What 𐀯 means
It writes the syllable “si” as part of a word.
Scholars conventionally transcribe its value as si: the consonant s followed by the vowel i. The technical term is syllabogram, a sign for a whole syllable. Neighboring signs supply the rest of the word.
Linear B first appears at Knossos around 1450 BCE. Its surviving Bronze Age palace tablets record goods, quantities and people; the script was adapted from older Linear A to write Mycenaean Greek.
Why is 𐀯 a syllable sign, not a letter?
Linear B signs represent vowels or consonant-and-vowel units.
That open-syllable pattern did not fit every Mycenaean Greek sound combination. Scribes sometimes left consonants unwritten or added a filler vowel to fit a consonant into the spelling. A written form can therefore differ from later Greek spelling.
After the Mycenaean palaces were destroyed, Linear B went out of use. The Cypriot syllabary remained in use from the eighth through fourth centuries BCE. It developed through Cypro-Minoan, an earlier Cypriot script descended from Linear A; its separate sign 𐠪 is also read si.
A specialist historical-script sign, at home in discussions of Mycenaean writing and records.
Alone, it identifies one syllable; neighboring signs determine the word.
Part of the collection
Who writes 𐀯
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Don't confuse it with
2
Questions people ask
1Why does Linear B show a box for 𐀯?
A box means the active font cannot draw the glyph. The text can still contain the correct character; choose a font with Linear B coverage.
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How to type or find 𐀯
- Search it as
- B041 · Linear B si · Linear B syllable si · Linear B signs · Mycenaean script · Cypriot syllabary
- Shows up in
- Anything that takes text · its shape is whatever your font draws
𐀯\1002FCodes and encoding1 code points
A visible symbol can contain several code points. JS .length counts UTF-16 units; UTF-8 counts bytes.