X 34142 225605472 2008-07-14T14:56:15Z JAnDbot 1725149 robot Adding: [[mzn:X]] {{Otherusesof}} {{wiktionarypar2|X|x}} {{Latin alphabet navbox|uc=X|lc=x}} '''X''' is the twenty-fourth letter in the modern [[Latin alphabet]]. Its name in [[English language|English]] is spelled '''ex''' or occasionally '''ecks''' ({{pronEng|ɛks}}),<ref>"X" ''Oxford English Dictionary,'' 2nd edition (1989); ''Merriam-Webster's Third New International Dictionary of the English Language, Unabridged'' (1993); "ex," op. cit.</ref> plural '''exes'''. ==History== The [[consonant cluster]] {{IPA|/ks/}} was, in [[Ancient Greek]], written as either [[Chi (letter)|''Chi'']] '''Χ''' (Western Greek) or [[Xi (letter)|''Xi'']] '''Ξ''' (Eastern Greek). In the end, ''Chi'' was standardized as {{IPA|/kʰ/}} ({{IPA|/x/}} in [[Modern Greek]]), while ''Xi'' was standardized for {{IPA|/ks/}}. But the [[Etruscans]] had taken over ''Χ'' from older Western Greek; therefore, it stood for {{IPA|/ks/}} in Etruscan and [[Latin]]. It is unknown whether the letters ''Chi'' and ''Xi'' are Greek inventions, or whether they are ultimately of [[Semitic]] origin. ''Chi'' was placed toward the end of the Greek alphabet, after the Semitic letters, along with ''[[Phi (letter)|Phi]]'', [[Psi (letter)|''Psi'']], and ''[[Omega]]'', suggesting that it was an innovation; further, there is no letter corresponding specifically to the sound /ks/ in Semitic. There was a Phoenician letter [[Image:Phoenician heth.png|15px]] ''ḥeth'' with a probable sound {{IPA|/ħ/}}, somewhat similar to {{IPA|/kʰ/}}, but this was adopted into Greek as first the consonant /h/, and later, the long vowel ''[[Eta]]'' (Η,η), and does not seem to have been the source of Greek ''Chi''. The Phoenician letter [[Image:phoenician samekh.png|15px]] ''Samekh'' (representing /s/) is usually considered the inspiration for Greek ''Xi'', but as noted, ''Chi'' had a graphically distinct shape from ''Xi'' &mdash; although it may possibly have been another variant originally based on ''samekh''. The original form of ''samekh'' may have been an [[Egyptian hieroglyph]] for the [[Djed]] column, but this too is uncertain, as no intervening [[Proto-Sinaitic]] form of this letter is attested. {| border="1" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0" style="border-collapse: collapse;text-align:center;" |- bgcolor="#EEEEEE" ! Egyptian hieroglyph "column" ! Phoenician S ! Greek Xi ! Greek Chi ! Etruscan X |----- |<hiero>R11</hiero> |[[Image:PhoenicianX-01.png]] |[[Image:Xi uc lc.svg|64px]] |[[Image:Chi uc lc.svg|64px]] |[[Image:EtruscanX-01.svg|40px]] |} ==Usage== In the [[International Phonetic Alphabet]], {{IPA|[x]}} represents a [[voiceless velar fricative]]. In some languages, as a result of assorted phonetic changes and handwriting adaptations, ''X'' has other pronunciations: *[[Basque language|Basque]]: as a spelling for {{IPA|[ʃ]}}. *[[Dutch language|Dutch]]: The island of Texel is pronounced as Tessel. This is because ss was written with a ligature closely resembling the x. *[[English language|English]]: ''X'' is a double consonant or, rather, a sign for the compound consonants {{IPA|[ks]}}; or sometimes when followed by an accented syllable beginning with a vowel, or when followed by silent h and an accented vowel {{IPA|[gz]}} (e.g. ''exhaust'', ''exam''); usually {{IPA|[z]}} at the beginnings of words (e.g. ''xylophone''), and in some compounds keeps the {{IPA|[z]}} sound, as in (e.g. ''meta-xylene''). It also makes the sound {{IPA|[kʃ]}} in words ending in -xion (typically used only in [[American and British English spelling differences#-xion / -ction|British-based spellings]] of