<p><strong>noun</strong></p><ul><li>Phonetics, Orthography: a diacritic (˘) over a vowel to show that it is short, or to indicate a specific pronunciation, as in (kŭt) cut.</li><li>Law: an initial writ; a writ, as one issued by a court of law.</li><li>Music: the longest modern note, equivalent to two semibreves or whole notes. Also called brev·is.</li><li>a note in medieval mensural notation equal to one-half or one-third of a longa.</li><li>Prosody: a mark (˘) over a syllable to show that it is not stressed.</li></ul>