Samekh

Samekh
Phonemic representation s
Position in alphabet 15
Numerical value 60
Alphabetic derivatives of the Phoenician

Samekh or Simketh is the fifteenth letter of many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician Samek , Hebrew ˈSamekh ס, Aramaic Semkath , Syriac Semkaṯ ܣ, representing /s/. The Arabic alphabet, however, uses a letter based on Phoenician Šīn to represent /s/ (see there); however, that glyph takes Samekh's place in the traditional Abjadi order of the Arabic alphabet.

The Phoenician letter gave rise to the Greek Xi (Ξ, ξ).[1] However, its name gave rise to Sigma.

Origins

The origin of Samekh is unclear. The Phoenician letter may continue a glyph from the Middle Bronze Age alphabets, either based on a hieroglyph for a tent peg / some kind of prop (s'mikhah, Hebrew: סמיכה‎, or t'mikhah, Hebrew: תמיכה‎, in modern Hebrew means to support), and thus may be derived from the Egyptian hieroglyph djed.[2]

R11

Hebrew Samekh

Orthographic variants
Various print fonts Cursive
Hebrew		 Rashi
script
SerifSans-serifMonospaced
ס ס ס

Hebrew spelling: סָמֶךְ‬

Pronunciation

Samekh represents a voiceless alveolar fricative /s/. Unlike most Semitic consonants, the pronunciation of /s/ remains constant between vowels and before voiced consonants.

Significance

Samekh in gematria has the value 60.

Samekh and Mem can be combined to form the abbreviation ס''ם, known as samekh-mem, a euphemism used for the name of the angel Samael to avoid speaking his name aloud and thereby attracting his attention.[3] It also stands for centimeter.

In some legends, samekh is said to have been a miracle of the Ten Commandments. Exodus 32:15 records that the tablets "were written on both their sides." The Jerusalem Talmud interprets this as meaning that the inscription went through the full thickness of the tablets. The stone in the center parts of the letters ayin and teth should have fallen out, as it was not connected to the rest of the tablet, but it miraculously remained in place. The Babylonian Talmud (tractate Shabbat 104a), on the other hand, attributes this instead to samekh, but samekh did not have such a hollow form in the sacred Paleo-Hebrew alphabet that would presumably have been used for the tablets. However, this would be appropriate for the Rabbis who maintained that the Torah or the Ten Commandments were given in the later Hebrew "Assyrian" script (Sanhedrin 21b-22a).

Character encodings

Characterסܣܤࠎ
Unicode nameHEBREW LETTER SAMEKHSYRIAC LETTER SEMKATHSYRIAC LETTER FINAL SEMKATHSAMARITAN LETTER SINGAAT
Encodingsdecimalhexdecimalhexdecimalhexdecimalhex
Unicode1505U+05E11827U+07231828U+07242062U+080E
UTF-8215 161D7 A1220 163DC A3220 164DC A4224 160 142E0 A0 8E
Numeric character referenceססܣܣܤܤࠎࠎ
Character𐎒𐡎𐤎
Unicode nameUGARITIC LETTER SAMKAIMPERIAL ARAMAIC LETTER SAMEKHPHOENICIAN LETTER SEMKA
Encodingsdecimalhexdecimalhexdecimalhex
Unicode66450U+1039267662U+1084E67854U+1090E
UTF-8240 144 142 146F0 90 8E 92240 144 161 142F0 90 A1 8E240 144 164 142F0 90 A4 8E
UTF-1655296 57234D800 DF9255298 56398D802 DC4E55298 56590D802 DD0E
Numeric character reference𐎒𐎒𐡎𐡎𐤎𐤎

References

  1. ↑ Muss-Arnolt, W. (1892). On Semitic Words in Greek and Latin. Transactions of the American Philological Association v. 23, p. 35-156. The Johns Hopkins University Press.
  2. ↑ Betro, M. C. (1996). Hieroglyphics. Abbeyville Press, NY, p. 209.
  3. ↑ Dennis, Geoffrey. W (2016). The Encyclopedia of Jewish Myth, Magic, and Mysticism: Second Edition. Llewellyn. p. 370. ISBN 978-0738745916.
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.