Y

I u where the Greek has u, as bucina and buka/nh, cubus and ku/bos, fuga and fugh/, mus and mu=s et saep.; or this u has given place to i, as in lacrima, formerly lacruma, = da/kruma. Sometimes, also, o took the place of the u; cf. mola and mu/lh, sorex and u(/rac, folium and fu/llon, and, shortening a long vowel, ancŏra and a)/gkura, like lacrĭma and da/kru=ma. In Cicero's time y seems to have been already in use; but its application was restricted to foreign words, and hence the spellings Sylla, Tybris, pyrum, satyra, etc., are to be rejected.

I i and j being counted as one), a vowel, which was early distinguished by the old grammarians from the consonant V, though represented by the same sign; v. the letter V. The long u corresponded in sound to the Greek ou, and to the German and Italian u (Engl. oo); the short u seems to have been an obscure sound resembling the German ü and the French u; hence ŭ sometimes represented the Greek u, as in fuga from fugh/, cuminum from ku/minon, etc.; and sometimes was exchanged with the Latin i, as in optimus and optumus, carnufex and carnifex, satura and satira, in the old inscriptions CAPVTALIS and NOMINVS LATINI, in the emperor Augustus's pronunciation of simus for sumus, etc.; v. the letter I. For the affinity of u with o and with v, v. under those letters. U inserted in Alcumena, Alcumaeo, Æsculapius, Tecumessa, drachuma al.; v. Ritschl in Rhein. Mus. Neue Folge, 8, p. 475 sq.; 9, p. 480; and cf. the letters A and O.—As an abbreviation, V. (as the sign of the vowel u) stands for uti, so V. V. uti voverant; and especially for urbs (i. e. Roma); as, U. C. (urbis conditae), or A. U. C. (ab urbe conditā). For its meanings when used as a sign of the consonant V, v. under the letter V fin.