Early Cyrillic alphabet

From MedBib.com - Medicine & Nature

The old Cyrillic alphabet was a writing system developed in the First Bulgarian Empire in the tenth century to write the Old Church Slavonic liturgical language.

History

The Slavic scripts were developed in what is now the Republic of Macedonia (Glagolitic) and later in Bulgaria (Cyrillic). The earliest form of manuscript Cyrillic, known as ustav, was based on Greek uncial script, augmented by ligatures and by letters from the Glagolitic alphabet for consonants not found in Greek. There was no distinction of capital and lowercase letters, though manuscript letters were rendered larger for emphasis, or in various decorative initial and nameplate forms.^[1]

Tradition holds that the two Slavic scripts were invented by two brothers, the monks Saint Methodius and Saint Cyril, who brought Christianity to Bulgaria in the 860s. However, Glagolitic appears to be older, and Cyrillic later. It appears that Glagolitic may have predated Christianity, and was only formalized by St Cyril and expanded by him to cover non-Greek sounds, possibly under commission of Boris I when Christianity was made the official state religion in 864. Cyrillic, on the other hand, may have been a creation of Cyril's students, perhaps at the Preslav Literary School, who derived it from a more 'dignified' Greek in the 890s as a more suitable script for church books, though retaining Cyril's non-Greek additions from Glagolitic.^[1]

Since its creation, the Cyrillic alphabet has adapted to changes in spoken language and developed regional variations to suit the features of national languages. It has been the subject of academic reforms and political decrees. Variations of the Cyrillic alphabet are used to write languages throughout Eastern Europe and Asia.

The form of the Russian alphabet underwent a change when Tsar Peter I of Russia introduced the Civil Script (Russian graždanskij šrift, or graždanka, in contrast to the prevailing Church Typeface, cerkovnoslavjanskij šrift) in 1708. Some letters and breathing marks which were only used for historical reasons were dropped. Medieval letterforms used in typesetting were harmonized with Latin typesetting practices, exchanging medieval forms for Baroque ones, and skipping the western European Renaissance developments. The reform subsequently influenced Cyrillic orthographies for most other languages. Today, the early orthography and typesetting standards only remain in use in Church Slavonic.

A comprehensive repertoire of early Cyrillic characters is included in the Unicode 5.1 standard, published on April 4, 2008. These characters and their distinctive letterforms are represented in specialized computer fonts for Slavistics.

