La cédille
The little hook ¸ added under the letter c in French is a diacritical mark known as a cedilla, une cédille. The letter c with the hook ç is called c cédille.
The sole purpose of the cedilla is to change a hard c, pronounced [k], to a soft c, pronounced [s]. In French, the pronunciation of the letter c is determined by the letter that immediately follows it, as explained in the "hard vs soft" section of the vowels lesson. So when c is followed by a hard vowel but needs a soft pronunciation, add the cedilla and voilà ! the c is soft.
On the other hand, since c is already soft in front of e, i, and y, it cannot and must not take a cedilla there – even if a related word has one.
Never. No exceptions.
Par exemple…
| Soft vowels | Hard vowels | |
| Besançon | ||
| bicyclette | ||
| ceci, cela | ça | |
| cédille | ||
| comme ci | comme ça | |
| commencer, commencé* | commençant | |
| commercial | commerçant | |
| concevoir | conçu | |
| décevant, décevoir | déçu | |
| douceâtre | douçâtre | |
| effacer, effacé* | effaçable | |
| façon | ||
| fiancé | fiançailles | |
| France | français | |
| Francis, Francine | François | |
| glace | glaçon | |
| hameçon | ||
| ici | ||
| lancer, lancez* | lançant, lançons | |
| leçon | ||
| maçon | ||
| merci | ||
| Provence | provençal | |
| rançon | ||
| recevoir | reçois, reçu | |
| soupçon |
* These are spelling change verbs.
Related lessons
- Letters: C | K | S
- Vowels
- Consonants
- Introduction to accents
- How to type French accents
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