Q: generic name for dieresis/umlaut
Andre G Isaak
Hi all,
Does anyone know if there is a generic name for the diacritic mark
whose postscript name is 'dieresis'?
Neither umlaut nor dieresis seem like particularly appropriate names
for the glyph since in languages like French it does not indicate
umlaut, and in languages like German it does not indicate diaeresis.
In addition, in a number of Mayan languages, it is used to indicate
laminal rather than retroflex articulation of certain consonants, and
velar articulation of n, again suggesting that a generic name would
be useful.
And, of course, rock bands use it for no discernable purpose whatsoever,
though suprisingly seem to undertand which characters it normally
appears above in European languages.
Neither Bringhurst nor Pullum & Ladusaw provide an alternate name
for this diacritic. Anyone know of one?
Andre
--
Andre G Isaak agi...@linguist.umass.edu
Department of Linguistics (413) 586-8949 (Res)
University of Massachusetts, Amherst
Harry Dodsworth
The old dieresis problem again :-)
I got into this a couple of years ago; partly here I think and partly by email.
The conclusion was that the two dots over a vowel could mean one of three
things.
1) A dieresis in French; it stops two vowels forming a diphthong
2) An umlaut in German; a sound modifier
3) In Scandinavian languages, it indicates a completely different letter
so that the letter a dieresis is just as different from the letter a
as the letter y is.
To add to the confusion, some languages sort a dieresis with the a's,
some sort it after the a's, and some sort it somewhere else altogether
depending on the sort order applicable (This may be slightly exaggerated)
Andre G Isaak has mentioned a fourth use, in Mayan languages, although
this looks like another sound modifier but applied to consonants
I guess we have to call it dieresis in PostScript.
Colloquially I suspect umlaut is the best known name, certainly snappier
than 'the diacritical mark consisting of two little dots over a letter' :-)
--
Harry Dodsworth Ottawa Ontario Canada af...@freenet.carleton.ca
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On 28 Jun 1998 23:54:44 GMT, Harry Dodsworth <af...@FreeNet.Carleton.CA> mooed:
>
> The old dieresis problem again :-)
>
>I got into this a couple of years ago; partly here I think and partly by email.
>The conclusion was that the two dots over a vowel could mean one of three
>things.
>1) A dieresis in French; it stops two vowels forming a diphthong
>2) An umlaut in German; a sound modifier
>3) In Scandinavian languages, it indicates a completely different letter
> so that the letter a dieresis is just as different from the letter a
> as the letter y is.
> To add to the confusion, some languages sort a dieresis with the a's,
> some sort it after the a's, and some sort it somewhere else altogether
> depending on the sort order applicable (This may be slightly exaggerated)
>
> Andre G Isaak has mentioned a fourth use, in Mayan languages, although
>this looks like another sound modifier but applied to consonants
Not just Mayan, either. There are a number of Native American and some
African (?) languages, and possibly others as well (i.e. some of the
languages in New Guinea and other similarily-not-well-known tongues that
have writing systems based off the Roman alphabet), that have "dotted
consonants" including consonants with diereses. (What *is* the plural of
dieresis, anyway? :)
If memory serves, this is either from the IPA itself or from a system used
before the IPA, and denotes different types of the consonant. Yes, a lot
of these languages have three or four different distinct variants of a
consonant sound! :) (I'll also note, as an aside, I have seen *dotted*
consonants in some transliteration schemes for Arabic and related
languages, and if memory serves I *do* remember consonants with diereses
used in a transliteration scheme for an East Indian language (this was
YEARS back, and I honestly can't remember which alphabet now :( ). This
was so the different sounds could be differentiated--they, too, had
several different "kinds" of n-sound, t-sound, etc.
