German
In German, ch represents two allophones: the voiceless velar fricative when following back vowels or (the so-called "Ach-Laut") and the voiceless palatal fricative in all other positions (the so-called "Ich-Laut"). A similar allophonic variation is assumed to have existed in Old English.
In German, it represents before -s, and an initial Ch (which only appears in loanwords) may also be pronounced in southern varieties, and is always pronounced when a consonant follows the initial Ch.
The Rheinische Dokumenta writing system uses ch, for the voiceless palatal fricative, while ch represents .
Read more about this topic: Ch (digraph)
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