upsilon

up·si·lon  (ps-ln, yp-)

n.

The 20th letter of the Greek alphabet. See Table at alphabet.

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[Late Greek pslon, simple u (from the fact that oi was given the same pronunciation in Late Greek as u) : , h, the letter U + pslon, neuter of pslos, simple (written with one letter as opposed to two).]

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upsilon [ˈʌpsɪˌlɒn juːpˈsaɪlən]

n

(Linguistics / Letters of the Alphabet (Foreign)) the 20th letter in the Greek alphabet (Υ or υ) a vowel, transliterated as y or u

[from Medieval Greek u psilon simple u, name adopted for graphic u to avoid confusion with graphic oi, since pronunciation was the same for both in Late Greek]

Thesaurus

Noun

1.

upsilon - the 20th letter of the Greek alphabet Greek alphabet - the alphabet used by ancient Greeks alphabetic character, letter of the alphabet, letter - the conventional characters of the alphabet used to represent speech; "his grandmother taught him his letters"