Natlang Uses of Diaeresis and Umlaut
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Diaeresis (known as tréma in French) and umlaut both employ the same character. But there is a difference of use between diaeresis and umlaut. Letters with umlaut stand for completely different sounds than their non-accented counterparts. For example in Swedish Oo represents /u/ while Öö represents /ø/. Diaeresis on the other hand does not change the sound value of a letter, but instead marks that a vowel is not part of a diphthong or digraph. Both are also known under the general name trema.
The diaeresis and umlaut characters have different origins. Diaeresis was borrowed from the Greek alphabet,[1] while umlaut began as a small e placed on top of Aa, Oo or Uu. This e then later evolved into the same shape as diaeresis.[2]
Diaeresis/Umlaut in Unicode
| ¨ | ◌̈ | Ä | ä | Ǟ | ǟ | Ë | ë | Ḧ | ḧ | Ï | ï | Ḯ |
| U+00A8 | U+0308 | U+00C4 | U+00E4 | U+01DE | U+01DF | U+00CB | U+00EB | U+1E26 | U+1E27 | U+00CF | U+00EF | U+1E2E |
| Diaeresis | Combining Diaeresis | Latin Capital Letter A With Diaeresis | Latin Small Letter A With Diaeresis | Latin Capital Letter A With Diaeresis And Macron | Latin Small Letter A With Diaeresis And Macron | Latin Capital Letter E With Diaeresis | Latin Small Letter E With Diaeresis | Latin Capital Letter H With Diaeresis | Latin Small Letter H With Diaeresis | Latin Capital Letter I With Diaeresis | Latin Small Letter I With Diaeresis | Latin Capital Letter I With Diaeresis And Acute |
| ḯ | Ö | ö | Ȫ | ȫ | Ṏ | ṏ | ẗ | Ü | ü | Ǖ | ǖ | Ǘ |
| U+1E2F | U+00D6 | U+00F6 | U+022A | U+022B | U+1E4E | U+1E4F | U+1E97 | U+00DC | U+00FC | U+01D5 | U+01D6 | U+01D7 |
| Latin Small Letter I With Diaeresis And Acute | Latin Capital Letter O With Diaeresis | Latin Small Letter O With Diaeresis | Latin Capital Letter O With Diaeresis And Macron | Latin Small Letter O With Diaeresis And Macron | Latin Capital Letter O With Tilde And Diaeresis | Latin Small Letter O With Tilde And Diaeresis | Latin Small Letter T With Diaeresis | Latin Capital Letter U With Diaeresis | Latin Small Letter U With Diaeresis | Latin Capital Letter U With Diaeresis And Macron | Latin Small Letter U With Diaeresis And Macron | Latin Capital Letter U With Diaeresis And Acute |
| ǘ | Ǚ | ǚ | Ǜ | ǜ | Ṻ | ṻ | Ẅ | ẅ | Ẍ | ẍ | Ÿ | ÿ |
| U+01D8 | U+01D9 | U+01DA | U+01DB | U+01DC | U+1E7A | U+1E7B | U+1E84 | U+1E85 | U+1E8C | U+1E8D | U+0178 | U+00FF |
| Latin Small Letter U With Diaeresis And Acute | Latin Capital Letter U With Diaeresis And Caron | Latin Small Letter U With Diaeresis And Caron | Latin Capital Letter U With Diaeresis And Grave | Latin Small Letter U With Diaeresis And Grave | Latin Capital Letter U With Macron And Diaeresis | Latin Small Letter U With Macron And Diaeresis | Latin Capital Letter W With Diaeresis | Latin Small Letter W With Diaeresis | Latin Capital Letter X With Diaeresis | Latin Small Letter X With Diaeresis | Latin Capital Letter Y With Diaeresis | Latin Small Letter Y With Diaeresis |
Natlang Examples
| Usage | Language | Letters | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Front version of back vowel (this includes Ää even though its unaccented version is not a back vowel in all of these languages) | Estonian | Ää /æ/, Öö /ø/, Üü /y/ | |
| Finnish | Ää /æ/, Öö /ø/ | Usage borrowed from Swedish. | |
| German | Ää /ɛ/, Öö /ø/, Üü /y/ | The umlaut evolved from the letter e in the digraphs ae, oe and ue. | |
| Livonian | Ää /æ/, Ǟǟ /æː/ | ||
| Hungarian | Öö /ø/, Üü /y/ | ||
| Slovak | Ää /æ~ɛ/ | /æ/ is archaic or dialectal pronunciation.[3] | |
| Swedish | Ää /ɛ/, Öö /ø/, Üü /y/ | The umlaut evolved from the letter e in the digraphs ae[4] and oe[5]. Üü is not really a part of the Swedish alphabet, but is used in some loanwords and in many surnames. | |
| Hiatus | Catalan | Ïï /i/, Üü /u/ | Diaeresis on an Ii or Uu following another vowel marks that the two vowels are in different syllables. Without diaresis, the Ii or Uu would stand for a semivowel.[6] |
| French | Ëë, Ïï, Üü, Ÿÿ | ||
| Non-silent vowel | Catalan | Üü /w/ | Diaresis on an Uu that is between Gg or Qq and a front vowel marks that this letter stands for /w/. Otherwise it would be a part of the digraph Gu gu /g/ or Qu qu /k/ that is used before front vowels.[7] |
| Raised vowel | Hungarian | Ëë /e/ | Unaccented Ee stands for /ɛ/. Ëë is not really a part of the Hungarian alphabet however; it is used when writing down spoken or sung language in a dialect that has this phoneme. |
