With Hebrew, it is not accepted that it is a different Vav - letters used as matres lectionis are not distinct from the same letters used otherwise. Neither is it accepted that this is a different Holam. The only thing established is that this artifact has been used in several manuscripts, one of many similar artifacts, to aid the understanding of the text. And the correct vehicle to convey such artifacts is markup.
Ink dots used to aid the understanding of the text are always encoded as characters. Markup is the wrong way to handle them. Otherwise we would write Karlj<fronted>u</fronted>rgen or the like.
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Michael Everson * * Everson Typography * * http://www.evertype.com
