In words, mostly of Latin origin, where ⟨ä⟩ and ⟨u⟩ are separated by a syllable boundary, it represents /ɛ.ʊ/, e.g. Matthäus (a German form for Matthew).
In English crip slang, ⟨cc⟩ can sometimes replace the letters ⟨ck⟩ or ⟨ct⟩ at the ends of words, such as with thicc, protecc, succ and fucc.
The first examples of this digraph are from the Oaths of Strasbourg, the earliest French text, where it denotes the same sound /ð/ developed mainly from intervocalic Latin -t-.
In the transcription of Australian Aboriginal languages such as Warlpiri, Arrernte, and Pitjantjatjara, it represents a postalveolar stop such as /ṯ/ or /ḏ/; this sound is also written ⟨dy⟩, ⟨tj⟩, ⟨ty⟩, or ⟨c⟩.
In Cornish, it is used for an optionally pre-occluded /n/; that is, it is pronounced either /n/ or /nː/ (in any position); /ᵈn/ (before a consonant or finally); or /dn/ (before a vowel); examples are pedn ('head') or pednow ('heads').
When followed by ⟨r⟩, it can represent the standard outcomes of the previously mentioned three vowels in this environment: /ɪər/ as in beard, /ɜːr/ as in heard, and /ɛər/ as in bear, respectively; as another exception, /ɑr/ occurs in the words hearken, heart, and hearth.
Latin velar-coronal sequences like this (and also ⟨cl cr ct gd gl gr x⟩) underwent a palatal mutation to varying degrees in most Italo-Western Romance languages.
This was not the case in Dalmatian and the Eastern Romance languages where a different mutation changed the velar component to a labial consonant as well as the spelling to ⟨mn⟩.
⟨hy⟩ is used in Hepburn romanization of the Japanese language to transcribe the sound /ç/, which is the syllable hi before a y-vowel, such as hya, hyu, and hyo, which appear in Chinese loanwords.
It also can represent many vowel combinations, including /aɪə/ in diet and client, /aɪɛ/ in diester and quiescent, /iːə/ in alien and skier, /iːɛ/ in oriental and hygienic, and /iː.iː/ in British medieval.
⟨ii⟩ is used in many languages such as Portuguese (e.g. Aniilar, Sacerdócii) and Finnish (e.g. Riikka, Niinistö, Siitala, Riikkeli), Italian (e.g. Riina), Estonian (e.g. Riik), Scots (e.g. Auld Nii, Iisay), with phonemic long vowels for /iː/.
For most other languages, [better source needed] it represents the voiceless velar fricative /x/, for example in transcriptions of the letter ḫāʾ (خ) in standard Arabic, standard Persian, and Urdu, Cyrillic Х, х (kha), Spanish ⟨j⟩, as well as the Hebrew letter kaf (כ) in instances when it is lenited.
In Welsh it stands for the nasal mutation of ⟨p⟩ and represents the voiceless /m̥/; for example fy mhen /və m̥ɛn/ 'my head' (cf.
It is used in Cornish for an optionally pre-occluded /m/; that is, it is pronounced either /m/ or /mː/ (in any position); /ᵇm/ (before a consonant or finally); or /bm/ (before a vowel); examples are mamm ('mother') or hemma ('this').
⟨ng⟩, in Sino-Tibetan languages,[6] as in English and several other European and derived orthographies (for example Vietnamese),[7] generally represents the velar nasal /ŋ/.
[15] In the transcription of Australian Aboriginal languages such as Warlpiri, Arrernte, and Pitjantjatjara, it distinguishes a prenasalized velar stop, /ŋ͡k ~ ŋ͡ɡ/, from the nasal /ŋ/.
In the Gwoyeu Romatzyh romanization of Mandarin Chinese, final -nn indicates a falling tone on a syllable ending in /n/, which is otherwise spelled -n. It is used in Haida (Bringhurst orthography) for glottalized /ˀn/.
In Cornish, it is used for an optionally pre-occluded /n/; that is, it is pronounced either /n/ or /nː/ (in any position); /ᵈn/ (before a consonant or finally); or /dn/ (before a vowel); examples are penn ('head') or pennow ('heads').
In the Gwoyeu Romatzyh romanization of Mandarin Chinese, final -nq indicates a falling tone on a syllable ending in /ŋ/, which is otherwise spelled -ng.
There are many English heteronyms distinguished only by the pronunciation of this digraph, like: bow (front of ship or weapon), bower (a dwelling or string player), lower (to frown or drop), mow (to grimace or cut), row (a dispute or line-up), shower (rain or presenter), sow (a pig or to seed), tower (a building or towboat).
⟨rl⟩ is used in the transcription of Australian Aboriginal languages such as Warlpiri, Arrernte, and Pitjantjatjara, as well in Norwegian and Swedish, for a retroflex lateral, written /ɭ/ in the IPA.
⟨rn⟩ represents the retroflex nasal /ɳ/ in Warlpiri, Arrernte, and Pitjantjatjara (see transcription of Australian Aboriginal languages), as well in Norwegian and Swedish.
It takes by rule this sound value before the front vowels (⟨e, i, y, ä, ö⟩) word or root initially (as in sked (spoon)), while normally representing /sk/ in other positions.
It is also the standard written form of the /tʃ/ sound in Dutch and was likewise used in Dutch-based orthographies that used to apply for languages in Indonesia and Surinam.
In the transcription of Australian Aboriginal languages such as Warlpiri, Arrernte, and Pitjantjatjara, it represents a postalveolar stop, transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ṯ/ or /ḏ/ depending on voicing.
⟨tr⟩ generally represents a sound like a retroflex version of English "ch" in areas of German influence, such as Truk lagoon, now spelled ⟨chuuk⟩.
It is mainly used to Latinize the letter Tse (Cyrillic) (ц) In Hausa, ⟨ts⟩ represents an alveolar ejective fricative /sʼ/ or affricate /tsʼ/), depending on dialect.
In the transcription of Australian Aboriginal languages such as Warlpiri, and Arrernte, it represents a postalveolar stop, either voiceless /ṯ/ or voiced /ḏ/.
In most dialects it is now pronounced /w/, but a distinct pronunciation realized as a voiceless w sound, [ʍ], is retained in some areas: Scotland, central and southern Ireland, southeastern United States, and (mostly among older speakers) in New Zealand.
⟨zh⟩ as a digraph is rare in European languages using the Latin alphabet; in addition to Albanian it is found in Breton in words that are pronounced with /z/ in some dialects and /h/ in others.