Ę

Ę (minuscule: ę) is a letter in the Polish alphabet and other languages. It is formed from the letter e and an ogonek. In Latin and Irish palaeography, it is known as E caudata.

In Polish

In Polish ę comes after e in the alphabet but never appears at the start of a word. It usually represents a nasal vowel, more specifically IPA: [/ɛ̃/] or IPA: [/ɛw̃/].

Unlike in French, nasal vowels in Polish are asynchronous, meaning that they are pronounced as an oral vowel + a nasal semivowel, or a nasal vowel + a nasal semivowel. For instance, ę might be more accurately represented as [ɛw̃] but for the sake of simplicity, it is usually represented as /ɛ̃/.

Some examples,

• język ("language"), pronounced IPA: [ˈjɛ̃zɨk]
• mięso ("meat"), pronounced IPA: [ˈmjɛ̃sɔ]
• ciężki ("heavy", "hard"), pronounced IPA: [ˈtɕɛ̃ʂki]

Before all stops and affricates, it is pronounced as an oral vowel + nasal consonant. The nasal consonant may be either m (before p or b) or n (all other cases). For example,

• więcej ("more"), pronounced IPA: [ˈvjɛntsɛj] rather than [ˈvjɛ̃tsɛj]
• sędzia ("judge", "referee"), pronounced IPA: [ˈsɛndʑa]
• głęboki ("deep"), pronounced IPA: [gwɛmˈbɔki]

If ę is the final letter of a word, or if it is followed by either l or ł, most Poles will pronounce it simply as /ɛ/. For example, będę ("I will (be)") can be either [ˈbɛndɛ] or [ˈbɛndɛ̃], similarly dziękuję ("I thank") can be either [dʑɛnˈkujɛ] or [dʑɛnˈkujɛ̃].

History

Polish ę evolved from short nasal a of medieval Polish, which developed into a short nasal e in the modern language. This medieval vowel, along with its long counterpart, evolved in turn from the merged nasal *ę and *ǫ of Late Proto-Slavic. Thus,

Evolution

Late Proto-Slavic	/ẽ/ and /õ/, represented by ę and ǫ
Medieval Polish	long and short /ã/, written approximately as ø
Modern Polish	long /ã/ → short /ɔ̃/, written ą short /ã/ → short /ɛ̃/, written ę

Alternations

ę often alternates with ą, for example:

• husband: mąż → mężowie (husbands), snake: wąż → węże (snakes), pigeon: gołąb → gołębie (pigeons)
• oak in nominative: dąb → dębem (instrumental)
• hands in nominative: ręce → rąk (genitive)
• five: pięć → piąty (fifth)

Audio examples

• (snakes)
• (sound)
• (I can, I am able to)

See also

• Ą
• Polish phonology
• Polish alphabet
• Ogonek