Iota: Difference between revisions

Latest revision as of 16:11, 4 March 2026

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Iota (/aɪˈoʊtə/ (Audio file "LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-Iota.wav" not found);^[1] /ˈjota/, uppercase Ι, lowercase ι; Script error: The function "langx" does not exist.) is the ninth letter of the Greek alphabet. It was derived from the Phoenician letter Yodh.^[2] Letters that arose from this letter include the Latin I and J, the Cyrillic І (І, і), Yi (Ї, ї), and Je (Ј, ј), and iotated letters (e.g. Yu (Ю, ю)). In the system of Greek numerals, iota has a value of 10.^[3]

Iota represents the close front unrounded vowel el. In early forms of ancient Greek, it occurred in both long [iː] and short [i] versions, but this distinction was lost in Koine Greek.^[4] Iota participated as the second element in falling diphthongs, with both long and short vowels as the first element. Where the first element was long, the iota was lost in pronunciation at an early date, and was written in polytonic orthography as iota subscript, in other words as a very small ι under the main vowel. Examples include ᾼ ᾳ ῌ ῃ ῼ ῳ. The former diphthongs became digraphs for simple vowels in Koine Greek.^[4]

The word is used in a common English phrase, "not one iota", meaning "not the slightest amount". This refers to iota, the smallest letter, or possibly yodh, י, the smallest letter in the Hebrew alphabet.^[5]^[6] The English word jot derives from iota.^[7] The German, Polish, Portuguese, and Spanish name for the letter J (Jot / jota) is derived from iota.

Uses

In some programming languages (e.g., A+, APL, C++,^[8] Go^[9]), iota (either as the lowercase symbol ⍳ or the identifier iota) is used to represent and generate an array of consecutive integers. For example, in APL ⍳4 gives 1 2 3 4.^[10]
The lowercase iota symbol is sometimes used to write the imaginary unit, but more often Roman i or j is used.
In mathematics, the inclusion map of one space into another is sometimes denoted by the lowercase iota.
In logic, the lowercase iota denotes the definite descriptor.
Turned iota ⟨℩⟩ was formerly used for the Sinological phonetic notation letter now transcribed as ⟨ɿ⟩.

Unicode

For accented Greek characters, see Greek diacritics: Computer encoding.

U+0196 Ɩ (HTML Ɩ)
U+0269 ɩ (HTML ɩ)
U+0345 ͅ (HTML ͅ)
U+037A ͺ [[|]]
U+038A Ί (HTML Ί)
U+0390 ΐ (HTML ΐ)
U+0399 Ι (HTML Ι⧼dot-separator⧽ Ι)
U+03AA Ϊ (HTML Ϊ)
U+03AF ί (HTML ί)
U+03B9 ι (HTML ι⧼dot-separator⧽ ι) (\iota in TeX)
U+03CA ϊ (HTML ϊ)
U+1D7C ᵼ (HTML ᵼ)
U+1DA5 ᶥ (HTML ᶥ)
U+1FBE ι (HTML ι)
U+2129 ℩ (HTML ℩⧼dot-separator⧽ &iiota;)
U+2373 ⍳ (HTML ⍳)
U+2378 ⍸ (HTML ⍸)
U+2C92 Ⲓ (HTML Ⲓ)
U+2C93 ⲓ (HTML ⲓ)
U+A646 Ꙇ (HTML Ꙇ)
U+A647 ꙇ (HTML ꙇ)
U+1D6B0 𝚰 (HTML 𝚰)^{[lower-alpha 1]}
U+1D6CA 𝛊 (HTML 𝛊)
U+1D6EA 𝛪 (HTML 𝛪)
U+1D704 𝜄 (HTML 𝜄)
U+1D724 𝜤 (HTML 𝜤)
U+1D73E 𝜾 (HTML 𝜾)
U+1D75E 𝝞 (HTML 𝝞)
U+1D778 𝝸 (HTML 𝝸)
U+1D798 𝞘 (HTML 𝞘)
U+1D7B2 𝞲 (HTML 𝞲)

↑ The MATHEMATICAL symbols are only for use in math. Stylized Greek text should be encoded using the normal Greek letters, with markup and formatting to indicate text style.

References

↑ "iota". Oxford English Dictionary (Online ed.). Oxford University Press. (Subscription or participating institution membership required.)
↑ Victor Parker, A History of Greece, 1300 to 30 BC, (John Wiley & Sons, 2014), 67.
↑ "Greek numbers". History.mcs.st-and.ac.uk. Retrieved 2014-05-04.
↑ ^4.0 ^4.1 see Koine Greek phonology
↑ "Yud (Hebrew Letter) - BJE". 2020-03-30. Retrieved 2025-03-21.
↑ Tverberg, Lois (2015-06-30). "Yod - One Very Significant Letter". En-Gedi Resource Center. Retrieved 2025-03-21.
↑ "Jot | Define Jot at Dictionary.com". Dictionary.reference.com. Retrieved 2014-05-04.
↑ Parent, Sean (2019-01-04). "#iotashaming". sean-parent.stlab.cc. Retrieved 2020-03-11.
↑ "The Go Programming Language Specification". The Go Authors. November 18, 2016. Retrieved 2017-08-08.
↑ Darlington, John, ed. (1991). Functional programming and its applications: an advanced course (Xerographic reprint [d. Ausg.] Cambridge 1982 ed.). Ann Arbor, Mich: University Microfilms International. p. 76. ISBN 978-0-521-24503-6. iota The APL ι operator: iota apply to an integer n produces a sequence of n consecutive integers starting from 1;

[11] The MATHEMATICAL symbols are only for use in math. Stylized Greek text should be encoded using the normal Greek letters, with markup and formatting to indicate text style.

