For the emoticon :D, see Emoticon. (For technical reasons, :D brings you here.)

Look up D, d in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

Basic Latin alphabet
Aa Bb Cc Dd   Ee Ff Gg Hh Ii Jj Kk Ll Mm Nn Oo Pp Qq Rr Ss Tt Uu Vv   Ww Xx Yy Zz

D is the fourth letter in the Latin alphabet. Its name in English is spelled dee or occasionally de (pronounced /diː/).^[1]

History

Egyptian hieroglyph door	Proto-Semitic Dal, Daleth	Phoenician Daleth	Etruscan D	Greek Delta	Roman D

^{[citation needed]}

The Semitic letter Dâlet probably developed from the logogram for a fish or a door. There are various Egyptian hieroglyphs that might have inspired this. In Semitic, Ancient Greek, and Latin, the letter was pronounced /d/; in the Etruscan alphabet the letter was superfluous, but still maintained (see letter B). Greek letter: Δ (capital) or δ (small) (Delta).^{[citation needed]}

The minuscule (lower-case) form of D consists of a loop and a tall vertical stroke. It developed by gradual variations on the majuscule (capital) form. In handwriting, it was common to start the arc to the left of the vertical stroke, resulting in a serif at the top of the arc. This serif was extended while the rest of the letter was reduced, resulting in an angled stroke and loop. The angled stroke slowly developed into a vertical stroke.

Usage

Alternative representations of D

NATO phonetic		Morse code
Delta		-··
Signal flag	Semaphore	ASL Manual	Braille

In most languages using the Latin alphabet, the letter d represents the sound /d/, but in the Vietnamese alphabet it represents the sound /z/ in the north and /j/ in the south. In Fijian it stands for the prenasalized stop /nd/. In some languages where voiceless unaspirated stops contrast with voiceless aspirated stops, d represents an unaspirated /t/, while t represents an aspirated /tʰ/. Examples of such languages include Icelandic, Scottish Gaelic, Navajo, and the Pinyin transliteration of Mandarin.

References

See also

Wikimedia Commons has media related to:

D

• Eth (Ð, ð)
• D with stroke (Đ, đ)
• Hooked D (Ɗ, ɗ)
• De (Д, д)