U+16B8 "ᚸ" Runic Letter Gar Unicode Character
Unicode Version 17.0
ᚸ
U+16B8 "ᚸ" Runic Letter Gar is a rare and later addition to the runic alphabet, specifically representing a voiceless velar or palatal fricative sound, similar to the "g" in "go" but with a distinct phonetic quality. This character appears in the medieval Futhork rune row, an extended version of the Younger Futhark used primarily in Scandinavia and Anglo-Saxon inscriptions. Unlike the more common rune "Gyfu" or "Gebo," which represents a gift, Gar is often associated with the word for "spear" in Old English and may have been used as a variant to denote a different sound value or to fill a rhythmic gap in runic writing systems. Its inclusion in Unicode helps preserve a unique piece of historical linguistic and paleographic heritage.
General Properties
| Code Point | U+16B8 |
| Version Added | 3.0 |
| Name | Runic Letter Gar |
| Block | Runic |
| General Category | Other Letter |
| Canonical Combining Class | Not Reordered |
| Bidirectional Class | Left To Right |
Encodings
| HTML Decimal Encoding | ᚸ |
| HTML Hex Encoding | ᚸ |
| UTF-8 Encoding | 0xE1 0x9A 0xB8 |
| UTF-16 Encoding | 0x16B8 |
| UTF-32 Encoding | 0x000016B8 |
| C/C++/Java Escape | \u16b8 |