the language; American spellings tend to use -ction). It can also represent the sounds {{IPA|[gʒ]}} or {{IPA|[kʃ]}}, for example, in the words luxury and sexual, respectively. When the letter ''X'' begins a word in the [[English language]] such as ''xynene'' and a ''z'' sound is created the ''X'' is said to be silent. Final x is always {{IPA|[ks]}} (e.g. ''ax''/''axe'') except in loan words such as ''faux'' (see French, below). *[[French language|French]]: at the ends of words, silent (or {{IPA|[z]}} in [[liaison]] if the next word starts with a vowel). This usage arose as a handwriting alteration of final ''-us''. Two exceptions are pronounced [s]: ''six'' and ''dix''. *In [[Italian language|Italian]], ''X'' is always {{pronounced|[ks]}}, as in the words ''uxorio'', ''extra'', ''xilofono''. It is also used, mainly amongst younger generations as a short form for "per" meaning "for", for example, x sempre (forever). *In [[Norwegian language|Norwegian]], ''X'' is generally pronounced {{IPA|[ks]}}, but since the nineteenth century there has been a tendency to spell it out as ''ks'' whenever possible; it may still be retained in names of people, though it is fairly rare, and occurs mostly in foreign words and [[SMS language]]. *[[Spanish language|Spanish]]: In Old Spanish, ''X'' was pronounced {{IPA|[ʃ]}}, as it is still currently in other [[Iberian languages]]. Later, the sound evolved to a hard {{IPA|[x]}} sound. In modern Spanish, the hard {{IPA|[x]}} sound is spelled with a ''j'', or with a ''g'' before ''e'' and ''i'', though ''x'' is still retained for some names (notably ''México'', which alternates with ''Méjico''). Now, ''X'' represents the sound {{IPA|[s]}} (word-initially), or the consonat clusters {{IPA|[ks]}} and {{IPA|[gs]}} (e.g. ''oxígeno'', ''examen''). Even rarer; like in Old Spanish, the ''x'' can be pronounced as {{IPA|[ʃ]}} in modern day in some proper nouns such as ''Raxel'' (a variant of [[Rachel]]) and ''[[Xelajú]]''. In American and [[seseo]] Spanish, the ''xc'' in ''excelente'' is pronounced as {{IPA|[ks]}} but in Spain, this combination is pronounced {{IPA|[ksθ]}}. *[[Galician language|Galician]]:In Galician (a language related to Portuguese and spoken in Northwestern Spain), ''x'' is pronounced as a vacillating ''h'', phonically similar to ''j'' in Spanish. *In [[Portuguese language|Portuguese]], ''x'' can have four sounds: the most common is {{IPA|[ʃ]}}, as in 'xícara' (cup). The other sounds are: {{IPA|[ks]}} as in 'fênix/fénix' (phoenix) and {{IPA|[[s]]}}, as in 'próximo' (close/next). The most rare is {{IPA|[z]}}, as in 'exagerado' (exaggerate). *In [[Albanian language|Albanian]], ''x'' represents {{IPA|[dz]}}, while the [[digraph]] ''xh'' represents {{IPA|[dʒ]}}. *[[Polish language|Polish]] doesn't use ''X''. In loanwords, ''X'' is either replaced by ''ks'' like in 'ekstra' (extra), or ''gz'' like in 'egzotyczny' (exotic). *In the [[German language|German]] and [[Italian language|Italian]] languages, ''X'' is used mainly in foreign [[loan word]]s. *In [[Maltese language|Maltese]] x is pronounced {{IPA|[ʃ]}} *In [[Vietnamese language|Vietnamese]] x is pronounced {{IPA|[s]}} Additionally, in languages for which the Latin alphabet has been adapted only recently, ''x'' has been used for various sounds, in some cases inspired by European usage, but in others, for consonants uncommon in Europe. For these no Latin letter stands out as an obvious choice, and since most of the various European pronunciations of ''x'' can be written by other means, the letter becomes available for more unusual sounds. *''X'' has its IPA value {{IPA|[x]}} in e.g. [[Kurdish