I will note, offhand, that using standard diacritical marks in
nonstandard ways is probably less migraine-intensive to font creators that
have to keep stuff halfway standard to "normal" Roman type. Some of the
extant transcription schemes for Native American languages in particular
range from possibly confusing to new readers (transliterated Cherokee is
an example of this--no less than *three* separate transliteration schemes
exist, including an old one that uses "v" for the nasalised "schwa" sound
that occurs, one that uses a tilde over letters or tilde'd u in the
syllable, and one that uses the IPA designation for "nasalised schwa") to
typographist's nightmares (Northwestern Native American languages use a
LOT of variant consonants, a few consonants that do not exist in English
at ALL, and transcription using straight "Roman" characters is probably
impossible to do--so one ends up with all sorts of stuff like upside-down
T's and L's and H's and a thousand diacritical marks and vowel and
consonant marks taken straight from the IPA list). I've my doubts that
one can do a "modified" system with a language with a LOT of variant
consonants (like Kwak'wakw--it used to be spelled Kwakiutl--this should
give an example of just how impossible it *is* to write Kwak'wakw without
having to dip into the IPA characters :) but for those languages with just
one or two variants (like most Mayan tongues, or Cherokee, or in Arabic
transliteration) you should be ok.
As a complete and utter aside--does anyone happen to have a list anywhere
of the *complete* IPA character set? (No, I'm not asking for the font.
I happen to have the SIL IPA fonts, thankee. :) I just wonder how many
characters there ARE and what they all mean and to maybe try my hand one
day when I'm feeling particularly masochistic at making an IPA fontset. :)
And if you've not, anyone know where such a list is to be had?
> I guess we have to call it dieresis in PostScript.
>Colloquially I suspect umlaut is the best known name, certainly snappier
>than 'the diacritical mark consisting of two little dots over a letter' :-)
Offhand--and this is where things are going to get frightening, and I may
be telling on myself here :)--I'd tend to agree. :)
When I was younger, I was (and still am) a heavy metal fan. :) In the
metal magazines (seeing as it was considered a Cool Thing to add the
little dots over vowels in the early 80's--you *probably* can blame either
Motorhead or Motley Crue for this, take your pick :) the little dots were
always referred to as umlauts. This was especially true in band histories
and whatnot. At the very least, metal fans from the Days of Hair Metal
And Shortly Before will call them umlauts. :)
(If there is anything more frightening, FWIW, than the author's
experiences in the 80's and early 90's as a diehard Cruehead and Motorhead
fan besides tieing in with serious discussion of fontography, I honestly
do not know what is. :) Save for what just hit me and what I'll mention
in passing. :)
And last, but not least:
I just remembered, offhand, the third place where I've seen an "n" with a
dieresis. Specifically, the "parody band" Spinal Tap. (Yes, the N in
Spinal Tap has a dieresis. This was, of course, meant to take the p*ss of
the metal and hard rock bands doing the same thing. :)
-moo
Tiro Typeworks
On 29 Jun 1998 20:01:33 GMT, dick...@aol.com (DickWeltz) wrote:
>That is, you can call it a dieresis in English...
Diaeresis would be even better.
John Hudson, Type Director
Tiro Typeworks
Vancouver, BC
ti...@tiro.com
www.tiro.com
DickWeltz
>
> I guess we have to call it dieresis in PostScript.
That is, you can call it a dieresis in English -- the name for this mark
existed long before PostScript replaced traditional typographic crafts
technologies.
Typesetting, after all, really wasn't invented by John Q. Adobe.
-- Dick Weltz, Spectrum Multilanguage Communications, NYC
America's leading translators & foreign language typesetters
===================================================
http://come.to/spectrum
tra...@inforamp.net
(What *is* the plural of
> dieresis, anyway? :)
diaeresis or dieresis - diaereses or diereses
Peter Stanbridge
Oakville, Ontario
tra...@inforamp.net
Andre G Isaak
In article <B7BF8EA6F86C4266.63798444...@library-proxy.airnews.net>,
Moocows hate spam. <pmba...@spamtrampling-moocow.slug.louisville.edu> wrote:
>consonants (like Kwak'wakw--it used to be spelled Kwakiutl--this should
>give an example of just how impossible it *is* to write Kwak'wakw without
>having to dip into the IPA characters :) but for those languages with just
Kwakiukl and Kwak'wala are two different words, they are are not simply
different transliterations of the same word.
