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Dze
Dze (Ѕ ѕ; italics: Ѕ ѕ or Ѕ ѕ; italics: Ѕ ѕ) is a letter of the Cyrillic script, used in the Macedonian alphabet to represent the voiced alveolar affricate /d͡z/, similar to the pronunciation of ⟨ds⟩ in "needs" or "kids" in English. It is derived from the letter dzelo or zelo of the Early Cyrillic alphabet, and it was used historically in all Slavic languages that use Cyrillic.
Although fully obsolete everywhere in the Cyrillic world by the 19th century, the letter zelo was revived in 1944 by the designers of the alphabet of the then-codified Macedonian language. The phoneme is also present in Greek (ΤΖ τζ) and Albanian (X x), both non-Slavic neighbours to the Macedonian language; all are a part of the Balkan linguistic area. In the early 21st century, the same letter also appeared in Vojislav Nikčević's proposal for the new alphabet for the modern Montenegrin language.
The most common early letterform (Ѕ ѕ) resembles the Latin letter S (S s), but it is also seen reversed (Ꙅ ꙅ) like the Latin letter Reversed S (Ƨ ƨ), or Z with a tail and a tick (Ꙃ ꙃ).
Abkhaz has Abkhazian Dze (Ӡ ӡ), with an identical function and name but a different shape.
The letter is descended from ѕѣло (pronounced dzělo; 
) in the Early Cyrillic alphabet, where it had the numerical value 6. The letter Dzělo was itself based on the letter Dzelo in the Glagolitic alphabet. In the Glagolitic alphabet, it was written ⟨Ⰷ⟩, and had the numerical value of 8. In Old Church Slavonic it was called ѕѣло (pronounced dzeló), and in Church Slavonic it is called ѕѣлѡ (pronounced zeló).
The origin of Glagolitic letter Dzelo is unclear, but the Cyrillic Ѕ may have been influenced by the Greek stigma ⟨Ϛ⟩, the medieval form of the archaic letter digamma, which had the same form and numerical value (6). Thus the visual similarity of the Cyrillic ⟨Ѕ⟩ and Latin ⟨S⟩ is largely coincidental.
The initial sound of ⟨Ѕ⟩ in Old Church Slavonic was a soft /d͡z/ or /z/, which usually came from a historically palatalised *g (ноѕѣ, ѕвѣзда, etc.). In almost all Slavic dialects this sound was pronounced as a simple /z/; however, as the Old Church Slavonic language was based on the Bulgaro-Macedonian dialects, the sound remained distinct.
In the Old Slavic period the difference between ⟨Ѕ⟩ and ⟨З⟩ had already begun to be blurred, and in the written Church Slavonic language from the middle of the 17th century ⟨Ѕ⟩ was used only formally. The letter's distinguishing features from ⟨З⟩ are:
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Dze
Dze (Ѕ ѕ; italics: Ѕ ѕ or Ѕ ѕ; italics: Ѕ ѕ) is a letter of the Cyrillic script, used in the Macedonian alphabet to represent the voiced alveolar affricate /d͡z/, similar to the pronunciation of ⟨ds⟩ in "needs" or "kids" in English. It is derived from the letter dzelo or zelo of the Early Cyrillic alphabet, and it was used historically in all Slavic languages that use Cyrillic.
Although fully obsolete everywhere in the Cyrillic world by the 19th century, the letter zelo was revived in 1944 by the designers of the alphabet of the then-codified Macedonian language. The phoneme is also present in Greek (ΤΖ τζ) and Albanian (X x), both non-Slavic neighbours to the Macedonian language; all are a part of the Balkan linguistic area. In the early 21st century, the same letter also appeared in Vojislav Nikčević's proposal for the new alphabet for the modern Montenegrin language.
The most common early letterform (Ѕ ѕ) resembles the Latin letter S (S s), but it is also seen reversed (Ꙅ ꙅ) like the Latin letter Reversed S (Ƨ ƨ), or Z with a tail and a tick (Ꙃ ꙃ).
Abkhaz has Abkhazian Dze (Ӡ ӡ), with an identical function and name but a different shape.
The letter is descended from ѕѣло (pronounced dzělo; ) in the Early Cyrillic alphabet, where it had the numerical value 6. The letter Dzělo was itself based on the letter Dzelo in the Glagolitic alphabet. In the Glagolitic alphabet, it was written ⟨Ⰷ⟩, and had the numerical value of 8. In Old Church Slavonic it was called ѕѣло (pronounced dzeló), and in Church Slavonic it is called ѕѣлѡ (pronounced zeló).
The origin of Glagolitic letter Dzelo is unclear, but the Cyrillic Ѕ may have been influenced by the Greek stigma ⟨Ϛ⟩, the medieval form of the archaic letter digamma, which had the same form and numerical value (6). Thus the visual similarity of the Cyrillic ⟨Ѕ⟩ and Latin ⟨S⟩ is largely coincidental.
The initial sound of ⟨Ѕ⟩ in Old Church Slavonic was a soft /d͡z/ or /z/, which usually came from a historically palatalised *g (ноѕѣ, ѕвѣзда, etc.). In almost all Slavic dialects this sound was pronounced as a simple /z/; however, as the Old Church Slavonic language was based on the Bulgaro-Macedonian dialects, the sound remained distinct.
In the Old Slavic period the difference between ⟨Ѕ⟩ and ⟨З⟩ had already begun to be blurred, and in the written Church Slavonic language from the middle of the 17th century ⟨Ѕ⟩ was used only formally. The letter's distinguishing features from ⟨З⟩ are: