Nun (letter)
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| Nun | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Arabic | Syriac | Hebrew | Aramaic | Phoenician |
| ﻥ | ܢܢ | נ,ן |
|
|
| Pronunciation (IPA): | ||||
| Position in alphabet: | 14 | |||
| Gematria/Abjad value: | 50 | |||
The Phoenician letter gave rise to the Greek nu (Ν), Etruscan 
𐌍, Latin N, and Cyrillic Н.
Origins
Nun is thought to have come from a pictogram of a snake (the Hebrew word for snake, nachash begins with a Nun and snake in Aramaic is nun) or eel. Some have hypothesized a hieroglyph of a fish in water for its origin (in Arabic, nūn means large fish or whale). The Phoenician letter was named nūn "fish", but the glyph likely descends from Proto-Canaanite naḥš "snake", ultimately from a hieroglyph representing a snake,Hebrew Nun
| Hebrew alphabet | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| א | ב | ג | ד | ||
| ה | ו | ז | ח | ט | י |
| כך | ל | מם | נן | ס | ע |
| פף | צץ | ק | ר | ש | ת |
| History · Transliteration Niqqud · Dagesh · Gematria Cantillation · Numeration | |||||
| The Arabic alphabet | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| History · Transliteration Diacritics · hamza {{ar Numerals · Numeration | ||||||
| Syriac alphabet | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Aleph (letter)>ܐ | Beth (letter)>ܒ | Gimel (letter)>ܓ | Dalet>ܕ | ||
| He (letter)>ܗ | Waw (letter)>ܘ | Zayin>ܙ | Heth (letter)>ܚ | Teth>ܛ | Yodh>ܝ |
| Kaph>ܟܟ | Lamedh>ܠ | Mem>ܡܡ | Nun (letter)>ܢܢ | Samekh>ܣ | Ayin>ܥ |
| Pe (letter)>ܦ | Tsade>ܨ | Qoph>ܩ | Resh>ܪ | Shin (letter)>ܫ | Taw (letter)>ܬ |
Pronunciation
Nun is pronounced as a alveolar nasal consonant, (IPA: /n/), like the English letter N.Variations
Nun, like Kaph, Mem, Pe, and Tzadi, has a final form, used at the end of words. Its shape changes from this: נ to this: ן.Significance
In gematria, Nun represents the number 50. Its final form represents 700 but this is rarely used, Tav and Shin (400+300) being used instead.Nun as an abbreviation can stand for neqevah, feminine. In medieval Rabbinic writings, Nun Sophit (Final Nun) stood for "Son of" (Hebrew ben or ibn).
Nun is also one of the seven letters which receive a special crown (called a tagin) when written in a Sefer Torah. See Shin, Ayin, Teth, Gimmel, Zayin, and Tzadi.
In modern Israeli slang, the word Nun has come to mean "failure" (from Hebrew Nichshal, he lost).
See also
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