Ukrainian Ye

Ukrainian Ye or Round Ye (Є є; italics: Є є) is a character of the Cyrillic script. It is a separate letter in the Ukrainian alphabet, the Pannonian Rusyn alphabet, and both the Carpathian Rusyn alphabets; in all of these, it comes directly after Е. It can also be found in the writing of the Khanty language. In modern Church Slavonic, it is considered a variant form of Ye (Е е) (there, the selection of Є and Е is driven by orthography rules). Until the mid-19th century, Є/є was also used in Romanian and Serbian. Other modern Slavonic languages may use Є/є shapes instead of Е/е for decorative purposes. Then, the letter is usually referred to by the older name Yest (which also refers to the conventional Ye). If the two need to be distinguished, the descriptive name Broad E is sometimes used (in contrast with "Narrow E"). In Ukrainian, Є/є commonly represents the sound /je/ or /jɛ/ like the pronunciation of ⟨ye⟩ in "yes". (See usage for more detail.) Ukrainian Ye is romanized as ⟨je⟩, ⟨ê⟩, or even ⟨e⟩. See scientific transliteration of Cyrillic. Ukrainian Ye is graphically a backwards Э.