Vithkuqi Small Letter E

It is the lowercase e in Vithkuqi spelling. In an Albanian word written with Vithkuqi, it marks the vowel e; by itself, it is a letter sample, not a word.

Naum Veqilharxhi developed the Vithkuqi alphabet over 1824–1845. Its earliest documented use is a nineteenth-century spelling book; the 1844–45 primer circulated in Korçë and later Berat. The project linked literacy with Albanian national awakening and avoided making written Albanian depend on the religious associations of Latin, Greek, or Arabic alphabets.

The letter gained a new setting, not a new meaning

As of 2026, Vithkuqi appears in modern artistic and cultural work, including tattoos. In a design or tattoo, 𐖟 still represents the vowel e; the setting adds a script reference, not a different letter value.

A 2020 proposal to add Vithkuqi to the Unicode character standard records modern revivalists extending the alphabet to distinguish present-day Albanian sounds that nineteenth-century writing did not always mark separately. Readers of older texts and modern revival users may therefore encounter different versions of the alphabet.

Elbasan and Todhri are distinct alphabets also used to write Albanian, not alternate forms of Vithkuqi. Some Vithkuqi letterforms resemble cursive Armenian writing, but that similarity alone does not establish a historical link.