A cedilla or cedille is a hook ( ) added under certain consonant letters as a diacritical mark to modify their pronunciation. Origin The tail originated in Spain as the bottom half of a miniature cursive "z" (zed). The word "cedilla" is the diminutive of the Old Spanish name for this letter, ceda (zeta). Modern Spanish, however, no longer uses this diacritic, although it's still current in Portuguese,"cedilla" Oxford English Dictiona… (More on Cedilla)