U
| Character | |
|---|---|
| Customary name: | y psilon |
| Represents: | u |
Variants and attestation
| Transliteration | Sinistroverse | Dextroverse | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Glyph | Number | Glyph | Number | |
| U | 
|
31 | 
|
8 |
| U2 | 
|
86 | 
|
5 |
| U3 | 
|
5 | 
|
3 |
| U4 | 
|
7 | 
|
0 |
| U5 | 
|
8 | 
|
5 |
Commentary
Upsilon is one of the letters (together with Lambda and Pi) which serve as a basis for distinguishing the Magrè and Sanzeno alphabets (see Script): The "inverted" variant 
(
, 
), sometimes termed "Venetoid" in the TIR, is attributed to the Magrè alphabet, while 
(
), typical for the Etruscan and Lugano alphabets, is used in the Sanzeno alphabet. The choice between a symmetrical form and a rarer one with a straight hasta appears to be one of style – the form of Alpha (
/
) usually corresponds to that of Upsilon. The curved variant (again, together with curved Alpha) appears only in rock inscriptions and the possibly archaic PU-1, as well as in the Trissino (not yet autopsied).
Note that because of the basicness of the shape of Upsilon, the number of occurrences given in the table above is misleading: Due to the great number of inscriptions without linguistic content in the Raetic corpus, the number includes all instances of a chevron in dubious or non-inscriptions.
In addition to Raetic /u/, Upsilon may have been employed to write foreign middle back rounded vowel phones ([o] or similar). See The Raetic language for a discussion.
