The Hebrew letter Noon
Noon is the fourteenth of the 22 letters of the alef beis. It is written נ in print, in ksiva it is written as a single unbroken stroke, and its gematria value is 50. It sounds like n. My Ksiva Workbook teaches it on page 42.
Noon is the fourteenth letter, value 50. In print it is an upright bent into a short base. At the end of a word it straightens out completely into noon sofis — a bare vertical dropping well below the line, and the letter that makes children who have only ever written inside boxes ask where it is supposed to stop.
- Position 14 of 22
- Gematria 50
- Sound n
- Ksiva strokes One
- Final form ן — Noon sofis
- Taught on page 42 of 82
How is Noon written?
The workbook teaches every letter the same four ways, so a child always knows what is being asked of them.
See both forms. The workbook opens the letter with Noon in print and in ksiva side by side, and marks the ksiva form with a numbered arrow showing where the stroke begins.
Trace it. A row of dotted outlines gives the whole shape. The child writes over the top of it, so the hand learns the movement before it has to remember the shape.
Finish it. Each box after that gives a little less of the letter than the one before, until the last box is empty and the child writes it unaided.
Use it in a word. The letter then appears in whole words to copy in script, built only from letters already taught, so the child is never asked to write a letter they have not met.
What is it confused with?
Noon and gimmel are both narrow letters on a foot: gimmel’s kicks out to the left, noon’s turns square beneath the upright. Final noon and vov are both bare verticals, separated by where they end — vov on the line, final noon well below it.
The final form
At the end of a word, Noon is written ן — Noon sofis. The workbook gives it its own page, on page 44.
How is it spelled in English?
This site uses the Ashkenazi transliteration the workbook prints, Noon. You will also see it written nun. They are all the same letter.
Where it is taught
Noon is taught on page 42 of My Ksiva Workbook, an 82-page Hebrew handwriting workbook covering all 22 letters in both scripts. Every letterform on this page is taken from the book itself.