language|Kurdish]], [[Azerbaijani language|Azerbaijani]], [[Uzbek language|Uzbek]], [[Tatar language|Tatar]] and [[Lojban]]. *In [[Pirahã language|Pirahã]], ''x'' symbolizes the glottal stop {{IPA|[ʔ]}}. *In [[Hanyu Pinyin]], the official transcription system for [[Mandarin Chinese]], the letter ''x'' represents the [[voiceless alveolo-palatal fricative]] {{IPA|/ɕ/}}. *[[Nguni languages]]: represents the [[alveolar lateral click]] {{IPA|[ǁ]}}. *An illustrating example of ''x'' as a "leftover" letter is differing usage in three different [[East Cushitic languages]]: **[[Afar language]] - [[voiced alveolar implosive]] {{IPA|[ɗ]}} **[[Oromo language]] - [[alveolar ejective]] {{IPA|[tʼ]}} **[[Somali language]] - [[voiceless pharyngeal fricative]] {{IPA|[ħ]}} No words in the [[Basic English]] vocabulary begin with ''X'', but it occurs in words beginning with other letters. It is often found in a word with an E before it. X is the third most rarely used letter in the [[English language]]. ==Codes for computing== {{Letter |NATO=X-ray |Morse=–··– |Character=X |Braille=⠭ }} In [[Unicode]] the [[majuscule|capital]] X is codepoint U+0058 and the [[lower case]] x is U+0078. The [[ASCII]] code for capital X is 88 and for lowercase x is 120; or in [[Binary numeral system|binary]] 01011000 and 01111000, correspondingly. The [[EBCDIC]] code for capital X is 231 and for lowercase x is 167. The [[numeric character reference]]s in [[HTML]] and [[XML]] are "<tt>&amp;#88;</tt>" and "<tt>&amp;#120;</tt>" for upper and lower case respectively. ==Other uses for the letter X== ===Similar non-Latin letters=== *Χ, χ : [[Chi (letter)|Greek letter Chi]] *Х, х : [[Kha (Cyrillic)|Cyrillic Kha]]. *メ : [[Me (kana)|Me]] ([[Japanese language|Japanese]] [[katakana]] character) *[[א]] ([[Hebrew alphabet|Hebrew]] [[aleph]]) sometimes looks like X when handwritten. *乂 : A [[Chinese language|Chinese]] character, pronounced "Yì" in [[Mandarin Chinese]]. Means "govern, settle, stable" (治理;安定).<ref>《现代汉语词典》修订本,商务印书馆,Page 1490.</ref> * In pre-[[Normans|Norman]] [[Britain in the Middle Ages|Britain]] a "ᚷ" ([[Gyfu]]) was a letter in the [[Anglo-Saxon futhorc]] [[runic]] alpabet and also indicated a [[gift]]. ===Non-letter symbols in [[Unicode]]=== *× : [[multiplication]] sign *╳ : [[box drawing characters|box drawings]] left diagonal cross *{{unicode|✕}} : multiplication x *{{unicode|✗}} : ballot x *{{unicode|✘}} : heavy ballot x *[[×]] : vector or cross product * In the Japanese [[resale price maintenance]] system for music and print publications, ''[[saihan seido]]'', [[Japanese typographic symbols#Organization-specific symbols|the typographic symbol]] {{unicode|[[Ⓨ]]}} marks the first date for the fixed price and {{unicode|Ⓧ}} marks the last date. ==References== {{reflist}} == See also == {{Commons|X}} *[[Ex]] *[[X mark]] *[[XXXX]] *[[XXX]] *[[XX]] *[[Rx]] *[[Tx]] *[[x marks the spot]] {{Latin alphabet}} [[Category:Latin letters]] [[Category:Placeholder names]] [[af:X]] [[als:X]] [[ar:X]] [[arc:X]] [[ast:X]] [[az:X]] [[br:X (lizherenn)]] [[ca:X]] [[cs:X]] [[co:X]] [[cy:X]] [[da:X]] [[de:X]] [[et:X]] [[el:X]] [[es:X]] [[eo:X]] [[eu:X]] [[fa:X]] [[fr:X (lettre)]] [[fur:X]] [[gan:X]] [[gd:X]] [[gl:X]] [[ko:X]] [[hr:X]] [[ilo:X]] [[is:X]] [[it:X]] [[he:X]] [[ka:X]] [[kw:X]] [[sw:X]] [[ht:X]] [[la:X]] [[lv:X]] [[lt:X]] [[hu:X]] [[mzn:X]] [[ms:X]] [[nah:X]] [[nl:X (letter)]] [[ja:X]] [[no:X]] [[nn:X]] [[nrm:X]] [[uz:X (harf)]] [[pt:X]] [[ro:X]] [[qu:X]] [[ru:X (латиница)]] [[simple:X]] [[sk:X]] [[sl:X]] [[fi:X]] [[sv:X]] [[tl:X]] [[th:X]] [[vi:X]] [[tr:X]] [[uk:X (латиниця)]] [[vo:X]] [[yo:X]] [[zh-yue:X]] [[bat-smg:X]] [[zh:X]]