The letter Y
is the 25th letter in the English alphabet. It is a vowel, but can also be used
as a consonant. In English, Y is an interesting letter because it is not
pronounced as /y/ any longer, but rather as /wi:/. This change in pronunciation
came with the 'Great Vowel Shift' in England between 1350-1500 AD.
The letter Y can be traced back to the Semitic alphabet and was the
letter Waw. This is something that many other letters are based on, including
F, V and U. The Phoenician letter is the basis for the Greek and the Latin
alphabets.
The shape of the letter has never really changed, since the Semitic
sign is what we know as a capital Y. There are now a few looks to the letter –
the main one being a vertical stick with two diagonal lines at the top for the
capital letter. The lower case version has a couple of forms – a single story
and double story version. It is basically a small Q but with a curl to the
left, like the letter G. This can then be turned into the double story by
adding a loop and is commonly used with joined up hand writing.
The Y is sometimes considered to be a vowel and is used in some
smaller words like fly and sky, without any other vowels – every word needs to
have a vowel in it. This is where the idea of six vowels in the English
alphabet comes from.
Y is also commonly used in mathematics, especially in algebra. It is
commonly used in formulas when there are two unknowns. It is also used in graph
work as the vertical scale and in geometry.
Despite its peculiarity, the Y is rather common in english words,
although there are only two Y in the standard Scrabble letter pouch. The Y
yields 4 points, which is fair. Together with an L, the Y can be used to create
many adverbs from adjectives, like "slow" becomes "slowly",
and "stubborn" becomes "stubbornly".
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