B 3783 226067505 2008-07-16T18:04:54Z BodhisattvaBot 6228552 robot Modifying: [[tr:B (harf)]] {{pp-semi-protected|small=yes}} {{Otherusesof|B}} {{wiktionarypar2|B|b}} {{Latin alphabet navbox|uc=B|lc=b}} '''B''' is the second letter in the [[Latin alphabet]]. Its name in [[English language|English]] is spelled '''bee''' or occasionally '''be''' ({{pronEng|biː}}), plural '''bees'''.<ref>"B" ''Oxford English Dictionary,'' 2nd edition (1989); ''Merriam-Webster's Third New International Dictionary of the English Language, Unabridged'' (1993); "bee," op. cit.</ref> ==History== The letter B might have started as a [[pictogram]] of the floorplan of a house in [[Egyptian hieroglyph]]s or the [[Proto-Sinaitic alphabet]]. By [[1050 BC]], the [[Phoenician alphabet]]'s letter had a linear form that served as the beth. {| class="wikitable" |- ! Egyptian hieroglyph <br>cottage ! [[Proto-Canaanite alphabet|Proto-Canaanite]] <br>house ! [[Phoenician alphabet|Phoenician]] <br>{{script|Phnx|𐤁}} ''[[Beth (Hebrew)|beth]]'' ! [[Greek alphabet|Greek]] <br>{{script|Grek|Β}} beta ! [[Etruscan alphabet|Etruscan]] <br>{{script|Ital|𐌁}} B ! Latin <br>B |- style="background-color:white; text-align:center;" |[[Image:EgyptianB-01.svg|64px|Egyptian hieroglyphic house]] |[[Image:Proto-semiticB-01.svg|64px|Proto-semitic house]] |[[Image:PhoenicianB-01.svg|64px|Phoenician beth]] |[[Image:Beta uc lc.svg|95px|Greek beta]] |[[Image:EtruscanB-01.svg|46px|Etruscan B]] |[[Image:RomanB-01.svg|37px|Roman B]] |} ==Typography== The modern lowercase letter ''b'' derives from later [[Roman cursive#New Roman cursive|Roman]] times, when scribes began omitting the upper loop of the capital. {| |align="center"|[[Image:BlackletterB-01.png|Blackletter B]] |align="center"|[[Image:UncialB-01.png|Uncial B]] |- |align="center"|[[Blackletter]] B |align="center"|[[Uncial]] B |- |align="center"|[[Image:ModernRomanB-01.png|Modern Roman B]] |align="center"|[[Image:ModernItalicB-01.png|Modern Italic B]] |align="center"|[[Image:ModernScriptB-01.png|Modern Script B]] |- |align="center"|Modern Roman B |align="center"|Modern Italic B |align="center"|Modern Script B |} The letter B is often confused with the visually similar [[German language|German]] [[ß]] which stands for ''ss''. ==Usage== In [[English language|English]] and most other languages that use the Latin alphabet, the letter b denotes the [[voiced bilabial plosive]] ({{IPAEng|b}}), as in ''bib''. In English it is sometimes silent, as in ''debt'' or ''comb'' (however the 'b' in 'comb' was actually pronounced at one time). In [[Estonian language|Estonian]], [[Icelandic language|Icelandic]], and in [[Chinese language|Chinese]] transcription, B is not voiced, but is still contrasted to P, which is [[geminate]]d {{IPA|/pp/}} in [[Estonian language|Estonian]] and [[aspiration (linguistics)|aspirated]] {{IPA|/pʰ/}} in Chinese and Icelandic. In [[Fijian language|Fijian]] B is [[prenasalized consonant|prenasalized]] {{IPA2|mb}}, whereas in [[Zulu language|Zulu]] and [[Xhosa language|Xhosa]] it is [[implosive consonant|implosive]] {{IPA2|ɓ}}, in contrast to the [[digraph]] Bh which represents {{IPA2|b}}. [[Finnish language|Finnish]] uses the letter ''b'' only for loanwords. In the [[help:IPA|International Phonetic Alphabet]] and [[X-SAMPA]], letter {{IPA|/b/}} denotes the [[voiced bilabial plosive]]. Variants of the letter b denote related [[bilabial consonant]]s, like the [[voiced bilabial implosive]] and the [[bilabial trill]]. In [[X-SAMPA]], capital B denotes the [[voiced bilabial fricative]]. B is also a [[musical note]]. ==Codes for computing== {{Letter |NATO=Bravo |Morse=–··· |Character=B2 |Braille=⠃ }} In [[Unicode]] the [[majuscule|capital]] B is codepoint U+0042 and the [[lower case]] b is U+0062. The [[ASCII]] code for capital B is 66 and for lowercase b is 98; or in [[Binary numeral system|binary]] 01000010 and 01100010, correspondingly. The [[EBCDIC]] code for capital B is 194 and for lowercase b is 130. The [[numeric character reference]]s in [[HTML]] and [[XML]] are "<tt>&amp;#66;</tt>" and "<tt>&amp;#98;</tt>" for upper and lower case respectively. ==References== {{reflist}} == See also == {{Commons|B}} *В, в : [[Ve (Cyrillic)]] *Б, б: [[Be (Cyrillic)]] *{{Unicode|[[Ɓ]]}} *[[B postcode area]] (United Kingdom) {{Latin alphabet}} [[Category:Latin letters]] [[af:B]] [[als:B]] [[ar:B]] [[arc:B]] [[ast:B]] [[az:B]] [[zh-min-nan:B]] [[bs:B]] [[br:B (lizherenn)]] [[ca:B]] [[cs:B]] [[co:B]] [[cy:B]] [[da:B]] [[de:B]] [[dv:B]] [[et:B]] [[el:B]] [[es:B]] [[eo:B]] [[eu:B]] [[fa:B]] [[fr:B (lettre)]] [[fur:B]] [[gan:B]] [[gd:B]] [[gl:B]] [[ko:B]] [[hr:B]] [[io:B]] [[ilo:B]] [[is:B]] [[it:B]] [[he:B]] [[ka:B]] [[kw:B]] [[sw:B]] [[ht:B]] [[la:B]] [[lv:B]] [[lb:B]] [[lt:B]] [[hu:B]] [[mzn:B]] [[ms:B]] [[nah:B]] [[nl:B (letter)]] [[ja:B]] [[no:B]] [[nn:B]] [[nrm:B]] [[uz:B (harf)]] [[pl:B]] [[pt:B]] [[crh:B]] [[ro:B]] [[qu:B]] [[ru:B (латиница)]] [[se:B]] [[scn:B]] [[simple:B]] [[sk:B]] [[sl:B]] [[szl:B]] [[sr:B (слово латинице)]] [[fi:B]] [[sv:B]] [[tl:B]] [[th:B]] [[vi:B]] [[tr:B (harf)]] [[tk:B]] [[tw:B]] [[uk:B (латиниця)]] [[vo:B]] [[yo:B]] [[zh-yue:B]] [[bat-smg:B]] [[zh:B]]