W, the Sütterlin letter w

History

The letter W is the 23rd letter of the German alphabet. Phonetically, it represents a voiced labiodental fricative /v/, corresponding to the consonant sound of English 'v' and found throughout native Germanic vocabulary.

Sütterlin lowercase w consists of two rounded upright basins followed by a small loop on the right shoulder. Capital W features two upright rounded troughs drawn in clean, rhythmic succession.

The letter w appears extensively in family documents: 'Witwe' (widow), 'Wohnort' (residence), 'Woche' (week), and 'Wasser' (water). Its multiple basins make it a prominent presence in cursive texts.

W shares most of its history with U and V.^[1] When Latin script began to be used for Germanic languages toward the end of the first millennium, V already seemed unsuited to their w sound, so the ligature VV or UU was created, from which W developed.^[2] The English name, double u, still shows that origin.^[3] The German w was at first a non-syllabic u, much like English w today.^[4]