Ogonek

The Ogonek at U+02DB is a spacing modifier mark shaped like a small hook below, used to represent the ogonek diacritic as an independent character. It belongs to the Spacing Modifier Letters block, where modifier signs take their own width instead of attaching directly to a base letter. In ordinary text, the ogonek is most familiar from Latin-script writing in Polish, Lithuanian, and several other languages, but it usually appears as part of precomposed or combining accented letters such as ą and ę rather than as this standalone spacing mark. In Polish, for example, ą and ę represent nasal vowel sounds, while Lithuanian uses ogonek letters in its spelling system for historically nasal vowels. This standalone character is mainly useful in typography, linguistics, keyboard layouts, and character charts when someone needs to discuss or display the diacritic itself. It may appear in explanations such as “add an ogonek below the vowel,” in font specimen pages, or in plain-text notes about orthography. Because it is spacing rather than combining, it should not be used to build normal letters in running text; that can produce visibly separated marks and poor search behavior.