Rotated letter

In the days of printing with metal type sorts, it was common to rotate letters and digits 180° to create new symbols. This was done for example with the Palaeotype alphabet, the International Phonetic Alphabet, the Fraser script, and for some mathematical symbols. Perhaps the earliest instance of this that is still in use was turned e for schwa.

Note the leading J of Jacquard in Caslon italic typeface, which was turned for the pound sign £.

In the eighteenth-century Caslon metal fonts, the British pound sign (£) was set with a rotated italic uppercase J.[1]

Unicode support

The following rotated (turned) letters have Unicode codepoints unless otherwise indicated.

Latin

In this table, parentheses mark letters that stand in for themselves or for another. For instance, a rotated 'b' would be a 'q', and indeed some physical typefaces didn't bother with distinct sorts for those letters, while a rotated 's' would be itself. Long s with a combining dot below, ſ̣, can stand in for a rotated j.

(En dash) mark small caps that would not be very distinct from the turned lower case letter, though they are possible: turned small cap c is supported, for example: ).

The Fraser script creates duplicates of all the rotated capitals, except for M, Q and W. Rotated Y was added as an additional to the script in March 2020.

Latin rotated letters
ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ
Rotated minuscule ɐ[q][ɔ][p][ə]·ǝɟ[2]ᵷ·[ɓ]ɥ[ſ̣]ʞɯ[u](o)[d][b]ɹ(s)ʇ[n]ʌʍ(x)ʎ(z)
Rotated small cap [⦡][ꞛ]𝼂·[פ](ʜ)(ɪ)[ɾ][2]𝼐[lower-alpha 1](ɴ)[ㅗ][ꭅ]
Rotated capital [ᗺ][Ɔ][ᗡ]Ǝ(H)(I)[Ր]Ꞁ·⅂[lower-alpha 2](N)(O)[Ԁ][Ꝺ][Ꞟ](S)[Ո]Ʌ[𐊰]·[𐤵](X)(Z)
Fraser (ꓧ)(ꓲ)(ꓠ)(ꓳ)(ꓢ)(ꓫ)𑾰(ꓜ)

The letters ⅁, ⅂, ⅄ are specified as sans-serif. Additional small cap forms are found in the literature (e.g. turned ᴀ ʟ ᴜ), but they are not supported as of Unicode 13.

Turned ɢ was added to the extIPA in 2015; it and turned ᴋ are scheduled for Unicode support in 2021.

Other rotated letters include the digraphs ᴂ and ᴔ. The "rotated" capital Q in Unicode is only turned 90 degrees: ℺.

Additional

Rotated minuscule
Rotated capital

Greek and Cyrillic

Many of the few rotated Greek letters are intended for mathematical notation. In this table, an en dash is used to mark Greek and Cyrillic letters that are not distinct from a Latin letter. Reversed L, , can stand in for a rotated gamma Γ, though it is defined as sans serif.

Greek rotated letters
ΑΒΓΔΕΖΗΘΙΚΛΜΝΞΟΠΡΣΤΥΦΧΨΩ
Rotated minuscule [ɒ][ꭅ][ƍ]ᴈ·϶[2][ն](θ) [ჸ] [ฟ][ᴧ][Ԑ] [ᚇ][ᑯ][ᓄ][ㅗ][𐐌](χ)[𐓸][ო]
Rotated small cap [⦡] [ꞛ] [⌟] [𝅎] [ⱻ] ([z]) ([ʜ]) [ꙩ] ([ɪ]) [𝼐] [v] [ꟺ] ([ɴ]) ([≡]) (ο) [ⳙ]
Rotated capital [Ɐ][ᗺ][⅃][∇][Ǝ](Ζ)(Η)(Θ)(Ι)[Ʞ][V][ꟽ](Ν)(Ξ)(Ο)[ⵡ][Ԁ][𐅠][Ʇ][⅄](Φ)(Χ)[𐓐]
Cyrillic rotated letters
АБВГДЕЖЗИЙКЛМНОПРСТУФХЦЧШЩЪЫЬЭЮЯ
Rotated minuscule [ɐ][g][ꞛ][⌟]ә(ж)[ɛ](и)и̯[𝼐][ѵ][ꟺ](н)(о)[ⳙ]ԁ[ɔ][⊥][ʎ](ф)(х)һ[ɋ]є[ʁ][lower-alpha 3]
Rotated capital [Ɐ][𐕌][ᗺ][⅃][Ǝ](Ж)[Ɛ](И)И̯[Ʞ][Ѵ][ꟽ](Н)(О)[ⵡ]Ԁ[Ɔ][Ʇ][ⵃ](Ф)(Х)Һ[𐊿][𐕑][Iꟼ][ꟼ]Є[ᖉ]

ƍ is close to the turned form of one variant of lower-case Б.

In some fonts, an allograph of Ʒ displays as turned Σ.

An example of a font that uses turned small-capital Ω for the vowel ʊ.

In addition, the horseshoe ʊ of the IPA has allographs that are a turned small-capital Ω.

Other

Other rotated symbols include ɞ (rotated or reversed ʚ), ʖ (rotated ʕ) (rotated ɽ), ɺ (rotated ɼ), and (inverted digits 2 and 3), Ꝿ ꝿ (inverted Ᵹ ᵹ), and (inverted &). Spanish uses the rotated punctuation marks ¡ and ¿ (inverted ! and ?).

