Á

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Á, á (a-acute) is a letter of the Czech, Faroese, Hungarian, Icelandic, Slovak and Sámi languages. This letter also appears in Dutch, Galician, Irish, Occitan, Portuguese, Spanish, Lakota, Navajo, and Vietnamese as a variant of the letter “a”. Some writers use á incorrectly to denote a quantity, often used on receipts, e.g. "5 apples á $1", when it actually should be "5 apples à $1" (one dollar each, which would amount to 5 dollars total). This letter also appears in Arin, and Blackfoot.

Usage in various languages

Chinese

In Chinese pinyin á is the yángpíng tone (阳平, high-rising tone) of “a”.

Irish

In Irish, á is called "a fada" (long a), pronounced [/ɑː/] and appears in words such as slán (goodbye).

Czech, Hungarian, and Slovak

Á is the 2nd letter of the Czech, Hungarian and Slovak languages and represents /aː/.

Faroese

Á is the 2nd letter of the Faroese alphabet and represents /ɔ/ or /ɔaː/.

Icelandic

Á is the 2nd letter of the Icelandic alphabet and represents /au̯/ (as in "ow").

Portuguese

The á is not part of the Portuguese alphabet, but represents the letter "a" with an acute accent. It is generally used to denote an "a" syllable with abnormal stress. Its pronunciation is very similar to /a/ or /aː/.

Scottish Gaelic

Á was once used in Scottish, but has now been largely superseded by "à". It can still be seen in certain writings, but it is no longer used in standard orthography.

Spanish

In Spanish, á is an accented letter, pronounced just like "a" is. Both á and a sound like /a/. The accent indicates the stressed syllable in words with irregular stress patterns. It can also to "break up" a diphthong or to distinguish words that would otherwise be spelled alike, although this does not happen with á, because a is a strong vowel and does not usually become a semivowel in a diphthong. See Diacritic and Acute accent for more details.

Vietnamese

In the Vietnamese alphabet, á is the sắc tone (high-rising tone) of "a."

Character mappings

See also

• Acute accent
• À

External links

• Omniglot - writing systems & languages of the world
  • Czech language
  • Faroese language
  • Hungarian language
  • Icelandic language
  • Slovak language
  • Sámi languages