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'sz' for 'ß' is sometimes used to make things roundtrip-proof in capslock, e.g. on military stencils. HTML calls it 'szlig'. Also, some use "Esszet" as the name
by korlja 4y ago
'sz' for 'ß' is sometimes used to make things roundtrip-proof in capslock, e.g. on military stencils. HTML calls it 'szlig'. Also, some use "Esszet" as the name of the character. But all are wrong in that ß isn't a ligature of s and z, it is a ligature of s and s. The shape of the character stems from the fact that in fractur writing and even some grotesk fonts, 's' at the end of a word was written 's', while 's' within a word was written 'ſ'. Thus the end of a word like Fuss was written Fuſs, giving a ligature of Fuß. No 'z' anywhere.
- kmm 4y agoOriginally ß arose as a ligature of s and z, or rather ſ and ʒ. In many older texts, or even current fonts, the second part of the ligature is indisputably a long-tailed ʒ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%9F https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%9F
- seszett 4y ago> some use "Esszet" as the name of the character I believe the actual name is Eszett.
- wanderingstan 4y agoOnly “wrong” in light of current usage, but not historically. By this measure, the English name of “W” would be wrong because it’s not actually a “double-U” but a “double-V”. But at the time of the letter’s formation, U and V were not yet separate letters. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W
- jfk13 4y agoThe Swedes get this "right", and call it [ˈdɵ̂bːɛlˌveː]. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swedish_alphabet https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swedish_alphabet
- wanderingstan 4y agoOh wow, didn’t know that!
- samatman 4y agoFrench as well, although the elegance gained is quickly tarnished by calling y "Greek i".
- kaetemi 4y agoIn Dutch it's even more sane, the alphabet just goes V = vee, W = wee.
- mzs 4y agoI always thought that German z used to look something between Ꙁ & з. ʒ looks pretty close so ſз became ß but Latin transliteration rules were ss instead. At least that's what I was taught in German class.