We (kana)

ゑ in hiragana, or ヱ in katakana, is a nearly-obsolete Japanese kana. The combination of a W-column kana letter with "ゑ゙" in hiragana was introduced to represent [ve] in the 19th and 20th centuries.

we
hiragana
japanese hiragana we		 katakana
japanese katakana we
transliterationwe
hiragana origin恵
katakana origin恵
Man'yōgana廻 恵 面 咲
spelling kanaかぎのあるヱ
Kagi no aru "we"
unicodeU+3091, U+30F1
braille⠖
kana gojūon
warayamahanatasakaa
wiriyimihinichishikii
wuruyumufunutsusukuu
wereyemehenetesekee
woroyomohonotosokoo
n
Kana modifiers and marks
Multi-syllabic kana

It is presumed that 'ゑ' represented [we] ⓘ, and that ゑ and え indicated different pronunciations until somewhere between the Kamakura and Taishō periods, when they both came to be pronounced as 'イェ' [je] ⓘ, later shifting to the modern 'エ' [e]. Along with the kana for wi ('ゐ' in hiragana, 'ヰ' in katakana), this kana was deemed obsolete in Japanese in 1946 and replaced with え and エ. It is now rare in everyday usage; in onomatopoeia or foreign words, the katakana form 'ウェ' (U-[small-e]) is preferred, as in "ウェスト" for "west".

The kana still sees some modern-day usage. Ebisu is usually written as "えびす", but sometimes "ゑびす" like Kyoto Ebisu Shrine (京都ゑびす神社, Kyōto Webisu Jinja),[1] and name of the beer Yebisu (ヱビス), which is actually pronounced "Ebisu". The Japanese title of the Rebuild of Evangelion series is Evangelion: New Theatrical Edition (ヱヴァンゲリヲン新劇場版, Wevangeriwon Shin Gekijōban). Katakana ヱ is sometimes written with a dakuten, ヹ, to represent a /ve/ sound in foreign words; however, most IMEs lack a convenient way to write this, and the combination ヴェ is far more common.

Hiragana ゑ is still used in several Okinawan orthographies for the syllable /we/. In the Ryūkyū University system, ゑ is also combined with a small ぃ (ゑぃ/ヱィ), to represent the sound /wi/. Katakana ヱ is used in Ainu for /we/.

Stroke order
Sign in Tokyo reading ゑびす (Webisu...)
Stroke order of both ゑ and ヱ
Animated Diagram
Animated gif showing the stroke order. The character is drawn similarly to the Arabic numeral '3', before a small loop is formed at the base of the character, and a small, squashed and italicised 'm' is drawn below as a base.
Stroke order in writing ゑ
Diagram showing the stroke order of the character: on the left, the finished character; on the right, a grayed-out version with small red arrows showing the stroke order, with a green dot showing the beginning point of the stroke.
Stroke order in writing ゑ
Animated gif showing the stroke order. The character begins with a stroke resembling a squashed version of the Arabic numeral '7', before a separate vertical line is drawn separately beneath it, and a horizontal line forming the base of the character drawn below it, attached.
Stroke order in writing ヱ
Diagram showing the stroke order of the character: on the left, the finished character; on the right, a grayed-out version with small red arrows showing the stroke order, with green dots showing the beginning points of each stroke.
Stroke order in writing ヱ

The hiragana ゑ is made with one stroke. It resembles a hiragana る that continues with a double-humped ん shape underneath.

The katakana ヱ is made with three strokes:

  1. A horizontal line that hooks down and to the left.
  2. A vertical line, just grazing the end of the first stroke.
  3. A long horizontal line across the bottom.

Other communicative representations
  • Full Braille representation
ゑ / ヱ in Japanese Braille
ゑ / ヱ
we		ヹ
ve		ゑい / ヱー
wē/wei		ヹー
vē/vei
⠖ (braille pattern dots-235) ⠐ (braille pattern dots-5) ⠖ (braille pattern dots-235) ⠖ (braille pattern dots-235) ⠒ (braille pattern dots-25) ⠐ (braille pattern dots-5) ⠖ (braille pattern dots-235) ⠒ (braille pattern dots-25)
Character information
Previewゑヱ𛅑
Unicode name HIRAGANA LETTER WE KATAKANA LETTER WE HIRAGANA LETTER SMALL WE
Encodingsdecimalhexdechexdechex
Unicode12433U+309112529U+30F1110929U+1B151
UTF-8227 130 145E3 82 91227 131 177E3 83 B1240 155 133 145F0 9B 85 91
UTF-161243330911252930F155340 56657D82C DD51
Numeric character referenceゑゑヱヱ𛅑𛅑
Shift JIS[2]130 23982 EF131 14583 91
EUC-JP[3]164 241A4 F1165 241A5 F1
GB 18030[4]164 241A4 F1165 241A5 F1147 54 132 5193 36 84 33
EUC-KR[5] / UHC[6]170 241AA F1171 241AB F1
Big5 (non-ETEN kana)[7]198 245C6 F5199 171C7 AB
Big5 (ETEN / HKSCS)[8]199 120C7 78199 237C7 ED
Character information
Preview𛅥ヹ㋽
Unicode name KATAKANA LETTER SMALL WE KATAKANA LETTER VE CIRCLED KATAKANA WE
Encodingsdecimalhexdechexdechex
Unicode110949U+1B16512537U+30F913053U+32FD
UTF-8240 155 133 165F0 9B 85 A5227 131 185E3 83 B9227 139 189E3 8B BD
UTF-1655340 56677D82C DD651253730F91305332FD
Numeric character reference𛅥𛅥ヹヹ㋽㋽
Shift JIS (KanjiTalk 7)[9]136 10888 6C
Shift JIS (JIS X 0213)[10]132 14884 94
EUC-JP (JIS X 0213)[11]167 244A7 F4
GB 18030[4]147 54 134 5193 36 86 33129 57 167 5581 39 A7 37

References
  1. 京都ゑびす神社
  2. Unicode Consortium (2015-12-02) [1994-03-08]. "Shift-JIS to Unicode".
  3. Unicode Consortium; IBM. "EUC-JP-2007". International Components for Unicode.
  4. Standardization Administration of China (SAC) (2005-11-18). GB 18030-2005: Information Technology—Chinese coded character set.
  5. Unicode Consortium; IBM. "IBM-970". International Components for Unicode.
  6. Steele, Shawn (2000). "cp949 to Unicode table". Microsoft / Unicode Consortium.
  7. Unicode Consortium (2015-12-02) [1994-02-11]. "BIG5 to Unicode table (complete)".
  8. van Kesteren, Anne. "big5". Encoding Standard. WHATWG.
  9. Apple Computer (2005-04-05) [1995-04-15]. "Map (external version) from Mac OS Japanese encoding to Unicode 2.1 and later". Unicode Consortium.
  10. Project X0213 (2009-05-03). "Shift_JIS-2004 (JIS X 0213:2004 Appendix 1) vs Unicode mapping table".
  11. Project X0213 (2009-05-03). "EUC-JIS-2004 (JIS X 0213:2004 Appendix 3) vs Unicode mapping table".

See also
Look up ゑ or ヱ in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.
Wikimedia Commons has media related to ゑ.
Wikimedia Commons has media related to ヱ.
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