Tsade

← Pe
Tsade
Qoph →
← Pe Tsade Qoph →
Phoenician	𐤑‎
Hebrew	צ‎
Aramaic	𐡑‎
Syriac	ܨ‎
Arabic	ص‎
Phonemic representation	sˤ (t͡s)
Position in alphabet	18
Numerical value	90
Alphabetic derivatives of the Phoenician
Greek	Ϻ, Ψ, ϡ
Latin	-
Cyrillic	Ц, Ч, Џ, Ѱ

Tsade (also spelled ṣade, ṣādē, ṣaddi, ṣad, tzadi, sadhe, tzaddik) is the eighteenth letter of the Semitic abjads, including Phoenician ṣādē 𐤑, Hebrew ṣādī צ‎, Aramaic ṣāḏē 𐡑, Syriac ṣāḏē ܨ, Ge'ez ṣädäy ጸ, and Arabic ṣād ص‎. Its oldest phonetic value is debated, although there is a variety of pronunciations in different modern Semitic languages and their dialects. It represents the coalescence of three Proto-Semitic "emphatic consonants" in Canaanite. Arabic, which kept the phonemes separate, introduced variants of ṣād and ṭāʾ to express the three (see ḍād, ẓāʾ). In Aramaic, these emphatic consonants coalesced instead with ʿayin and ṭēt, respectively, thus Hebrew ereṣ ארץ (earth) is araʿ ארע‎ in Aramaic.

The Phoenician letter is continued in the Greek san (Ϻ) and possibly sampi (Ϡ), and in Etruscan 𐌑 Ś. It may have inspired the form of the letter tse in the Glagolitic and Cyrillic alphabets.

The corresponding letter of the Ugaritic alphabet is 𐎕 ṣade.

The letter is named "tsadek" in Yiddish,^[1] and Hebrew speakers often give it a similar name as well. This name for the letter probably originated from a fast recitation of the alphabet (i.e., "tsadi, qoph" → "tsadiq, qoph"), influenced by the Hebrew word tzadik, meaning "righteous person".^[2]

Origins

The origin of ṣade is unclear. It may have come from a Proto-Sinaitic script based on a pictogram of a plant, perhaps a papyrus plant, or a fish hook (in Modern Hebrew, צד tsad means "[he] hunt[ed]", and in Arabic صاد ṣād means "[he] hunted").

Arabic ṣād

The letter is named ṣād and in Modern Standard Arabic is pronounced /sˤ/.

It is written in several ways depending in its position in the word:

Position in word	Isolated	Final	Medial	Initial
Glyph form: (Help)	ص‎	ـص‎	ـصـ‎	صـ‎

Chapter 38 of the Quran is named for this letter, which begins the chapter.

The phoneme is not native to Persian, Ottoman Turkish, or Urdu, and its pronunciation in Arabic loanwords in those languages is not distinguishable from س or ث, all of which are pronounced [s].

In relation with Hebrew

Often, words that have ظ ẓāʾ, ص ṣād, and ض ḍād in Arabic have cognates with צ tsadi in Hebrew.

Examples

ظ ẓāʾ: the word for "thirst" in Classical Arabic is ظمأ ẓamaʾ and צמא tsama in Hebrew.
ص ṣād: the word for "Egypt" in Classical Arabic is مصر miṣr and מצרים mitsrayim in Hebrew.
ض ḍād: the word for "egg" in Classical Arabic is بيضة bayḍah and ביצה betsah in Hebrew.

When representing this sound in transliteration of Arabic into Hebrew, it is written as צ tsade.

Hebrew tsadi

Orthographic variants
position in word	Various print fonts			Modern Cursive Hebrew	Rashi script
position in word	Serif	Sans-serif	Monospaced	Modern Cursive Hebrew	Rashi script
non-final	צ	צ	צ
final	ץ	ץ	ץ

Hebrew spelling: צָדִי or צָדֵי.

Name

In Hebrew, the letter's name is tsadi or ṣadi, depending on whether the letter is transliterated as Modern Israeli "ts" or Tiberian "ṣ". Alternatively, it can be called tsadik or ṣadik, spelled צָדִּיק, influenced by its Yiddish name tsadek and the Hebrew word tzadik.

Variations

Ṣadi, like kaph, mem, pe, and nun, has a final form, used at the end of words. Its shape changes from צ‎ to ץ‎.

Pronunciation

In Modern Hebrew, צ tsade represents a voiceless alveolar affricate /t͡s/. This is the same in Yiddish. Historically, it represented either a pharyngealized /sˤ/ or an affricate such as the modern Hebrew pronunciation or the Ge’ez [t͡sʼ];^[3] which became [t͡s] in Ashkenazi pronunciation. A geresh can also be placed after tsade (צ׳ ; ץ׳‎), giving it the sound [t͡ʃ] (or, in a hypercorrected pronunciation, a pharyngealized [ʃˤ]), e.g. צִ׳יפְּס‎ chips.

Ṣade appears as [sˤ] amongst Yemenite Jews and other Jews from the Middle East.

Some Sephardi Jews pronounce צ‎ like a regular s, and this is the sound value it has in Judaeo-Spanish, as in "masa" (matzo) or "sadik" (tzadik).

Significance

In gematria, ṣadi represents the number 90. Its final form represents 900, but this is rarely used, taw, taw, and qof (400+400+100) being used instead.

As an abbreviation, it stands for ṣafon, north.

Ṣadi is also one of the seven letters that receive special crowns (called tagin) when written in a Sefer Torah. See shin, ‘ayin, tet, nun, zayin, and gimmel.

Character encodings

Character information
Preview	צ		ץ		ص		ܨ		ࠑ
Unicode name	HEBREW LETTER TSADI		HEBREW LETTER FINAL TSADI		ARABIC LETTER SAD		SYRIAC LETTER SADHE		SAMARITAN LETTER TSAADIY
Encodings	decimal	hex	dec	hex	dec	hex	dec	hex	dec	hex
Unicode	1510	U+05E6	1509	U+05E5	1589	U+0635	1832	U+0728	2065	U+0811
UTF-8	215 166	D7 A6	215 165	D7 A5	216 181	D8 B5	220 168	DC A8	224 160 145	E0 A0 91
Numeric character reference	צ	צ	ץ	ץ	ص	ص	ܨ	ܨ	ࠑ	ࠑ

Character information
Preview	𐎕		𐡑		𐤑
Unicode name	UGARITIC LETTER SADE		IMPERIAL ARAMAIC LETTER SADHE		PHOENICIAN LETTER SADE
Encodings	decimal	hex	dec	hex	dec	hex
Unicode	66453	U+10395	67665	U+10851	67857	U+10911
UTF-8	240 144 142 149	F0 90 8E 95	240 144 161 145	F0 90 A1 91	240 144 164 145	F0 90 A4 91
UTF-16	55296 57237	D800 DF95	55298 56401	D802 DC51	55298 56593	D802 DD11
Numeric character reference	𐎕	𐎕	𐡑	𐡑	𐤑	𐤑

Notes

^ Weinreich, Uriel (1968). Modern English-Yiddish Yiddish-English Dictionary. New York: McGraw-Hill Book Co. p. 453. ISBN 07-0690380-3.
^ "The Letter Tsade: Righteousness and Modesty" (in Hebrew). Archived from the original on 31 May 2024. Retrieved 5 December 2010.
^ Steiner, Richard (1982). "Affricated Sade in the Semitic Languages". The American Academy for Jewish Research, Research Monograph Series. 3.