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I've noticed that a lot of users (especially those asking questions) tend to use $E$ instead of $I$ for the identity matrix. Is this a common convention in certain languages?

I tried looking through the wiki pages for the identity matrix in different languages, but they all seem to use $I$ rather than $E$. I'd imagine that in German, one might use $E$ for Einheitsmatrix rather than $I$ for Identitätsmatrix, but that's just a guess.

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    After looking some more, I've seen that the [Russian](https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%95%D0%B4%D0%B8%D0%BD%D0%B8%D1%87%D0%BD%D0%B0%D1%8F_%D0%BC%D0%B0%D1%82%D1%80%D0%B8%D1%86%D0%B0) wiki uses $E_n$. I'd still be interested to hear some first-hand perspectives. – 2017-01-27
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    this might be related: http://mathoverflow.net/questions/87794/why-is-the-identity-element-of-a-group-denoted-by-e – 2017-01-27
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    @Jorge Funny, I never made that connection! – 2017-01-27
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    In russian, it appears to be [Е (*Ye*)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ye_%28Cyrillic%29) rather than the latin E ;) – 2017-01-27
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    In germany we use E and I always thought it was for Einheitsmatrix as you suggested – 2017-01-28

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In Russian, Identity Matrix is translated as "Edinichnaya Matritsa". "Edinichnaya" from the word "Edinitsa" what weans $1$ (one), maybe thats why in Russian it is $E$

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    Great, that makes sense. Love the user name by the way – 2017-01-27