>
>As a complete and utter aside--does anyone happen to have a list anywhere
>of the *complete* IPA character set? (No, I'm not asking for the font.
>I happen to have the SIL IPA fonts, thankee. :) I just wonder how many
You should be able to get a complete list of IPA characters from any
decent phonetics text published after 1993. The IPA proper is not that
large, and can easily be summarised on a single page. I believe the
SIL fonts are fairly complete in this regards.
Note, however, that the set of phonetic characters in common usage is
not restricted to those defined by the IPA. North American usage, in
particular, deviates from the IPA in a number of regards, and people
working on specific groups of languages often employ their own conventions
which may or may not conform strictly with IPA usage.
If you want a decent reference on common phonetic symbols which is
not restricted to the IPA proper, you should consult the _Phonetic
Symbol Guide_, 2nd ed., by Geoffrey Pullum and Bill Ladusaw. (U of
Chicago Press).
Tiro Typeworks
On 29 Jun 1998 17:07:28 -0400, agi...@emily.oit.umass.edu (Andre G
Isaak) wrote:
>If you want a decent reference on common phonetic symbols which is
>not restricted to the IPA proper, you should consult the _Phonetic
>Symbol Guide_, 2nd ed., by Geoffrey Pullum and Bill Ladusaw. (U of
>Chicago Press).
This is a very handy book, and I certainly agree that anyone involved
in phonetics would probably find this a useful reference book. It
should be noted, as a small caveat, that some of the IPA usage cited
in the book is a little misleading. As an example, Pullam and Ladusaw
identify the IPA usage of the Greek letter chi as 'voiced uvular
central fricative', whereas a more normal IPA designation would be
simply voiced uvular fricative.
Andre G Isaak
In article <35980bcd...@news.portal.ca>,
Tiro Typeworks <ti...@tiro.com> wrote:
>in the book is a little misleading. As an example, Pullam and Ladusaw
>identify the IPA usage of the Greek letter chi as 'voiced uvular
>central fricative', whereas a more normal IPA designation would be
>simply voiced uvular fricative.
Hi Mr. Hudson,
I think I may have mislead you in my earlier post. chi represents
a voiceless uvular fricative. It is perfectly accurate to describe
it as central. This is just normally left out since there is not
AFAIK any lateral (i.e. non-central) uvular fricative which it contrasts
with.
Sorry about the confusion,
Andre G Isaak
In article <199806292001...@ladder01.news.aol.com>,
DickWeltz <dick...@aol.com> wrote:
>>
>> I guess we have to call it dieresis in PostScript.
>
>That is, you can call it a dieresis in English -- the name for this mark
>existed long before PostScript replaced traditional typographic crafts
>technologies.
Yes, I don't think anyone is suggesting that the term diaeresis is
specific to postscript.
The question I originally asked was whether the 'double dot accent'
has a generic name which does not denote a specific function.
Diaeresis refers to the process of breaking up two vowels into separate
syllables (which in English is more commonly represented by a hyphen
than a 'double dot accent' -- or at least it appears to be becoming
more common).
Umlaut refers to the process by which a back vowel becomes fronted
under the influence of a following front vowel or glide (or, in many
instances, of the historical remnants of such a process).
Both of these terms refer to processes rather than the diacritic mark
itself, which is also used in ways not accurately described by either
of the above terms.
In many Kanjobalan (Mayan) languages, this indicates velar articulation
when placed above an n, and laminal articulation when placed above an x.
Neither of these usages can accurately by referred to as either
diaeresis or umlauting.
In chemistry it can be used to indicate the presence of a lone pair
(though this usage is more iconic, and might therefore not be considered
an instance of the same diacritic).
In French (where it indicates diaeresis), it is refered to as a trema,
but I believe that this term is used to indicate other diacritics in
other languages, so this is probably also not an appropriate as a
generic term for the diacritic itself.
Double dot accent, a term which I invented for this post, sounds
silly, so I would hardly advocate it.
