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The American Cyclopædia (1879)/Al

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Edition of 1879. See also Al- on Wikipedia; and the disclaimer.

AL, il, or ul (improperly pronounced by those of other nations el), the Arabic definite article, and indeed the only article in use in the Arabic language, words indefinitely used standing alone, as yad, a hand, al or il yad, the hand. When this article stands before a lingual or dental (of which there are in Arabic 13, called shamsi), the sound of the letter l (lam) is dropped for the sake of euphony, and the initial dental or lingual takes a double sound; thus, il shams, the sun, is pronounced ish shams. When the word preceding the article ends in a long vowel, a wasla (marked thus ~) is placed over the a (alif), indicating that it is to be dropped in pronunciation, and the l joined to the vowel sound. Thus, Abu il Feda is pronounced Abulfeda.