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Niqqud

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Hebrew Israeli Rowspan Tiberian

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{ style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; border-style:none"	Shva Segol Patach Kamatz Hiriq
Tzere Segol Patach Kamatz Holam
ֻ Dagesh Rafe ׁ ׂ

| colspan="2" style="text-align:center;" |Example
|-
| colspan="2" align="center" style="background:white;height:50px"|[[Image:Example of biblical Hebrew trope.svg|220px]]
|-
| colspan="2" style="width:250px;background:white; text-align:center;" | Gen. 1:9, "And God said,
Let the waters be collected".'''
'''Letters in black, niqqud in red, 
cantillation in blueCantillation

| colspan="2" style="text-align:center;" |Niqqud articles

| colspan="2" style="width:250px;background:white; text-align:center;"| [[Shva]][[Hiriq]][[Zeire]][[Segol]][[Patach]][[Kamatz]][[Holam]][[Dagesh]][[Mappiq]][[Shuruk]][[Kubutz]][[Rafe]][[Sin/Shin dot|Shin dot]]
|}

In Hebrew orthography, niqqud or nikud ( or ) is a system of signs used to represent or distinguish between alternative pronunciations of letters of the Hebrew alphabet. Several such diacritical systems were developed in the Early Middle Ages. The most widespread system, and the only one still used to a significant degree today, was created by the Masoretes of Tiberias in the second half of the first millennium AD in the Land of Israel (see Masoretic Text, Tiberian Hebrew). Text written with niqqud is called ktiv menuqad.

Niqqud marks are small compared to the letters, so they can be added without retranscribing texts whose writers did not anticipate them.

In modern Israeli orthography, niqqud is mainly used in specialised texts such as dictionaries, poetry, or texts for children or new immigrants to Israel.

(2025). 9789004176423, Brill. ISBN 9789004176423

For purposes of disambiguation, a system of spelling without niqqud, known in Hebrew language as ktiv maleh (כְּתִיב מָלֵא, literally "full spelling") had developed before the introduction of niqqud. This was formally standardised in the Rules for Spelling without Niqqud (כְּלָלֵי הַכְּתִיב חֲסַר הַנִּקּוּד) enacted by the Academy of the Hebrew Language in 1996, and updated in 2017. Nevertheless, niqqud is still used occasionally in texts to prevent ambiguity and mispronunciation of specific words.

One reason for the lesser use of niqqud is that it no longer reflects the current pronunciation. In modern Hebrew, tzere is pronounced the same as segol, although they were distinct in Tiberian Hebrew, and pataḥ the same as qamatz. To the younger generation of native Hebrew speakers, these distinctions seem arbitrary and meaningless; on the other hand, Hebrew language purists have rejected out of hand the idea of changing the basics of niqqud and fitting them to the current pronunciation – with the result that in practice niqqud is increasingly going out of use.

According to Ghil'ad Zuckermann, the lack of niqqud in what he calls "Israeli" (Modern Hebrew) often results in "mispronunciations".

Zuckermann, Ghil'ad (2025). 9780199812790, Oxford University Press. . ISBN 9780199812790

For example, the Israeli lexical item מתאבנים is often pronounced as mitabním (literally "becoming fossilized (masculine plural)") instead of metaavním "appetizers", the latter deriving from תאבון teavón "appetite", the former deriving from אבן éven "stone". Another example is the toponym מעלה אדומים, which is often pronounced as maalé edomím instead of maalé adumím, the latter appearing in the Hebrew Bible (Joshua 15:7 and 18:17). The hypercorrect yotvetá is used instead of yotváta for the toponym יטבתה, mentioned in Deuteronomy 10:7. The surname of American actress Farrah Fawcett (פארהפוסט) is often pronounced fost instead of fóset by many Israelis.

Chart

This table uses the consonant letters ', ' or , where appropriate, to demonstrate where the niqqud is placed in relation to the consonant it is pronounced after. Any other letters shown are actually part of the vowel. Note that there is some variation among different traditions in exactly how some vowel points are pronounced. The table below shows how most Israelis would pronounce them, but the classic Ashkenazi pronunciation, for example, differs in several respects.

Note concerning IPA: the transcription symbols are linked to the articles about the sounds they represent. The diacritic ˘ (breve) indicates a short vowel; the triangular colon symbol ː indicates that the vowel is long.

"dagesh kal", which designates the plosive (as opposed to fricative) variant of any of the letters Begadkefat]] (in biblical Hebrew this distinction was allophone; in Israeli Hebrew , and with or without dagesh kal are acoustically and phonologically indistinguishable, whereas plosive and fricative variants of , and are sometimes allophonic and sometimes distinct phonemes (e.g., אִפֵּר applied make up vs. אִפֵר tipped ash).
"dagesh hazak", which designates gemination (prolonged pronunciation) of consonants, but which, although represented in most cases when transliterated according to standards of the Academy of the Hebrew Language, is acoustically and phonologically nonexistent in Modern Hebrew (except occasionally in dramatic or comical recitations, in some loanwords—such as a few Arabic Profanity—and pronunciations exaggerated for the sake of disambiguation).

