What ꭻ means
It spells the whole Cherokee syllable gu. The syllabary gives each sign a full syllable instead of a single Latin sound, so ꭻ is not just a “g” — it is roughly “goo.” Its case partner is Ꭻ, the same syllable at cap height.
Sequoyah began the writing system around 1809; the syllabary was complete by 1821, adopted by the Cherokee Council by 1826, and set in printing type by 1827. Its job was practical: carry spoken Cherokee into print for news, religious works, teaching, and shared knowledge.
Why is ꭻ lowercase?
Because case is a modern option, not a new sound. Classic Cherokee writing is caseless — every sign sat at cap height. Unicode added the small partners in version 8.0 (2015), in a separate block, so older uppercase text stayed exactly as it was.
ꭻ and Ꭻ still spell the same syllable; only the typographic form changes. Many Cherokee documents stay caseless — the small forms exist so modern texts can mark case where writers want it.
It signals Cherokee-language or Cherokee-script context, not an emoji reaction.
A recipient who does not read Cherokee — or whose font lacks it — may see an unknown glyph or a box.
Part of the collection
Who writes ꭻ
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Don't confuse it with
1
Related characters
3
Questions people ask
2Is ꭻ an emoji?
No. ꭻ is a lowercase Cherokee syllabary character, not a reaction emoji, so it has no vendor artwork.
Why does ꭻ show as a box?
It means the current font lacks this lowercase Cherokee glyph. Pick a font with Cherokee support; the box is a rendering failure, not another meaning.
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How to type or find ꭻ
- Also called
- gu · Cherokee gu
- Search it as
- small gu · gu letter · cherokee letter gu · tsalagi · cherokee syllabary · cherokee lowercase · cherokee phonetic keyboard · ꭻ
- Shows up in
- Anything that takes text · its shape is whatever your font draws
ꭻ\AB7BCodes and encoding1 code points
A visible symbol can contain several code points. JS .length counts UTF-16 units; UTF-8 counts bytes.