-the-week-letter-aleph/). 17 February 2013. Archived (https://web.archive.org/web/2018052
6113655/https://www.timesofisrael.com/spotlight/hebrew-lesson-of-the-week-letter-aleph/) from the
original on 26 May 2018. Retrieved 25 May 2018 – via The Times of Israel.
22. "Cyrillic Alphabet" (https://www.britannica.com/topic/Cyrillic-alphabet). Encyclopedia Britannica.
Archived (https://web.archive.org/web/20180526114423/https://www.britannica.com/topic/Cyrillic-a
lphabet) from the original on 26 May 2018. Retrieved 25 May 2018.
23. Silvestre, M. J. B. (1850). Universal Palaeography (https://books.google.com/books?id=n2QWAAA
AYAAJ&q=coptic+alphabet&pg=PA123). Translated by Madden, Frederic. London: Henry G. Bohn.
Archived (https://web.archive.org/web/20210507000632/https://books.google.com/books?id=n2Q
WAAAAYAAJ&q=coptic%20alphabet&pg=PA123) from the original on 7 May 2021. Retrieved
27 October 2020.
24. Frothingham, A. L. Jr. (1891). "Italic Studies" (https://books.google.com/books?id=fwAoAQAAIAAJ
&q=old+italic+greek+alphabet&pg=PA534). Archaeological News. American Journal of
Archaeology. 7 (4): 534. JSTOR 496497 (https://www.jstor.org/stable/496497). Archived (https://we
b.archive.org/web/20220218163821/https://books.google.com/books?id=fwAoAQAAIAAJ&q=old+i
talic+greek+alphabet&pg=PA534) from the original on 18 February 2022. Retrieved 27 October
2020.
25. Steele, Philippa M., ed. (2017). Understanding Relations Between Scripts: The Aegean Writing
Systems (https://books.google.com/books?id=Lv4sDwAAQBAJ&q=old+italic+script+greek&pg=PA
96). Oxford: Oxbow Books. ISBN 9781785706479. Archived (https://web.archive.org/web/2021050
6235949/https://books.google.com/books?id=Lv4sDwAAQBAJ&q=old+italic+script+greek&pg=PA
96) from the original on 6 May 2021. Retrieved 27 October 2020.
26. Fortson, Benjamin W. (2010). Indo-European Language and Culture: An Introduction (https://book
s.google.com/books?id=bSxHgej4tKMC&q=Runic+developed+from+old+italic&pg=PA349)
(second ed.). John Wiley & Sons. ISBN 9781444359688. Archived (https://web.archive.org/web/20
210814142703/https://books.google.com/books?id=bSxHgej4tKMC&q=Runic+developed+from+ol
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27. "𐌰" (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/%F0%90%8C%B0). Wiktionary. Archived (https://web.archive.or
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jstor.org/stable/3210965). S2CID 126182369 (https://api.semanticscholar.org/CorpusID:12618236
9).
Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E.S.C., eds. (1989). "A"
(https://archive.org/details/oxfordenglishdic01oxfo). The Oxford English Dictionary. Vol. I: A–
Bazouki (2nd ed.). Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-861213-1.

External links
History of the Alphabet (http://members.peak.org/~jeremy/dictionaryclassic/chapters/pix/alphabet.g
if)
Texts on Wikisource:
"A" in A Dictionary of the English Language by Samuel Johnson
"A". The American Cyclopædia. 1879.
"A". Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). 1911.
"A". The New Student's Reference Work. 1914.
"A". Collier's New Encyclopedia. 1921.

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