For most letters the dagesh is written within the glyph, near the middle if possible, but the exact position varies from letter to letter (some letters do not have an open area in the middle, and in these cases it is written usually beside the letter, as with yod).The guttural consonants () and resh () are not marked with a dagesh, although the letter he () (and rarely ) may appear with a mappiq (which is written the same way as dagesh) at the end of a word to indicate that the letter does not signify a vowel but is consonantal.To the resulting form, there can still be added a niqqud diacritic designating a vowel. |- | Tiberian Hebrew | dāḡēš | | | |- ! scope="row" rowspan="2" style="font-size: 180%; line-height: 110%;" | | rowspan="2" | Rafe | rowspan="2" | rafe | Israeli Hebrew | rafe | rowspan="2" | רָפֵה | Ø | a˺, e˺, i˺, o˺, or u˺ | No longer used in Hebrew. Still seen in Yiddish (especially following the YIVO standard) to distinguish various letter pairs. Some ancient manuscripts have a dagesh or a rafe on nearly every letter. It is also used to indicate that a letter like or is silent. In the particularly strange case of the Ten Commandments, which have two different traditions for their cantillations which many texts write together, there are cases of a single letter with both a dagesh and a rafe, if it is hard in one reading and soft in the other. |- | Tiberian Hebrew | rāfa | [Vowel length] | ă, ĕ, ĭ, or ŭ | Niqqud, but not a vowel. Used as an "anti-dagesh", to show that a Begadkefat]] letter is soft and not hard, or (sometimes) that a consonant is single and not double, or that a letter like or is completely silent. |- ! scope="row" style="font-size: 180%; line-height: 110%;" | | Shin dot | shin dot | Israeli Hebrew and Tiberian Hebrew | šin dot | שִׁי"ן, שִׁי״ן יְמָנִית, "right Shin" | | š/sh | Niqqud, but not a vowel (except when inadequate typefaces merge the holam of a letter before the shin with the shin dot). The dot for shin is written over the right (first) branch of the letter. It is usually transcribed "sh". |- ! scope="row" rowspan="2" style="font-size: 180%; line-height: 110%;" | | rowspan="2" | Sin dot | rowspan="2" | sin dot | Israeli Hebrew | rowspan="2" | śin dot | rowspan="2" | שִׂי"ן, שִׁי״ן שְׂמָאלִית, "left Shin" | rowspan="2" | | rowspan="2" | ś/s | Niqqud, but not a vowel (except when inadequate typefaces merge the holam of the sin with the sin dot). The dot for sin is written over the left (third) branch of the letter. |- | Tiberian Hebrew | Some linguistic evidence indicates that it was originally IPA . |}

Keyboard

Both consonants and niqqud can be typed from virtual graphical keyboards available on the World Wide Web, or by methods integrated into particular operating systems.

Microsoft Windows

In Windows 8 or later, niqqud can be entered using the right alt (or left alt + ctrl) + the first Hebrew letter of the name of the value, when using the default (Hebrew Standard) keyboard layout: (Hebrew)

	for קָמץ (kamatz)	first Hebrew letter of the niqqud's name
	for פַתח (patach)
	for שְׁווא (sheva)
	for דּגש (dagesh)
	for חִירִיק (hiriq)
	for סֶגול (segol)
	for צֵירֵי (tsere)
	for ח וֹלם (holam)	the key (like the 'o' vowel), since the key is already used for hiriq
	for קֻבּוּץ (kubuts)	because the line \ visually resembles ֻ
	for reduced patach פַתח	the key to the right of
	for reduced kamats קָמץ	the key to the right of
	for reduced segol סֶגול	the key to the right of
	for the Shin dot	the key above , right-side, since the dot is placed above , right-side
	for the Sin dot	the key above , left-side, since the dot is placed above , left-side
	for רפֿה (rafe)

In Windows 7 or earlier,Likewise in Windows 8 or later if, in the Hebrew options of the language settings, the keyboard is changed from "Hebrew (Standard)" to "Hebrew"–the latter being the legacy keyboard layout. niqqud can be entered by enabling Caps Lock and then, with the cursor positioned after a letter, pressing Shift and one of the keys in the Windows column below. (Hebrew);
The user can configure the registry to allow use of the Alt key with the numeric plus key to type the hexadecimal Unicode value.
The user can use the Microsoft Keyboard Layout Creator to produce a custom keyboard layout, or can download a layout produced by another party.

Linux

In GTK+ Linux systems, niqqud can be entered by holding down AltGR and pressing the same keys as for Windows, above, or by pressing ctrl+shift+u followed by the appropriate 4 digit Unicode.

macOS

Using the Hebrew keyboard layout in macOS, the typist can enter niqqud by pressing the Option key together with a number on the top row of the keyboard. Other combinations such as sofit and hataf can also be entered by pressing either the Shift key and a number, or by pressing the Shift key, Option key, and a number at the same time.

{class="wikitable"
~	0	05B0	Sh'va	¹
1	3	05B1	Reduced Segol	¹
2	1	05B2	Reduced Patach	¹
3	2	05B3	Reduced Kamatz	¹
4	4	05B4	Hiriq	¹
5	5	05B5	Zeire	¹
6	9	05B6	Segol	¹
7	6	05B7	Patach
8	7	05B8	Kamatz	¹
9	A	05C2	Sin dot (left)	²
0	M	05C1	Shin dot (right)	²
–	=	05B9	Holam	¹
= ³	,	05BC	Dagesh or Mappiq	¹
= ³	U	05BC	Shuruk	⁴
\	8	05BB	Kubutz	¹

|} Notes:

¹ The letter "" represents any Hebrew consonant.
² For sin-dot and shin-dot, the letter "" (sin/shin) is used.
³ The dagesh, mappiq, and shuruk have different uses, but the same graphical representation, and hence are input in the same manner.
⁴ For shuruk, the letter "" (vav) is used since it can only be used with that letter.
A rafe can be input by inserting the corresponding Unicode character, either explicitly or via a customized keyboard layout.

SIL International have developed another standard, which is based on Tiro, but adds the Niqqud along the home keys. Linux comes with "Israel — Biblical Hebrew (Tiro)" as a standard layout. With this layout, niqqud can be typed without pressing the Caps Lock key.

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