What ᲃ means
It is a historical wide form of Cyrillic с. Wide Slovo is a typographic variant of that letter, not a different sound or a routine letter of modern spelling.
The form is documented in early printed books: Schweipolt Fiol's Kraków Octoechos (1491), the Ostrog Bible (1581), and Metropolitan Peter Mohyla's Trebnik (1646). A wider set of historical Cyrillic variants appears in Church Slavonic printed books from 1550–1700. These forms developed through manuscript and print practice.
Why does its position matter?
At the start of a word, it can signal a reference to God. This use is documented in Kievan editions and some poluustav texts. Poluustav is a traditional, relatively informal book-hand style; the convention was not universal across Cyrillic writing.
Wide Slovo also belongs to a Kievan typographic tradition that used ᲁ for д and ꙁ for з. These are connected as distinctive forms in that tradition, not because they look alike.
How do I type ᲃ?
Use Unicode input or a Church Slavonic keyboard layout. On GNU/Linux, press CtrlShiftU, type 1C83, then Space or Enter. A dedicated layout or virtual keyboard is useful for repeated typesetting; ordinary Russian typing does not offer this historical form as a routine key.
If the character appears as a box, the font may lack its historical glyph. The text can contain ᲃ even when the font cannot draw its shape.
It marks Church Slavonic or historical Kievan typography, including scholarly and liturgical reproductions.
Keep ᲃ when transcribing a source that uses it.
Drift: The Kievan type style is now mainly reproduced for historical or liturgical work; as of 2026, Church Slavonic fonts and keyboard tools remain available for digital editions.
Part of the collection
Who writes ᲃ
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Don't confuse it with
1
Related characters
2
Questions people ask
1Why does ᲃ show as a box?
The font may not include its historical Church Slavonic glyph. The text can contain ᲃ even when the font cannot draw its shape.
More like this
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How to type or find ᲃ
- Also called
- wide Slovo
- Search it as
- U+1C83 · 1C83 · wide Cyrillic es · Church Slavonic letter · Kievan typography
- Shows up in
- Anything that takes text · its shape is whatever your font draws
ᲃ\1C83Codes and encoding1 code points
A visible symbol can contain several code points. JS .length counts UTF-16 units; UTF-8 counts bytes.