The alphabet

Image	Unicode	Name (Cyrillic)	Name (translit.)	Name (IPA)	Trans.	IPA	Origin	Notes
	А а	азъ	azŭ	[azŭ]	a	[a]	Greek alpha Α
	Б б	боукы	buky	[buky], [bukŭi]	b	[b]	Derived from в below?
	В в	вѣдѣ	vědě	[vædæ]	v	[v]	Greek beta Β
	Г г	глаголи	glagoli	[glagoli]	g	[g]	Greek gamma Γ
	Д д	добро	dobro	[dobro]	d	[d]	Greek Delta Δ
	Є є	єсть	estĭ	[ɛstĭ]	e	[ɛ]	Greek epsilon Ε
	Ж ж	живѣтє	živěte	[ʒivætɛ]	ž, zh	[ʒ]	Glagolitic zhivete Ⰶ
	Ѕ ѕ / Ꙃ ꙃ	ѕѣло	dzělo	[ʣælo]	dz	[dz]	Greek final sigma ς
	З з / Ꙁ ꙁ	земля	zemlja	[zemlja]	z	[z]	Greek zeta Ζ	The first form developed into the second.
	И и	ижє	iže	[iʒɛ]	i	[i]	Greek eta Η
	І і / Ї ї	и/ижеи	i/ižei	[i, iʒɛі]	i, I	[i]	Greek iota Ι
	Ћ ћ	гѥрв	gerv, gjerv	[ʤɛrv], [djɛrv]	đ, dj	[ʤ], [dj]	Glagolitic djerv Ⰼ ?	Revived for Serbian. In Russian, it is used in academic texts to transliterate Glagolitic.
	К к	како	kako	[kako]	k	[k]	Greek kappa Κ
	Л л	людиѥ	ljudije	[ljudijɛ]	l	[l]	Greek lambda Λ
	М м	мыслитє	myslite	[myslitɛ]/[mŭislitɛ]	m	[m]	Greek mu Μ
	Н н	нашь	našĭ	[naʃĭ]	n	[n]	Greek nu Ν
	О о	онъ	onŭ	[onŭ]	o	[o]	Greek omicron Ο
	П п	покои	pokoi	[pokoj]	p	[p]	Greek pi Π
	Р р	рьци	rĭci	[rĭʦi]	r	[r]	Greek rho Ρ
	С с	слово	slovo	[slovo]	s	[s]	Greek lunate sigma Ϲ
	Т т	тврьдо	tvrdo	[tvr̥do]	t	[t]	Greek tau Τ
	Оу оу / Ꙋ ꙋ	оукъ	ukŭ	[ukŭ]	u	[u]	Greek omicron-upsilon ΟΥ / Ꙋ	The first form developed into the second, a vertical ligature.
	Ф ф	фрьтъ	frtŭ	[fr̤̥tŭ]	f	[f]	Greek phi Φ
	Х х	хѣръ	xěrŭ	[xærŭ]	x	[x]	Greek chi Χ
	Ѡ ѡ	отъ	otŭ	[otŭ]	ō, w	[oː]	Greek omega ω
	Ц ц	ци	ci	[ʦi]	c	[ʦ]	Glagolitic tsi Ⱌ
	Ч ч	чрьвь	črvĭ	[ʧr̤̥vĭ]	č, ch	[ʧ]	Glagolitic cherv Ⱍ
	Ш ш	ша	ša	[ʃa]	š, sh	[ʃ]	Glagolitic sha Ⱎ
	Щ щ	шта	šta	[ʃta]	št, sht	[ʃt]	Glagolitic shta Ⱋ	Later analyzed as a Ш-Т ligature by folk etymology
	Ъ ъ	ѥръ	jerŭ	[jɛrŭ]	ŭ, u:	[ŭ]	Glagolitic yer Ⱏ
	Ꙑ ꙑ	ѥры	jery	[jɛry]	y	[y], or possibly [ŭi]	ЪI or ЪИ ligature
	Ь ь	ѥрь	jerĭ	[jɛrĭ]	ĭ, i:	[ĭ]	Glagolitic yerj Ⱐ
	Ѣ ѣ	ять	jatĭ	[jatĭ]	ě	[æ]	Glagolitic yat Ⱑ ?
	Ю ю	ю	ju	[ju]	ju	[iu]	I-ОУ ligature, dropping У	There was no [jo] sound in early Slavic, so I-ОУ did not need to be distinguished from I-О.
	Ꙗ ꙗ	я	ja	[ja]	ja	[ia]	I-А ligature
	Ѥ ѥ	ѥ	jeː	[jɛ]	je	[iɛ]	І-Є ligature
	Ѧ ѧ	ѧсъ	ęsŭ	[ɛ̃sŭ]	ę, ẽ	[ɛ̃]	Glagolitic ens Ⱔ	Called юсъ малый (little yus) in Russian.
	Ѩ ѩ	ѩсъ	jęsŭ	[jɛ̃sŭ]	ję, jẽ	[jɛ̃]	I-Ѧ ligature	Called юсъ малый йотированный (iotated little yus) in Russian.
	Ѫ ѫ	ѫсъ	ǫsŭ	[ɔ̃sŭ]	ǫ, õ	[ɔ̃]	Glagolitic ons Ⱘ	Called юсъ большой (big yus) in Russian.
	Ѭ ѭ	ѭсъ	jǫsŭ	[jɔ̃sŭ]	jǫ, jõ	[jɔ̃]	I-Ѫ ligature	Called юсъ большой йотированный (iotated big yus) in Russian.
	Ѯ ѯ	кси	ksi	[ksi]	ks	[ks]	Greek xi Ξ	These last four letters were not needed for Slavic but used to transcribe Greek.
	Ѱ ѱ	пси	psi	[psi]	ps	[ps]	Greek psi Ψ
	Ѳ ѳ	фита	fita	[fita]	θ, th, T, F	[t]/[θ]/[f]	Greek theta Θ
	Ѵ ѵ	ижица	ižica	[iʒiʦa]	ü, v	[ɪ], [y], [v]	Greek upsilon Υ

