Niqqud

Niqqud
ְ   ֱ   ֲ   ֳ   ִ   ֵ   ֶ   ַ   ָ   ֹ   ֻ   ּ   ֿ   ׁ   ׂ
Other diacritics	cantillation, geresh, gershayim
Example
File:Example of biblical Hebrew trope.svg
Gen. 1:9, "And God said, Let the waters be collected". Letters in black, niqqud in red, cantillation in blue
Niqqud articles
Shva · Hiriq · Zeire · Segol · Patach · Kamatz · Holam · Dagesh · Mappiq · Shuruk · Kubutz · Rafe · Sin/Shin dot

In Hebrew orthography, niqqud or nikud (Hebrew: , Modern: , Tiberian: , 'dotting, pointing' or Hebrew: , Modern: , Tiberian: , 'dots') is a system of diacritical signs used to represent vowels or distinguish between alternative pronunciations of letters of the Hebrew alphabet. Several such diacritical systems were developed in the Early Middle Ages. The most widespread system, and the only one still used to a significant degree today, was created by the Masoretes of Tiberias in the second half of the first millennium AD in the Land of Israel (see Masoretic Text, Tiberian Hebrew). Text written with niqqud is called ktiv menuqad.

Niqqud marks are small compared to the letters, so they can be added without retranscribing texts whose writers did not anticipate them.

In modern Israeli orthography, niqqud is mainly used in specialised texts such as dictionaries, poetry, or texts for children or new immigrants to Israel. For purposes of disambiguation, a system of spelling without niqqud, known in Hebrew as ktiv maleh (, literally "full spelling"), had developed before the introduction of niqqud. This was formally standardised in the Rules for Spelling without Niqqud () enacted by the Academy of the Hebrew Language in 1996, and updated in 2017. Nevertheless, niqqud is still used occasionally in texts to prevent ambiguity and mispronunciation of specific words.

One reason for the lesser use of niqqud is that it no longer reflects the current pronunciation. In modern Hebrew, tzere is pronounced the same as segol, although they were distinct in Tiberian Hebrew, and pataḥ the same as qamatz. To the younger generation of native Hebrew speakers, these distinctions seem arbitrary and meaningless; on the other hand, Hebrew language purists have rejected out of hand the idea of changing the basics of niqqud and fitting them to the current pronunciation – with the result that in practice niqqud is increasingly going out of use.

According to Ghil'ad Zuckermann, the lack of niqqud in what he calls "Israeli" (Modern Hebrew) often results in "mispronunciations".Template:Rp For example, the Israeli lexical item is often pronounced as mitabním (literally "becoming fossilized (masculine plural)") instead of metaavním "appetizers", the latter deriving from teavón "appetite", the former deriving from éven "stone".Template:Rp Another example is the toponym , which is often pronounced as maalé edomím instead of maalé adumím, the latter appearing in the Hebrew Bible (Joshua 15:7 and 18:17).Template:Rp The hypercorrect yotvetá is used instead of yotváta for the toponym , mentioned in Deuteronomy 10:7.Template:Rp The surname of American actress Farrah Fawcett () is often pronounced fost instead of fóset by many Israelis.Template:Rp

Chart

This table uses the consonant letters ב‎, ח‎ or ש‎, where appropriate, to demonstrate where the niqqud is placed in relation to the consonant it is pronounced after. Any other letters shown are actually part of the vowel. Note that there is some variation among different traditions in exactly how some vowel points are pronounced. The table below shows how most Israelis would pronounce them, but the classic Ashkenazi pronunciation, for example, differs in several respects.

Note concerning IPA: the transcription symbols are linked to the articles about the sounds they represent. The diacritic ˘ (breve) indicates a short vowel; the triangular colon symbol ː indicates that the vowel is long.

