Voiced alveolar tap or flap in the context of "Lenition"

In phonetics, rhotic consonants, or "R-like" sounds, are liquid consonants that are traditionally represented orthographically by symbols derived from the Greek letter rho (Ρ and ρ), including ⟨R⟩, ⟨r⟩ in the Latin script and ⟨Р⟩, ⟨p⟩ in the Cyrillic script. They are transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet by upper- or lower-case variants of Roman ⟨R⟩, ⟨r⟩: ⟨r⟩, ⟨ɾ⟩, ⟨ɹ⟩, ⟨ɻ⟩, ⟨ʀ⟩, ⟨ʁ⟩, ⟨ɽ⟩, and ⟨ɺ⟩. Transcriptions for vocalic or semivocalic realisations of underlying rhotics include the ⟨ə̯⟩ and ⟨ɐ̯⟩.

This class of sounds is difficult to characterise phonetically; from a phonetic standpoint, there is no single articulatory correlate (manner or place) common to rhotic consonants. Rhotics have instead been found to carry out similar phonological functions or to have certain similar phonological features across different languages.

Resh /rɛʃ/ is the twentieth letter of the Semitic abjads, including Phoenician rēš 𐤓, Hebrew rēš ר‎, Aramaic rēš 𐡓‎, Syriac rēš ܪ, and Arabic rāʾ ر‎. It is related to the Ancient North Arabian 𐪇‎‎, South Arabian 𐩧, and Ge'ez ረ. Its sound value is one of a number of rhotic consonants: usually [r] or [ɾ], but also [ʁ] or [ʀ] in Hebrew and some North Mesopotamian Arabic dialects.

In most Semitic alphabets, the letter resh (and its equivalents) is visually quite similar to the letter dalet (and its equivalents). In the Syriac alphabet, the letters became so similar that now they are only distinguished by dots; resh has a dot above it, and the otherwise identical dalet has a dot below. In the Arabic alphabet, rāʼ has a longer tail than dāl. In the Aramaic and Hebrew square alphabet, resh is a rounded single stroke while dalet is two strokes that meet at right angles.