In addition to the basic letters, there were a number of scribal variations, combining ligatures, and regionalisms used, all of which varied over time.

Numerals, diacritics and punctuation

Each letter had a numeric value also, inherited from the corresponding Greek letter. A titlo over a sequence of letters indicated their use as a number. See Cyrillic numerals, Titlo.

Several diacritics, adopted from Polytonic Greek orthography, were also used (these may not appear correctly in all web browsers; they are supposed to be directly above the letter, not off to its upper right):

ӓ  trema, diaeresis (U+0308)

а̀  varia (grave accent), indicating stress on the last syllable (U+0340)

а́  oksia (acute accent), indicating a stressed syllable (Unicode U+0341)

а҃  titlo, indicating abbreviations, or letters used as numerals (U+0483)

а҄  kamora, indicating palatalization (U+0484), similar to an inverted breve

а҅  dasy pneuma, rough breathing mark (U+0485)

а҆  zvatel'tse, or psilon pneuma, soft breathing mark (U+0486)

а҆̀  Combined zvatel'tse and varia is called apostrof.

а҆́  Combined zvatel'tse and oksia is called iso.

Punctuation marks:

·  ano teleia (U+0387), a middle dot used as a word separator

,  comma (U+002C)

.  full stop (U+002E)

։  Armenian full stop (U+0589), resembling a colon

჻  Georgian paragraph separator (U+10FB)

⁖  triangular colon (U+2056, added in Unicode 4.1)

⁘  diamond colon (U+2058, added in Unicode 4.1)

⁙  quintuple colon (U+2059, added in Unicode 4.1)

;  Greek question mark (U+037E), similar to a semicolon

!  exclamation mark (U+0021)

See also

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: early Cyrillic alphabet

• Bosnian Cyrillic
• Romanian Cyrillic alphabet
• Reforms of Russian orthography

References

• Berdnikov, Alexander and Olga Lapko, "Old Slavonic and Church Slavonic in TEX and Unicode", EuroTEX ’99 Proceedings, September 1999 (PDF)
• Birnbaum, David J., "Unicode for Slavic Medievalists", September 28, 2002 (PDF)
• Cubberley, Paul (1996) "The Slavic Alphabets". In Daniels and Bright.
• Daniels, Peter T., and William Bright, eds. (1996). The World's Writing Systems. Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-507993-0.
• Everson, Michael and Ralph Cleminson, "Final proposal for encoding the Glagolitic script in the UCS", Expert Contribution to the ISO N2610R, September 4, 2003 (PDF)
• Franklin, Simon. 2002. Writing, Society and Culture in Early Rus, c. 950-1300. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-052181381.
• Lev, V., "The history of the Ukrainian script (paleography)", in Ukraine: a concise encyclopædia, volume 1. University of Toronto Press, 1963, 1970, 1982. ISBN 0-8020-3105-6
• Simovyc, V., and J. B. Rudnyckyj, "The history of Ukrainian orthography", in Ukraine: a concise encyclopædia, volume 1 (op cit).
• Zamora, J., J Zamora, "Help me learn Church Slavonic", online
• Azbuka, Church Slavonic calligraphy and typography.
• Obshtezhitie.net, Cyrillic and Glagolitic manuscripts and early printed books.