cedilla
9.8
A small mark under the letter c that makes the c sound like s
- noun
- /səˈdɪlə/
- Specialized
:
cedilla
- The word 'façade' features acedilla beneath the 'c' to indicate the soft 's' sound.
Examples
-
That's French, with a cedilla.
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In French, the letter 'c' with acedilla is pronounced like 's', as in 'façade'.
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With the exception of "c" cedilla and palatal "n" (transcribed here as "" and "h"), I have followed the norms presented in David Mackenzie's A Manual of Manuscript Transcription for the Dictionary of the Old Spanish Language.
Academic text (2003) -
To write correctly in French, you must include acedilla when using 'c' in certain words.
Surface Forms
Etymology
Cedilla comes from Spanish and originally meant 'little z' because early writers put a small z under the letter c to show it should sound like 's'. That's why the small mark ¸ under a c, as in 'façade', tells you to say the c like an 's'.
