Sun and Moon Letters

Sun And Moon Letters

In Arabic and Maltese, the consonants are divided into two groups, called the sun letters or solar letters (Arabic: حروف شمسية‎ ḥurūf šhamsiyyah) and moon letters or lunar letters (حروف قمرية ḥurūf qamariyyah), based on whether or not they assimilate the letter lām (ﻝ l) of a preceding definite article al- (الـ). These names come from the fact that the word for "the sun", aš-šams, assimilates the lām, while the word for "the moon", al-qamar, does not.

Read more about Sun And Moon Letters:  Rule, Orthography, See Also

Famous quotes containing the words sun and, sun, moon and/or letters:

    These late eclipses in the sun and moon portend no good to us.
    William Shakespeare (1564–1616)

    The angels were all singing out of tune,
    And hoarse with having little else to do,
    Excepting to wind up the sun and moon
    Or curb a runaway young star or two.
    George Gordon Noel Byron (1788–1824)

    I thought to hear him speak
    the girl might rise
    and make the garden silver,
    as the white moon breaks,
    “Nossis,” he cried, “a flame.”
    Hilda Doolittle (1886–1961)

    And graven with diamonds in letters plain
    There is written her fair neck round about:
    “Noli me tangere for Caesar’s I am,
    And wild for to hold though I seem tame.”
    Sir Thomas Wyatt (1503?–1542)