My understanding is that in blackletter forms, umlaut was originally
indicated by a superscript e written above the vowel in question. I
would guess, therefore, that the umlaut diacritic evolved from two
strokes of the e (though I am speculating here and could easily be
wrong). Does anyone know whether two dots were used to represent
diaeresis in renaissance whiteletter types, and whether this usage
evolved before or after its use to represent umlaut in German (n.b.
I'm not all that knowledgable of this history of type, so this question
could well be ill-formed). I ask this out of curiosity, not because
I think it would help answer the above question.
Tiro Typeworks
On 30 Jun 1998 19:28:04 -0400, agi...@emily.oit.umass.edu (Andre G
Isaak) wrote:
>I think I may have mislead you in my earlier post. chi represents
>a voiceless uvular fricative. It is perfectly accurate to describe
>it as central. This is just normally left out since there is not
>AFAIK any lateral (i.e. non-central) uvular fricative which it contrasts
>with.
Yes, I understand the distinction. This is why I characterised Pullam
& Ladusaw as peculiar, not incorrect.
Carl Edlund Anderson
In article <6nbt6p$f...@emily.oit.umass.edu>, agi...@emily.oit.umass.edu
(Andre G Isaak) wrote:
> My understanding is that in blackletter forms, umlaut was originally
> indicated by a superscript e written above the vowel in question. I
> would guess, therefore, that the umlaut diacritic evolved from two
> strokes of the e (though I am speculating here and could easily be
> wrong).
That is certainly true. Incidentlly, the "slashed o" [ø] is also
originally from a combination of "o" and "e" (as is, obviously, the common
"oe ligature [¦]). Likewise, the characteristically Scandinavian "a with
ring" [å] is really just an "a" with a superscript "o".
> Does anyone know whether two dots were used to represent
> diaeresis in renaissance whiteletter types, and whether this usage
> evolved before or after its use to represent umlaut in German
I believe the "two dots" (from a superscript "e") was evolved
specifically to represent umlaut (not only in German, but in the
Scandinavian languages as well (where similar phonetic operations occur).
Of course, printing practices in Scandinavia were heavily influenced by
German practices. The Swedish "Gustavus Vasa Bible" of 1541 was set in
"blackletter" and contains "o with superscript e" for "ö", "a with
superscript e" for "ä", and "a with superscript o" for "å". However, I
believe the "two dots" to replace "superscript e" was already a scribal
abbreviation in the late medieval period (but I could be wrong!).
Also, I don't know precisely the "two dots" for "superscript e" became
common in printing blackletter faces. However, by the 18th century Sweden,
anyway, was moving away from blackletter printing--the "national law code"
of 1734 was printed in "regular" serifed typeface with "two dots" (in "ö"
and "ä") and, of course, "a with ring/superscript-o" for "å".
That is my understanding of the situation, more or less, anyway!
Cheers,
Carl
--
Carl Edlund Anderson
Dept. of Anglo-Saxon, Norse, & Celtic
St. John's College, University of Cambridge
mailto:ce...@cus.cam.ac.uk
http://hea-www.harvard.edu/~carl/
Ralph Hancock
Carl Edlund Anderson <ce...@cus.cam.ac.uk> wrote in article
<cea20-ya02408000...@nntp-serv.cam.ac.uk>...
> In article <6nbt6p$f...@emily.oit.umass.edu>, agi...@emily.oit.umass.edu
> (Andre G Isaak) wrote:
> > My understanding is that in blackletter forms, umlaut was originally
> > indicated by a superscript e written above the vowel in question. I
> > would guess, therefore, that the umlaut diacritic evolved from two
> > strokes of the e (though I am speculating here and could easily be
> > wrong).
In old-fashioned German handwriting, as used roughly up to World War II, e
is written as two vertical strokes joined by a diagonal, so that it looks
much like u or n. This form is also used in miniature above a letter to
indicate an umlaut. That is clearly the origin of the practice of
representing an umlaut by two vertical strokes, which evolved into two dots
when the Germans adopted 'roman' typefaces. In Fraktur fonts, the umlaut is
shown as two vertical or slightly slanted strokes of a teardrop shape, like
two straight apostrophes. Strictly speaking, if you use a dieresis as such
in such a font, you should use two round dots rather than these strokes.
