We (kana)


ゑ in hiragana, or ヱ in katakana, is a nearly obsolete Japanese kana.
It is presumed that ゑ represented and that ゑ and え indicated different pronunciations until somewhere between the Kamakura period and the Taishō period when they both came to be pronounced as イェ, later shifting to the modern エ. Along with the kana for wi, this kana was deemed obsolete in Japanese in 1946 and replaced with え and エ. It is now rare in everyday usage; in onomatopoeia or foreign words, the katakana form ウェ is preferred, as in "ウェスト" for "west".
The kana still sees some modern-day usage. Ebisu is usually written "えびす", but sometimes "ゑびす" like Kyōto Ebisu Shrine, and name of the beer Yebisu, which is actually pronounced "Ebisu". The Japanese title of the Rebuild of Evangelion series is Evangelion: New Theatrical Edition. Katakana ヱ is sometimes written with a dakuten, ヹ, to represent a sound in foreign words; however, most IMEs lack a convenient way to write this and the combination ヴェ is far more common.
Hiragana ゑ is still used in several Okinawan orthographies for the syllable. In the Ryūkyū University system, ゑ is also combined with a small ぃ, ゑぃ/ヱィ, to represent the sound. Katakana ヱ is used in Ainu for.

"Not to be confused with"... info

While being confused with E and We because their katakana are similar.

Stroke order

The Hiragana ゑ is made with one stroke. It resembles a Hiragana る that continues with a double-humped ん shape underneath.
The Katakana ヱ is made with three strokes:
  1. A horizontal line that hooks down and to the left.
  2. A vertical line, just grazing the end of the first stroke.
  3. A long horizontal line across the bottom.

    Other communicative representations