Symbol	Common name	Alternative names	Type	Scientific name	Hebrew	IPA	Transliteration	Comments
בְ‎	Sh'va	sheva	Israeli	švaʾ		[e̞] or Ø	ə, e, ', or nothing	In modern Hebrew, shva represents either or Ø, regardless of its traditional classification as shva naḥ (Template:Langx) or shva na (Template:Langx). Examples: Niqqud Shva denoting the vowel Shva denoting Ø (absence of a vowel) shva naḥ shva na
			Tiberian	šəwāʾ		[ă] [ɛ̆] [ĕ] [ĭ] [ɔ̆] [ŏ] [ŭ]	Template:CEmpty
חֱ‎	Reduced segol	hataf segol	Israeli	ẖataf seggōl		[e̞]	e or é	Template:CEmpty
			Tiberian	ḥăṭep̄ səgōl		[ɛ̆]	ĕ	Template:CEmpty
חֲ‎	Reduced patach	hataf patah	Israeli	ẖataf pattaẖ		[a]	a or á	Template:CEmpty
			Tiberian	ḥăṭep̄ páṯaḥ		[ă]	ă	Template:CEmpty
חֳ‎	Reduced kamatz	hataf kamats	Israeli	ẖataf qamaṣ		[o̞]	ŏ	Template:CEmpty
			Tiberian	ḥăṭep̄ qāmeṣ		[ɔ̆]	ŏ	Template:CEmpty
בִ‎	Hiriq	hiriq	Israeli	ẖīrīq		[i]	ī	Usually promoted to Hiriq Malei in Israeli writing for the sake of disambiguation.
			Tiberian	ḥīreq		[i] or [iː]	ī	Template:CEmpty
בִי‎	Hiriq malei	hiriq yod	Israeli	ẖīrīq maleʾ		[i]	ī	Template:CEmpty
			Tiberian	ḥīreq mālēʾ		[iː]	ī	Template:CEmpty
בֵ‎	Zeire	tsere, tzeirei	Israeli	ṣērē		[e̞]	e	Template:CEmpty
			Tiberian	ṣērē		[eː]	ē	Template:CEmpty
בֵי‎, בֵה‎, בֵא‎	Zeire malei	tsere yod, tzeirei yod	Israeli	ṣērē maleʾ		[e̞]	ē	More commonly ei (IPA ).
			Tiberian	ṣērē mālēʾ		[eː]	ē	Template:CEmpty
בֶ‎	Segol	segol	Israeli	seggōl		[e̞]	e	Template:CEmpty
			Tiberian	səḡōl	סְגוֹל‎	[ɛ] or [ɛː]	e or é	Template:CEmpty
בֶי‎, בֶה‎, בֶא‎	Segol malei	segol yod	Israeli	seggōl maleʾ		[e̞]	e	With succeeding yod, it is more commonly ei (IPA ).
			Tiberian	səḡōl mālēʾ		[ɛː]	ệ	Template:CEmpty
בַ‎	Patach	patah	Israeli	pattaẖ		[a]	a	A patach on the letters ח‎, ע‎, ה‎ at the end of a word is sounded before the letter, and not after. Thus, (Noah) is pronounced . This only occurs at the ends of words and only with patach and ח‎, ע‎, and הּ‎ (that is, ה‎ with a dot (mappiq) in it). This is sometimes called a patach ganuv (), or "stolen" patach (more formally, "furtive patach"), since the sound "steals" an imaginary epenthetic consonant to make the extra syllable.
			Tiberian	páṯaḥ		[a] or [aː]	a or á	Template:CEmpty
בַה‎, בַא‎	Patach malei	patah he	Israeli	pattaẖ maleʾ		[a]	a	Template:CEmpty
			Tiberian	páṯaḥ mālēʾ		[aː]	a	Template:CEmpty
בָ‎	Kamatz gadol	kamats	Israeli	qamaṣ gadōl		[a]	a	Template:CEmpty
			Tiberian	qāmeṣ gāḏōl		[ɔː]	ā	Template:CEmpty
בָה‎, בָא‎	Kamatz malei	kamats he	Israeli	qamaṣ maleʾ		[a]	a	Template:CEmpty
			Tiberian	qāmeṣ mālēʾ		[ɔː]	â	Template:CEmpty
בׇ‎	Kamatz katan	kamats hatuf	Israeli	qamaṣ qatan		[o̞]	o	Usually promoted to holam malei in Israeli writing for the sake of disambiguation. Also, not to be confused with Hataf Kamatz.
			Tiberian	qāmeṣ qāṭān		[ɔ]		Template:CEmpty
בֹ‎	Holam	holam	Israeli	ẖolam		[o̞]	o	Usually promoted to holam malei in Israeli writing for the sake of disambiguation. The holam is written above the consonant on the left corner, or slightly to the left of (i.e., after) it at the top.
			Tiberian	ḥōlem		[oː]	ō	Template:CEmpty
בוֹ‎, בֹה‎, בֹא‎	Holam malei	holam male	Israeli	ẖōlam mālēʾ		[o̞]	ō	The holam is written in the normal position relative to the main consonant (above and slightly to the left), which places it directly over the vav.
			Tiberian	ḥōlem mālēʾ		[oː]	ō	Template:CEmpty
בֻ‎	Kubutz	kubuts (shuruk - Ashkenazi)	Israeli	qubūṣ		[u]	u	Usually promoted to Shuruk in Israeli writing for the sake of disambiguation.
			Tiberian	qībūṣ		[u] or [uː]	u or ú	Template:CEmpty
