Zess

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Zess is the name of a character in the initial teaching alphabet, a series of about forty minuscule letters specified by Sir Isaac Pitman, grandson of a devisor of shorthand, to assist children in their learning to read English. Its form is easy to describe - it's a backwards "z".

The use of the zess is to replace the letter "s" where it is pronounced "z" in English; most obviously in the word "is". Those plurals of nouns or third-person present forms of verbs in which the letter "s" is voiced are spelled with a zess ("dogs" for both uses); those in which it is unvoiced are still spelled with an "s" ("barks" for both uses). The i.t.a., of course, also has a "z" for use in other places.

The zess is specified only as minuscule in form. For an equivalent of a capital letter, it is made boldface.