(also Teth, Tet) is the ninth letter of many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician, Aramaic, Hebrew , Syriac and Arabic (in abjadi order, 16th in modern order).

Its value is IPA , one of the Semitic emphatic consonants.

The Phoenician letter gave rise to the Greek Theta (Θ).

Origins

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The Phoenician letter name means "wheel", but the letter possibly (according to Brian Colless) continues a Middle Bronze Age glyph named "good", based on the nfr "good" hieroglyph, F35

Hebrew Teth

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Hebrew Pronunciation:

In Modern Hebrew Teth is pronounced as a voiceless alveolar plosive , although it can be pharyngealized in traditional Temani and Sephardi pronunciation.

Significance

In gematria, Teth represents the number nine, and when used at the beginning of Hebrew years, it means 9000 (i.e. טתשנד in numbers would be the date 9754).

As well, in gematria, the number 15 is written with Teth and Vav, (9+6) to avoid the normal construction Yodh and He (10+5) which spells a name of God. Similarly, 16 is written with Teth and Zayin (9+7) instead of Yodh and Vav (10+6) to avoid spelling part of the Tetragrammaton.

Teth is also one of the seven letters which receive a special crown (called a tagin) when written in a Sefer Torah. See Shin, Ayin, Gimmel, Nun, Zayin, and Tzadi.

Phoenician alphabet | Arabic letters

ט | Tet (lizherenn) | Thet | Tet (Buchstabe) | Thet | Tet (lettre) | ט | Tet (letter) | Tet (kirjain)