The 'turned comma' is, as its name suggests, a rotated comma. It is used for the Hawaiian letter ʻokina. Since 1995, it has been used in the Uzbek alphabet to write the letters (Cyrillic Ў) and (Cyrillic Ғ). It is also sometimes used in Latin transliterations of the Hebrew letter ʻáyin and the Arabic letter ʻayn. In English, a turned comma was also sometimes used on printing presses to approximate c, a small superscript c, such as when abbreviating surnames beginning with the prefix "Mac-".[3] For example, this can be seen in the U.S. Supreme Court's reports of McCulloch v. Maryland (1819) and Johnson v. McIntosh (1823), where those names where printed "M‘Culloch" and "M‘Intosh".

Reversed letters

In addition to turned letters, Unicode supports a few reversed (mirror-image) letters from the Latin alphabet (including 𝼇, Ƹ ƹ and ʕ); the Cyrillic alphabet (as well as Cyrillic И и and Я я, which are graphically equivalent to reversed Latin N ɴ and R ʀ), superscript ᶟ ᴻ, the tresillo Ꜫ ꜫ, which historically is a reversed 3, and the math symbol , which historically is a reversed 6.

Current IPA ɜ is officially a reversed rather than rotated ɛ; the older rotated ᴈ is now deprecated.

Lower-case Ƌ is close to a reversed Cyrillic capital Б.

Reversed k ɡ ŋ (𝼃 𝼁 𝼇) were added to the extIPA in 2015 and are scheduled for Unicode support in 2021.

Latin reversed letters
ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ
Reversed minuscule [d][b]ɘ𝼁(i)𝼃(o)[q][p]ƨ(v)(w)(x)[ჸ]
Reversed small cap (ᴀ)(ʜ)(ɪ)(ᴍ)(ᴏ)(ᴛ)(ᴜ)(ᴠ)(ᴡ)(ʏ)
Reversed capital (A)[𐤡][Ↄ]Ǝ(H)(I)[𐐢]𝈲(M)[И](O)[Я]Ƨ(T)(U)(V)(W)(X)(Y)[𑨖]

Greek and Cyrillic

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Greek reversed letters
ΑΒΓΔΕΖΗΘΙΚΛΜΝΞΟΠΡΣΤΥΦΧΨΩ
Reversed minuscule ɒ(ү)ɜ[𝼇](θ)[ᴊ][ʎ][v](ο)[ᑫ][ᓀ](ᴜ)(φ)(ψ)(ω)
Reversed capital (Α)[ꓭ][⅂](Δ)[Ǝ][𑨖][Η](Θ)(Ι)[ꟼ][𐅠][Τ][Υ](Φ)(Χ)(Ψ)(Ω)
Cyrillic reversed letters
АБВГДЕЖЗИЙКЛМНОПРСТУФХЦЧШЩЪЫЬЭЮЯ
Reversed minuscule (ж)ԑ[ɴ][ɴ̆](м)(н)(о)(п)(q)(т)(ф)(х)(ш)є[ʀ]
Reversed capital (А)[Ƌ][ꓭ][⅂](Ж)Ԑ[N][N̆][ꓘ](М)(Н)(О)(П)(Т)(Ф)(Х)[𐋍](Ш)[ІԀ][Ԁ]Є[R]

Sideways

There are only a few characters that are sideways that are encoded in Unicode, but some might come in future versions.

Latin tables

Latin sideways letters
ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ
Sideways minuscule [ᓄ][ပ][ᓀ][𐆉][⹃⃓][·–][ᓜ][—][ᗴ][ჺ][ᓇ][ᓂ][ﬠ][>][ᕒ][×][ɴ]
Sideways small cap [ߘ][ш][z][ơ][⸧][lower-alpha 4]
Sideways capital [ᗉ][ᗶ][𝈱] • [U][ᗝ][Ш][𝈯][ᘎ][エ][lower-alpha 5][ᓓ] • [𝈥][𝈎][Σ][Z][𝈟][lower-alpha 6][𝈩][ᑐ][ᐳ][𐅠][⨉][𝈠][N]
Extended latin sideways letters
ƜƆÜ
Sideways minuscule [𐐡][ᴟ]
Sideways capital [𐅺][ꡗ][𐅠][ᐣ]

Greek and Cyrillic tables

There are no brackets included for the following tables because any sideways character that is not in the Latin script do not have encoded Unicode characters.

Cyrillic sideways letters
АБВГЫЮ Ѧ
Sideways minuscule [ⱷ]ߘ
Sideways capital [ഥ]L

Notes

  1. displays a number of ways in different typefaces, but according to Unicode it is a turned small capital M.
  2. is actually an inverted M.
  3. ʁ is equivalent to rotated Cyrillic я, though historically it is an inverted Latin ʀ
  4. This is a sideways u bracket, so the glyph often appears small, making it have an appearance of a small capital.
  5. This is not a dash, this is a sideways capital I.
  6. Despite its Unicode character name, (rotated capital q) is only rotated 90 degrees.

References

  1. Howes, Justin (2000). "Caslon's punches and matrices". Matrix. 20: 1–7.
  2. Geoffrey K Pullum; William A Ladusaw. Phonetic symbol guide. University of Chicago Press. doi:10.1017/S0008413100017230. ISBN 9780226685366. S2CID 149152125.
  3. Michael G. Collins, M‘Culloch and the Turned Comma, 12 Greenbag 2d 265 (2009).
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