А (А а; italics: А а or А а; italics: А а) is a letter of the Cyrillic script. It commonly represents an open central unrounded vowel /ä/, halfway between the pronunciation of ⟨a⟩ in "cat" and "father". The Cyrillic letter А is romanized using the Latin letter A.
History[edit]The Cyrillic letter А was derived directly from the Greek letter Alpha (Α α). In the Early Cyrillic alphabet its name was азъ (azǔ), meaning the personal pronoun "I". In the Cyrillic numeral system, the Cyrillic letter А has a value of 1.
Form[edit]Throughout history, the Cyrillic letter А has had various shapes, but today is standardized on one that looks exactly like the Latin letter A, including the italic and lower case forms.
Usage[edit]In most languages that use the Cyrillic alphabet – such as Bulgarian, Ukrainian, Belarusian, Russian, Rusyn, Serbian, Macedonian and Montenegrin – the Cyrillic letter А represents the open central unrounded vowel /a/. In Ingush and Chechen the Cyrillic letter А represents both the open back unrounded vowel /ɑ/ when stressed and the mid-central vowel /ə/ when unstressed. In Turkic languages that use the Cyrillic script it represents the open back unrounded vowel /ɑ/, with the exception of Volga Tatar, in which it represents the open back rounded vowel /ɒ/, and Uzbek, in which it represents the near-open front unrounded vowel /æ/. In languages that contrast vowel length the letter can be written as a double vowel.[1]
Related letters and other similar characters[edit] A a : Latin letter A Á á : Latin letter A with acute Α α : Greek letter Alpha Ă ă : Latin letter A with breve  â : Latin letter A with Circumflex Ā ā : Latin letter A with Macron Æ æ : Latin letter Ash À à : Latin letter A with gre Computing codes[edit] А (Cyrillic) Pronunciation of name of Cyrillic 'А' Problems playing this file? See media help. Character information Preview А а Unicode name CYRILLIC CAPITAL LETTER A CYRILLIC SMALL LETTER A Encodings decimal hex dec hex Unicode 1040 U+0410 1072 U+0430 UTF-8 208 144 D0 90 208 176 D0 B0 Numeric character reference А А а а Named character reference А а KOI8-R and KOI8-U 225 E1 193 C1 CP 855 161 A1 160 A0 Windows-1251 192 C0 224 E0 ISO-8859-5 176 B0 208 D0 Mac Cyrillic 128 80 224 E0 See also[edit] Cyrillic characters in Unicode References[edit] ^ Campbell, George L.; King, Gareth (24 July 2013). Compendium of the World's Languages. Routledge. ISBN 9781136258459. Retrieved 14 June 2016 – via Google Books. External links[edit] The dictionary definition of А at Wiktionary The dictionary definition of а at Wiktionary vteCyrillic scriptItalics indicate that the language no longer uses CyrillicCyrillic alphabets Early Abaza Abkhaz Aleut Azerbaijani Bashkir Belarusian Bulgarian Chechen Crimean Tatar Dargwa Dungan Even Evenki Gagauz Ingush Interslic Karakalpak Karelian Kazakh Khakas Kildin Sámi Komi Kurdish Kyrgyz Lezgin Macedonian Mansi Mongolian Mordvinic Nivkh Nogai Polish Ossetian Pannonian Rusyn Romani Romanian transitional Moldovan Russian Rusyn Serbo-Croatian Bosnian Montenegrin Tat Tatar Tajik Tlingit Turkmen Udege Udmurt Ukrainian Uyghur Uzbek Yakut Siberian Yupik Chaplino dialect Naukan Yupik Cyrillization of Arabic Chinese French German Greek Japanese Polivanov Korean Lithuanian Manchu Polish Letters of the Cyrillic scriptPrimary letters Аа Бб Вв Гг Дд Ее Жж Зз Ии Іі Йй Кк Лл Мм Нн Оо Пп Рр Сс Тт Уу Фф Хх Цц Чч Шш Щщ Ъъ Ыы Ьь Ээ Юю Яя Other Slic letters Ѓѓ Ґґ Ђђ Ёё Єє З́з́ Ѕѕ Її Ꙇꙇ Јј Љљ Њњ С́с́ Ќќ Ћћ Ўў Џџ Ꙏꙏ Non-Slic letters А̊а̊ А̃а̃ Ӓ̄ӓ̄ Ӕӕ Әә Ә̃ә̃ Ӛӛ В̌в̌ Ԝԝ Ҕҕ Ғғ Ӻӻ Ғ̌ Ӷ/Г̡ Д̌ Д̆ Ӗ Е̃ Ё̄ Є̈ Ԑ Җ Ӝ Ӂ Ҙ Ӟ З̌ Ӡ И̃ И̇ Ҋ Қ Ӄ Ҡ Ҟ Ҝ Ԛ Л́ Ӆ Ԯ Ԓ Ӎ ᵸ Ӊ Ԩ Ң Ӈ Ҥ О̆ О̃ Ө Ө̄ Ө̆ Ӫ Ԥ Р̌ Ҏ Ҫ Т̌ Ҭ Ӱӱ У̃ Ӳ У̊ Ұ Ү Ү́ Х̑ Х̌ Ҳ Ӽ Ӿ Һ Ԧ Ҵ Ҷ Ҷ̣ Ӵ Ӌ Ҹ Ч̣ Ҽ Ҿ Ы̆ Ы̄ Ӹ Ҍ Ҩ Э̄ Э̇ Ӭ Ӭ́ Ӭ̄ Ю̆ Ю̈ Ю̄ Я̆ Я̄ Ӏ Archaic Slic letters Ꙣꙣ Ꙉꙉ Ꙥꙥ Ꙧꙧ O variants Ꙋꙋ Ѡѡ Ѿѿ Ꙡꙡ Ѣѣ Я̈я̈ Ꙗꙗ Ѥѥ Ѫѫ Ѧѧ Ѯѯ Ѱѱ Ѳѳ Ѵѵ Ҁҁ Archaic non-Slic letters А̨ Б̣ Г̧ Г̄ Г̆г̆ Д̨ Ԁ Ԃ Ꚁ Ꚅ Ԅ Ԇ Ꚉ Ԫ Ꚃ Ꚕꚕ Ј̵ К̀ К̄ К̂ Ԟ Ԡ Ԉ Ԕ Ԋ Ԣ Ҧ Ԗ Ԍ Ԏ Ꚋ Ꚍ Х̾ Ꚏ Ꚑ Ԭ Ꚓ Ꚗ Ԙ Ꙟ Archaic diacritics palatalization sign (◌҄) pokrytie (◌҇) titlo (◌҃) Combinations of Cyrillic letters Digraphs Multigraphs Glagolitic script Cyrillic numerals Scientific transliteration of Cyrillic Authority control databases Encyclopedia of Modern Ukraine