From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Cyrillic letter Shcha
Unicode (hex)
majuscule: U+0429
minuscule: U+0449
Cyrillic alphabet
А	Б	В	Г	Ґ	Д	Ђ
Ѓ	Е	Ѐ	Ё	Є	Ж	З
Ѕ	И	Ѝ	І	Ї	Й	Ј
К	Л	Љ	М	Н	Њ	О
П	Р	С	Т	Ћ	Ќ	У
Ў	Ф	Х	Ц	Ч	Џ	Ш
Щ	Ъ	Ы	Ь	Э	Ю	Я
Non-Slavic letters
Ӑ	Ӓ	Ә	Ӛ	Ӕ	Ғ	Ҕ
Ӻ	Ӷ	Ԁ	Ԃ	Ӗ	Ӂ	Җ
Ӝ	Ԅ	Ҙ	Ӟ	Ԑ	Ӡ	Ԇ
Ӣ	Ҋ	Ӥ	Қ	Ӄ	Ҡ	Ҟ
Ҝ	Ԟ	Ԛ	Ӆ	Ԓ	Ԡ	Ԉ
Ԕ	Ӎ	Ӊ	Ң	Ӈ	Ҥ	Ԣ
Ԋ	Ӧ	Ө	Ӫ	Ҩ	Ҧ	Ҏ
Ԗ	Ҫ	Ԍ	Ҭ	Ԏ	Ӯ	Ӱ
Ӳ	Ү	Ұ	Ҳ	Ӽ	Ӿ	Һ
Ҵ	Ҷ	Ӵ	Ӌ	Ҹ	Ҽ	Ҿ
Ӹ	Ҍ	Ӭ	Ԙ	Ԝ	Ӏ
Archaic letters
Ҁ	Ѻ	Ѹ	Ѡ	Ѿ	Ѣ	Ꙓ
Ꙗ	Ѥ	Ѧ	Ѫ	Ѩ	Ѭ	Ѯ
Ѱ	Ѳ	Ѵ	Ѷ	Ꙟ
List of Cyrillic letters
Cyrillic digraphs

Shcha or Shta (Щ, щ, italics: Щ, щ) is a letter of the Cyrillic alphabet, today representing the sound /ɕɕ/ in Russian (historically representing the consonant cluster /ɕt͡ɕ/^{[citation needed]}), the consonant cluster /ʃt͡ʃ/ in Ukrainian and Rusyn, and the consonant cluster /ʃt/ in Bulgarian. Originally, this letter was a ligature of sha and te (Ш + Т = Щ, like in the modern Bulgarian language), with the descender in the middle of the sha, and is descended from the Glagolitic letter Shta Ⱋ ().

In modern Russian, the sound this letter represents is a voiceless alveolo-palatal fricative, similar to the /ʃ/ of English sheep (though actually longer). This letter is the most troublesome for romanization. In linguistics, its Russian pronunciation is usually transliterated as <šč> (with háčeks). It indeed used to indicate a pronunciation with an "additional" /t/ in between the two /ɕ/ sounds, almost as in the phrase "fresh cheese." In English, it is typically transcribed with the tetragraph <shch> (reflecting the traditional pronunciation), but in German it requires seven letters: <schtsch>. Polish words with <szcz> correspond the Russian words with <щ> (e.g. щека = szczeka, etc.) and is also used for transliteration of Russian words, although the Polish combination <śś> would render the modern Russian pronunciation more accurately.

See also

• Ш, ш - Sha (Cyrillic)