A depiction of waves. The number of ripples varies, but the ends always slant down and can sometimes be longer than the other strokes. In less careful writing, the hieroglyph can be found simplified to a single horizontal line, sometimes rising at the end. Rarely, it can be turned on its side to stand vertically. This glyph was conventionally colored black, or dark blue, suggestive of silt-laden Nile flood water which watered the "black land" (kmt). (Compare the canal glyph 𓈘, where the water is most often green, and the pool glyph 𓈙, where the water was lighter blue or green.) Compare the Chinese character 巛.
The phonogrammatic value is possibly derived by the rebus principle from nt(“water”), but this word only appears in the Middle Kingdom. An alternative source could be the older nwyt(“swell of water”).
Gardiner, Alan (1957) Egyptian Grammar: Being an Introduction to the Study of Hieroglyphs, third edition, Oxford: Griffith Institute, →ISBN, page 490
Henry George Fischer (1988) Ancient Egyptian Calligraphy: A Beginner’s Guide to Writing Hieroglyphs, New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, →ISBN, page 11
Betrò, Maria Carmela (1995) Geroglifici: 580 Segni per Capire l'Antico Egitto, Milan: Arnoldo Mondadori Editore S.p.A., →ISBN
Peust, Carsten (1999) Egyptian Phonology: An Introduction to the Phonology of a Dead Language[1], Göttingen: Peust und Gutschmidt Verlag GbR, page 48
