Ku (hiragana: ãÂÂ, katakana: ã¯) is one of the Japanese kana, which each represent one mora. Both represent and their shapes come from the kanji ä¹ .
This kana may have a dakuten added, transforming it into ã in hiragana, ã° in katakana and gu in Hepburn romanization. The dakuten's addition also changes the sound of the mora represented, to in initial positions and varying between and in the middle of words.
A handakuten (ãÂÂ) does not occur with ku in normal Japanese text, but it may be used by linguists to indicate a nasal pronunciation .
In the Ainu language, the katakana 㯠can be written as small ã°, representing a final k sound as in ã¢ã¤ãÂÂã¤ã¿ã° Ainu itak (Ainu language). This was developed along with other extended katakana to represent sounds in Ainu that are not found in standard Japanese katakana.