Ébad
An extra letter of ogham, two strokes crossing on the stem line in an X. It is the only one of the extra letters common on the stones, where it stands for k, and in late inscriptions for e.
Meaning
Ébad is the first of the forfeda, the supplementary letters added to the twenty, and the only one, the Ogham in 3D project at the Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies says, that is frequent on the stones, cut as “two diagonal scores crossing each other on the stemline in the shape of an X”. It has two values: k (or ch), most often in the formula word KOI, “here”, and in the later inscriptions e. Unicode encodes it as U+1695 OGHAM LETTER EABHADH.
Origin and history
Its use in some early inscriptions, Ogham in 3D adds, shows that ogham was “already well established as a script” by then. The medieval tracts give it trees like the rest: the aspen in the Auraicept na nÉces, elecampane in In Lebor Ogaim, with the kennings “most buoyant of wood” and “corrective of a sick man”. Deborah Hayden and David Stifter of the OG(H)AM project think the name “is probably just a meaningless variation on edad”, the letter for e.
KOI, “here”
KOI corresponds to the HIC IACIT of the Latin inscriptions in Britain, Ogham in 3D notes. One example is a stone found at Monataggart in County Cork, now in the National Museum of Ireland, which reads BROINIENAS KOI NETTA-TTRENALUGOS, “of Broíniu, here, of Nad-Trénlug”.
Write in ogham
stringmash.comOgham translatorWrite English in ogham, the early Irish alphabet of strokes cut along an edge, with the full ogham chart.Read next
- Next in OghamForfeda: ór, uilleann, pín and emanchollThe extra letters added to ogham’s twenty: ór, uilleann, pín and emancholl, with ébad and the late peith. They belong to the manuscripts far more than to the stones.
- The same shape in Catholic symbolsMarian crossA cross with a capital M beside it or beneath it, for Mary standing at the foot of the cross. It is best known from the coat of arms of Pope John Paul II.
See also
Beithe, Luis, Fern, Sail, Nin, Úath.
Sources
- Ogham in 3D: alphabet, Ogham in 3D (2013 edition), letter names after Damian McManus, A Guide to Ogam (1991) and Ériu 39 (1988), Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies, alphabet: the forfeda
- Auraicept na n-éces: the scholars' primer, George Calder (ed. and trans.), 1917: the Ogham tract from the Book of Ballymote and the Yellow Book of Lecan, with In Lebor Ogaim, John Grant, Edinburgh (Internet Archive), Auraicept, p. 93; In Lebor Ogaim, pp. 277, 283, 287
- Ogam and trees, Deborah Hayden and David Stifter, 20 December 2022, OG(H)AM project, University of Glasgow and Maynooth University, §4, Ébad
- Og(h)am of the Month, OG(H)AM project team (Nora White, Patricia O’Connor, David Stifter and others), 2021–2025, OG(H)AM project, University of Glasgow and Maynooth University, March 2025: Monataggart
- Ogham (Unicode code chart U+1680–U+169F), The Unicode Standard, code chart for the Ogham block, Unicode Consortium, U+1695
The same shape elsewhere
Browse symbols formed from crosses or letters and numbers.
Researched, edited and approved by Rory Hansen before publishing. Last reviewed October 9, 2026. How we research
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