If you choose Unicode, make sure you have Unicode fonts installed. Many modern fonts have Unicode capabilities, but following comments should be made:
1. The standard Times New Roman font contains far too few Unicode letters, especially diacritics.
2. Times New Roman Star may be used, but it will display Cyrillic letters instead of some IPA characters.
3. Most Unicode fonts available - such as Arial Unicode MS, Bitstream Cyberbit, Titus Cyberbit, Code2000 or Lucida Sans Unicode - will display all characters properly.
We recommend you to enter queries in the recoding system presented below. Due to the limitations of most keyboards and to potential Internet recoding errors this is certainly the preferable way.
Enclose your queries in figure brackets {}, e.g. {d|a"t}.
Symbol description | Symbol | Unicode | Recoding | Phonetic description |
a with a length sign | ā | a: | long a | |
acute | ˊ | / | accent or high tone (with vowels), palatalisation (with consonants) | |
a with an Umlaut sign | ä | a" | low front vowel | |
inferior comma | ˛ | , | [used for different symbols of European alphabets] | |
a with an Umlaut sign and a length sign | ǟ | a": | long low front vowel | |
c with an inferior dot | c | c̣ | c. | hissing glottalized affricate |
c with a hachek sign | č | c^ | hushing affricate | |
c with a hachek sign and an inferior dot | č̣ | c^. | glottalized hushing affricate | |
delta | δ | d| | voiced interdental fricative | |
e with a length sign | ē | e: | long e | |
superior dot | ˙ | ` | [used for different symbols of European alphabets] | |
Umlaut | ̈ | " | symbol of vowel fronting (used basically when the respective single symbol is missing) | |
epsylon | ɛ | e| | mid-low front vowel | |
crossed glottal stop sign | ʡ | ?_ | emphatic laryngeal stop | |
inferior arc sign | ̯ | _ | [used basically with i and u to denote glides] | |
ce cedille | ç | c, | [used in the French alphabet, as well as in the common transliteration of the Old Indian palatal fricative] | |
gamma | ɣ | g| | voiced velar fricative | |
inversed R | ʁ | G| | voiced uvular fricative | |
crossed h | ħ | h_ | voiceless emphatic laryngeal fricative | |
length sign | ˉ | : | used to denote length / strength of vowels and consonants | |
i with a length sign | ī | i: | long i | |
crossed i | ɨ | y | unrounded high mid or back vowel | |
crossed i with a length sign | ɨ̅ | y: | long unrounded high mid or back vowel | |
inferior circle | o | & | used for denoting syllabic resonants | |
superior circle | o | % | [used for different symbols of European alphabets] | |
k with an inferior dot | ḳ | k. | glottalized k | |
lambda | λ | l| | voiceless lateral fricative | |
crossed lambda | ƛ | l^ | voiceless lateral affricate | |
crossed lambda with an inferior dot | ƛ̣ | l^. | glottalized lateral affricate | |
crossed l | ł | l/ | velarized lateral resonant | |
crossed L | Ł | L^ | voiced lateral affricate | |
n with lowered right edge | ŋ | n| | velar nasal resonant | |
o with a length sign | ō | o: | long o | |
o with an Umlaut sign | ö | o" | rounded front mid vowel | |
o with an Umlaut sign and a length sign | ö̅ | o": | long rounded front mid vowel | |
o with a disconnected left side | ɔ | o| | rounded back low vowel | |
o with a disconnected left side and with a length sign | ɔ̅ | o|: | long rounded back low vowel | |
p with a superior dot | ṗ | p. | glottalized p | |
q with a superior dot | q̇ | q. | glottalized q (uvular stop or affricate) | |
Szet | ß | s| | [used in the German alphabet] | |
lowered tilda | ~ | ~ | [used as an auxiliary symbol, basically with the meaning of the conjunction "~"; the usual in the computer alphabet raised tilda is used as a nasalisation sign; within the provided artificial encoding system the two tildas are not differentiated] | |
gravis | ˋ | \ | low tone (with vowels) | |
inferior dot | ̦ | . | symbol of glottalisation (sometimes of retroflexity) with consonants, as well as of closedness / lowering (sometimes retroflexity) with vowels; used basically when the respective single symbol is missing | |
s with a hachek sign | š | s^ | voiceless hushing fricative | |
t with an inferior dot | ṭ | t. | dental glottalized stop | |
shortness sign | ̆ | > | used to denote shortness/ weakness of vowels and consonants | |
theta | θ | t| | voiceless interdental fricative | |
u with a length sign | ū | u: | long u | |
u with an Umlaut sign | ü | u" | rounded front high vowel | |
u with an Umlaut sign and a length sign | ǖ | u": | long rounded front high vowel | |
inversed e (shwa) | ə | @ | mid mid vowel | |
inversed e (shwa) with a length sign | ə̅ | @: | long mid mid vowel | |
hachek (or raised v) | ̌ | ^ | [used with symbols for affricates and fricatives (basically in cases when the respective single symbol is missing); in North Caucasian languages - to denote dentolabialized affricates and fricatives; sometimes used with vowels to denote the falling-rising tone] | |
raised w | w | w| | used to denote labialisation of consonants (less frequently - of vowels) | |
h with bent upper edge | ɦ | h| | voiced laryngeal | |
chi | χ | x| | voiceless uvular fricative | |
z with lowered and bent edge | ɜ | z| | voiced hissing affricate | |
z with lowered bent edge and a hachek sign | ǯ | z^| | voiced hushing affricate | |
z with a hachek sign | ž | z^ | voiced hushing fricative | |
question sign without the inferior dot | ʔ | ? | glottalized laryngeal (glottal stop) | |
inversed question sign without the inferior dot | ʕ | ?| | voiced emphatic laryngeal | |
inversed v | ʌ | Y | unrounded back mid vowel |
Additional characters Some additional characters are available in the latest (March 2001) Unicode version. These are ð {dh|}, Þ {th|}, ʃ {sh|}, æ {a|}, ø {o|} and ɪ {i|}. They may be entered for search as given above and will be visible in Unicode mode, but otherwise displayed only as pictures or letter combinations - since they do not fit into non-Unicode encodings.
Rules for the transliteration of Cyrillic
Enclose your queries in square brackets [ ], e.g. [pjesnja].
- a, - b, - v, - g, - d, - je, " - jo, - zh, -
z,
- i, - j, - k, - l, - m, - n, - o, - p,
- r, - s, - t, - u, - f, - kh, - c, - ch, - sh, -
shh, - `, - y, - ', - e, - ju, - ja.
Rules for the transliteration of Greek
Enclose your queries in figure brackets plus G {G..}.
alpha - a, beta - b, gamma - g, delta - d, e psilon - e, zeta - z,
eta - e:, theta - th, iota - i, kappa - k, lambda - l, my - m, ny - n,
o mikron - o, pi - p, ro - r, sigma - s (initially and medially), c (finally),
tau - t, y psilon - u, phi - ph, khi - kh, psi - ps, ksi - x, o mega -
o:
Alpha, eta and o mega with subscribed iota: aj, ej, oj
All diacritic signs should be placed after the preceding letters in
the following way:
Spiritus asper - `
Spiritus tener - '
Acute tone - /
Grave tone - \
Circumflex tone - ~
E.g.:{Ga`/pax}, {Gphe/ro:},{Gr`eu~ma} etc.