בוּ‎, בוּה‎, בוּא‎	Shuruk	shuruk (melopum - Ashkenazi)	Israeli	šūrūq		[u]	ū	The shuruk is written after the consonant it applies to (the consonant after which the vowel is pronounced). The dot in the shuruk is identical to a dagesh, thus shuruq and vav with a dagesh are indistinguishable. (see below)
			Tiberian	šūreq		[uː]	ū	Template:CEmpty
בּ‎	Dagesh	dagesh	Israeli	dageš		varied	varied	Not a vowel, "dagesh" refers to two distinct grammatical entities: "dagesh kal", which designates the plosive (as opposed to fricative) variant of any of the letters (in earlier forms of Hebrew this distinction was allophonic; in Israeli Hebrew ג‎, ד‎ and ת‎ with or without dagesh kal are acoustically and phonologically indistinguishable, whereas plosive and fricative variants of ב‎, כ‎ and פ‎ are sometimes allophonic and sometimes distinct phonemes (e.g., applied make up vs. tipped ash). "dagesh hazak", which designates gemination (prolonged pronunciation) of consonants, but which, although represented in most cases when transliterated according to standards of the Academy of the Hebrew Language, is acoustically and phonologically nonexistent in Modern Hebrew (except occasionally in dramatic or comical recitations, in some loanwords—such as a few Arabic profanities—and pronunciations exaggerated for the sake of disambiguation). For most letters the dagesh is written within the glyph, near the middle if possible, but the exact position varies from letter to letter (some letters do not have an open area in the middle, and in these cases it is written usually beside the letter, as with yod). The guttural consonants (א, ה, ח, ע‎) and resh (ר‎) are not marked with a dagesh, although the letter he (ה‎) (and rarely א‎) may appear with a mappiq (which is written the same way as dagesh) at the end of a word to indicate that the letter does not signify a vowel but is consonantal. To the resulting form, there can still be added a niqqud diacritic designating a vowel.
			Tiberian	dāḡēš	דָּגֵשׁ‎	Template:CEmpty	Template:CEmpty
בֿ‎	Rafe	rafe	Israeli	rafe		Ø	a˺, e˺, i˺, o˺, or u˺	No longer used in Hebrew. Still seen in Yiddish (especially following the YIVO standard) to distinguish various letter pairs. Some ancient manuscripts have a dagesh or a rafe on nearly every letter. It is also used to indicate that a letter like ה‎ or א‎ is silent. In the particularly strange case of the Ten Commandments, which have two different traditions for their cantillations which many texts write together, there are cases of a single letter with both a dagesh and a rafe, if it is hard in one reading and soft in the other.
			Tiberian	rāfa		[◌̆]	ă, ĕ, ĭ, or ŭ	Niqqud, but not a vowel. Used as an "anti-dagesh", to show that a letter is soft and not hard, or (sometimes) that a consonant is single and not double, or that a letter like ה‎ or א‎ is completely silent.
שׁ‎	Shin dot	shin dot	Israeli and Tiberian	šin dot	, , "right Shin"	[ʃ]	š/sh	Niqqud, but not a vowel (except when inadequate typefaces merge the holam of a letter before the shin with the shin dot). The dot for shin is written over the right (first) branch of the letter. It is usually transcribed "sh".
שׂ‎	Sin dot	sin dot	Israeli	śin dot	, , "left Shin"	[s]	ś/s	Niqqud, but not a vowel (except when inadequate typefaces merge the holam of the sin with the sin dot). The dot for sin is written over the left (third) branch of the letter.
			Tiberian					Some linguistic evidence indicates that it was originally IPA [ɬ].