A pity that the great Hilmar Schlegel seems to have given up reading
comp.fonts. I'm sure he would put us all right with a vengeance.
Ralph Hancock
<han...@dircon.co.uk>
<http://www.users.dircon.co.uk/~hancock>
Steve MacGregor
Andre G Isaak <agi...@emily.oit.umass.edu> wrote in article
<6n6fum$v...@emily.oit.umass.edu>...
<<Does anyone know if there is a generic name for the diacritic mark
whose postscript name is 'dieresis'?>>
Typographically, as opposed to linguistically, it's called a
"trema".
--
(Reply to SteveMacGregor at InfiCad dot Com)
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Andre G Isaak
In article <01bda4f7$6d3c7d00$4b65...@goodnet.goodnet.com>,
Steve MacGregor <SteveMa...@Inficad.Com> wrote:
>Andre G Isaak <agi...@emily.oit.umass.edu> wrote in article
><6n6fum$v...@emily.oit.umass.edu>...
>
><<Does anyone know if there is a generic name for the diacritic mark
>whose postscript name is 'dieresis'?>>
>
> Typographically, as opposed to linguistically, it's called a
>"trema".
Thanks for your reply. The typographic name is in fact what I am after.
Do you know if this term is generally used in English? I know that it
is the French term, but my English dictionary doesn't contain an entry
for it (admittedly I have checked the OED - my eysesight isn't what it
used to be).
DickWeltz
>
>>That is, you can call it a dieresis in English...
>
>Diaeresis would be even better.
>
>John Hudson, Type Director
>
>
Your way is more aesthetic I guess, John.
-- Dick
DickWeltz
>
>The question I originally asked was whether the 'double dot accent'
>has a generic name which does not denote a specific function.
>
>
I fully realized that was your meaning. However, in several decades as a
typographer, I have not come across a name in English other than dieresis or
umlaut for the mark, regardless of the language or function of a particular
instance. There may be some other terms in non-typographic fields with which I
am not familiar.
DickWeltz
>Do you know if this term is generally used in English? I know that it
>is the French term, but my English dictionary doesn't contain an entry
>for it (admittedly I have checked the OED - my eysesight isn't what it
>used to be).
>
>
The term "trema" is not normally used by English-speaking typographers in the
US, to the best of my knowledge and experience. I doubt that it is used by
Anglophone typographers in Canada either.
Michel
In article <01bda4f7$6d3c7d00$4b65...@goodnet.goodnet.com>, "Steve
MacGregor" <SteveMa...@Inficad.Com> wrote:
> Andre G Isaak <agi...@emily.oit.umass.edu> wrote in article
> <6n6fum$v...@emily.oit.umass.edu>...
>
> <<Does anyone know if there is a generic name for the diacritic mark
> whose postscript name is 'dieresis'?>>
>
> Typographically, as opposed to linguistically, it's called a
> "trema".
The Unicode standard does not mention 'Tréma' anywhere, but defines the
symbol as Diaresis.
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Tiro Typeworks
>The Unicode standard does not mention 'Tréma' anywhere, but defines the
>symbol as Diaresis.
Unicode descriptive names are frequently peculiar and perrenially
inconsistent, although the adoption of the terms 'big letter' and
'small letter' for upper- and lowercase, respectively, displays a
possibly charming innocence: multi-octet encoding meets primary school
nostalgia.
That point made, most typographers and type designers seem to use the
term diaeresis. Most heavy metal musicians seem to use the term
umlaut, which they usually mispronounce.
The term trema is synonymous with diaeresis: two dots indicating
seperate pronunciation of a vowel. Interestingly, the other meaning of
trema, and its Greek etymology, is 'orifice'. How this relates to
either linguistics or typography I do not wish to speculate.