[1] "iota". Oxford English Dictionary (Online ed.). Oxford University Press. (Subscription or participating institution membership required.)

[2] Victor Parker, A History of Greece, 1300 to 30 BC, (John Wiley & Sons, 2014), 67.

[3] "Greek numbers". History.mcs.st-and.ac.uk. Retrieved 2014-05-04.

[kgp-4] 4.0 ^4.1 see Koine Greek phonology

[5] "Yud (Hebrew Letter) - BJE". 2020-03-30. Retrieved 2025-03-21.

[6] Tverberg, Lois (2015-06-30). "Yod - One Very Significant Letter". En-Gedi Resource Center. Retrieved 2025-03-21.

[7] "Jot | Define Jot at Dictionary.com". Dictionary.reference.com. Retrieved 2014-05-04.

[8] Parent, Sean (2019-01-04). "#iotashaming". sean-parent.stlab.cc. Retrieved 2020-03-11.

[9] "The Go Programming Language Specification". The Go Authors. November 18, 2016. Retrieved 2017-08-08.

[10] Darlington, John, ed. (1991). Functional programming and its applications: an advanced course (Xerographic reprint [d. Ausg.] Cambridge 1982 ed.). Ann Arbor, Mich: University Microfilms International. p. 76. ISBN 978-0-521-24503-6. iota The APL ι operator: iota apply to an integer n produces a sequence of n consecutive integers starting from 1;

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@@ Line 1: / Line 1: @@
 {{Short description|Ninth letter in the Greek alphabet}}
 {{Hatnote group|
-{{About-distinguish|Greek iota|Jota (disambiguation){{!}}Jota}}{{For-multi|Latin iota|ɩ|Cyrillic Iota|Iota (Cyrillic)|other uses}}
+{{About|the Greek letter|the Latin letter|Latin iota|the Cyrillic letter|Iota (Cyrillic)|other uses}}
-{{Distinguish|Yota}}
+{{Distinguish|Jota|Yota}}
 }}
 {{Refimprove|date=December 2009}}
@@ Line 13: / Line 13: @@
 The word is used in a common English phrase, "not one iota", meaning "not the slightest amount". This refers to iota, the smallest letter, or possibly [[yodh]], י, the smallest letter in the Hebrew alphabet.<ref>{{Cite web |date=2020-03-30 |title=Yud (Hebrew Letter) - BJE |url=https://bje.org.au/knowledge-centre/jewish-languages/hebrew-alphabet/yud/ |access-date=2025-03-21 |language=en-US}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=Tverberg |first=Lois |date=2015-06-30 |title=Yod - One Very Significant Letter |url=https://engediresourcecenter.com/2015/06/30/yod-one-very-significant-letter/#gsc.tab=0 |access-date=2025-03-21 |website=En-Gedi Resource Center |language=en-US}}</ref> The English word ''[[wikt:jot#English|jot]]'' derives from iota.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/jot |title=Jot &#124; Define Jot at Dictionary.com |publisher=Dictionary.reference.com |access-date=2014-05-04}}</ref> The German, Polish, Portuguese, and Spanish name for the letter J (''[[wikt:Jot#German|Jot]]'' / ''[[wikt:jota#Spanish|jota]]'') is derived from iota.
-==Symbol==
+==<span class="anchor" id="Symbol"></span> Uses==
 * In some [[programming language]]s (e.g., [[A+ (programming language)|A+]], [[APL (programming language)|APL]], [[C++]],<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://sean-parent.stlab.cc/2019/01/04/iota.html|title=#iotashaming|last=Parent|first=Sean|date=2019-01-04|website=sean-parent.stlab.cc|access-date=2020-03-11}}</ref> [[Go (programming language)|Go]]<ref>{{cite web|url=https://golang.org/ref/spec#Iota |title=The Go Programming Language Specification |publisher=The Go Authors |date=November 18, 2016 |access-date=2017-08-08}}</ref>), iota (either as the lowercase symbol <code>⍳</code> or the identifier <code>iota</code>) is used to represent and generate an array of consecutive integers. For example, in APL <code>⍳4</code> gives <code>1 2 3 4</code>.<ref>{{Cite book |title=Functional programming and its applications: an advanced course |date=1991 |publisher=University Microfilms International |isbn=978-0-521-24503-6 |editor-last=Darlington |editor-first=John |edition=Xerographic reprint [d. Ausg.] Cambridge 1982 |location=Ann Arbor, Mich |pages=76 |quote=iota The APL ι operator: iota apply to an integer ''n'' produces a sequence of ''n'' consecutive integers starting from 1;}}</ref>
@@ Line 19: / Line 19: @@
 * In [[mathematics]], the [[inclusion map]] of one space into another is sometimes denoted by the lowercase iota.
 * In [[logic]], the lowercase iota denotes the [[Definite description#Symbolic form|definite descriptor]].
-* The lowercase iota symbol has Unicode code point U+03B9 and the uppercase U+0399.
+* Turned iota {{angbr IPA|℩}} was formerly used for the [[Sinological phonetic notation]] letter now transcribed as {{angbr IPA|ɿ}}.
 ==Unicode==

Iota: Difference between revisions

Latest revision as of 16:11, 4 March 2026

Contents

Uses

Unicode

See also

References

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Iota: Difference between revisions

Latest revision as of 16:11, 4 March 2026

Uses

Unicode

See also

References

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