Keyboard

Both consonants and niqqud can be typed from virtual graphical keyboards available on the World Wide Web, or by methods integrated into particular operating systems.

Microsoft Windows

• In Windows 8 or later, niqqud can be entered using the right alt (or left alt + ctrl) + the first Hebrew letter of the name of the value, when using the default (Hebrew Standard) keyboard layout:

Niqqud	Right Alt (=AltGr) + Hebrew-keyboard key:	Explanation (usually the first Hebrew letter of the niqqud's name)
אָ‎	for (kamatz)	first Hebrew letter of the niqqud's name
אַ‎	for (patach)
בְ‎	for (sheva)
בּ וּ הּ‎	for (dagesh)
אִ‎	for (hiriq)
אֶ‎	for (segol)
אֵ‎	for (tsere)
אֹ‎	for (holam)	the key (like the 'o' vowel), since the key is already used for hiriq
אֻ‎	for (kubuts)	because the line \ visually resembles ֻ
אֲ‎	for reduced patach	the key to the right of
אֳ‎	for reduced kamats	the key to the right of
אֱ‎	for reduced segol	the key to the right of
שׁ‎	for the Shin dot	the key above , right-side, since the dot is placed above ש‎, right-side
שׂ‎	for the Sin dot	the key above , left-side, since the dot is placed above ש‎, left-side
אֿ‎	for (rafe)

• In Windows 7 or earlier, niqqud can be entered by enabling Caps Lock and then, with the cursor positioned after a letter, pressing Shift and one of the keys in the Windows column below.
• The user can configure the registry to allow use of the Alt key with the numeric plus key to type the hexadecimal Unicode value.
• The user can use the Microsoft Keyboard Layout Creator to produce a custom keyboard layout, or can download a layout produced by another party.

Linux

In GTK+ Linux systems, niqqud can be entered by holding down AltGR and pressing the same keys as for Windows, above, or by pressing ctrl+shift+u followed by the appropriate 4 digit Unicode.

macOS

Using the Hebrew keyboard layout in macOS, the typist can enter niqqud by pressing the Option key together with a number on the top row of the keyboard. Other combinations such as sofit and hataf can also be entered by pressing either the Shift key and a number, or by pressing the Shift key, Option key, and a number at the same time.

Niqqud input Input (Windows) Key (Windows) Input (macOS) Unicode Type Result ~ File:TildeKey.svg 0 05B0 Sh'va File:Tilde Schwa.svg [1] 1 3 05B1 Reduced Segol File:Hataf Segol.svg [1] 2 1 05B2 Reduced Patach File:Hataf Patah.svg [1] 3 2 05B3 Reduced Kamatz File:Hataf Qamaz.svg [1] 4 4 05B4 Hiriq File:Hebrew Hiriq.svg [1] 5 5 05B5 Zeire File:Hebrew Zeire.svg [1] 6 9 05B6 Segol File:Hebrew Segol.svg [1] 7 6 05B7 Patach File:Hebrew Patah.svg [] 8 7 05B8 Kamatz File:Hebrew Qamaz.svg 1 9 A 05C2 Sin dot (left) File:Hebrew Sin.svg 2 0 M 05C1 Shin dot (right) File:0 Shin.svg 2  – = 05B9 Holam File:Hebrew Holam.svg 1 = 3 , 05BC Dagesh or Mappiq File:Hebrew Equal Dagesh.svg 1 U 05BC Shuruk File:Hebrew Equal Shuruk.svg 4 \ 8 05BB Kubutz File:Hebrew Backslash Qubuz.svg 1

Notes:

• ¹ The letter "ס‎" represents any Hebrew consonant.
• ² For sin-dot and shin-dot, the letter "ש‎" (sin/shin) is used.
• ³ The dagesh, mappiq, and shuruk have different uses, but the same graphical representation, and hence are input in the same manner.
• ⁴ For shuruk, the letter "ו‎" (vav) is used since it can only be used with that letter.
• A rafe can be input by inserting the corresponding Unicode character, either explicitly or via a customized keyboard layout.

SIL Global have developed another standard, which is based on Tiro, but adds the Niqqud along the home keys. Linux comes with "Israel — Biblical Hebrew (Tiro)" as a standard layout. With this layout, niqqud can be typed without pressing the Caps Lock key.

See also

• The Arabic equivalent, nuqaṭ
• Hebrew diacritics
• Q're perpetuum
• Hebrew spelling
• Tiberian Hebrew
• Hebrew keyboard

Bibliography

• Gonen, Einat; Dan, Barak (2006). Gadish, Ronit (ed.). "Leshonenu La′am. Academy Decisions: Grammar". Ha-ʻIvrit (in עברית). Jerusalem: The Academy of the Hebrew Language. ISSN 0024-1091.
• File:Wikisource-logo.svg Gesenius' Hebrew Grammar, especially §7, §8, §9
• Netzer, Nisan (1976). Haniqqud halakha lema′ase (in עברית). Israel: Massada.

External links

• Diacritical Vowel Markers