arabic alphabet sukuun

• sukuun:

The sukuun (absence of a vowel) is a diacritic that indicates the end of a syllable. Put another way, a consonant with a sukuun above it is not followed by a vowel. This only occurs when the consonant itself follows a vowel. The sukuun is written as a circle above the consonant.

Using left-to-right English 'words' as examples, the word "bata" would be spelled "b/t/"; however "bat" would be spelled "b/to".

The only time that one consonant immediately follows another is when they are in different syllables; in which case, the first consonant would have a sukuun.

Again using English 'words' as examples, we could write "vista" as "v/sot/." The sukuun indicates that the "s" is not followed by a vowel. Otherwise, the word could have been "visita", "visata", or "visuta".

The sukuun cannot be used to combine consonants into single sounds. For example, "...sot..." could only be combined in such a combination as the English "mister" ("mis-ter"), not as in "stair". Combinations such as "stray" are not posible at all in Arabic.
examples:

مَدْ mad	دْ d	مَ ma
شَكْ shak	كْ k	شَ sha