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The
Kurdish languages
Kurdish (, ) is a language or a group of languages spoken by Kurds in the geo-cultural region of Kurdistan and the Kurdish diaspora. Kurdish constitutes a dialect continuum, belonging to Western Iranian languages in the Indo-European language ...
are written in either of two alphabets: a
Latin alphabet
The Latin alphabet or Roman alphabet is the collection of letters originally used by the ancient Romans to write the Latin language. Largely unaltered with the exception of extensions (such as diacritics), it used to write English and the o ...
introduced by
Celadet Alî Bedirxan in 1932 called the Bedirxan alphabet or Hawar alphabet (after the ''
Hawar'' magazine) and a Perso-Arabic script called the Sorani alphabet or Central Kurdish alphabet. The
Kurdistan Region has agreed upon a standard for Central Kurdish, implemented in Unicode for computation purposes.
The Hawar alphabet is used in
Syria
Syria ( ar, سُورِيَا or سُورِيَة, translit=Sūriyā), officially the Syrian Arab Republic ( ar, الجمهورية العربية السورية, al-Jumhūrīyah al-ʻArabīyah as-Sūrīyah), is a Western Asian country loc ...
,
Turkey
Turkey ( tr, Türkiye ), officially the Republic of Türkiye ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, links=no ), is a list of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolia, Anatolian Peninsula in Western Asia, with ...
and
Armenia
Armenia (), , group=pron officially the Republic of Armenia,, is a landlocked country in the Armenian Highlands of Western Asia.The UNbr>classification of world regions places Armenia in Western Asia; the CIA World Factbook , , and ''Ox ...
; the Central Kurdish in
Iraq
Iraq,; ku, عێراق, translit=Êraq officially the Republic of Iraq, '; ku, کۆماری عێراق, translit=Komarî Êraq is a country in Western Asia. It is bordered by Turkey to Iraq–Turkey border, the north, Iran to Iran–Iraq ...
and
Iran
Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkmeni ...
. Two additional alphabets, based on the
Armenian alphabet
The Armenian alphabet ( hy, Հայոց գրեր, ' or , ') is an alphabetic writing system used to write Armenian language, Armenian. It was developed around 405 AD by Mesrop Mashtots, an Armenian linguist and wikt:ecclesiastical, ecclesiast ...
and the
Cyrillic script
The Cyrillic script ( ), Slavonic script or the Slavic script, is a writing system used for various languages across Eurasia. It is the designated national script in various Slavic languages, Slavic, Turkic languages, Turkic, Mongolic languages, ...
, were once used in the
Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic
The Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic,; russian: Армянская Советская Социалистическая Республика, translit=Armyanskaya Sovetskaya Sotsialisticheskaya Respublika) also commonly referred to as Soviet A ...
and
Kurdistansky Uyezd
Kurdistan uezd,, ku, Кӧрдӧйәзд, Kurduyezd also known colloquially as Red Kurdistan,, ku, Кӧрдьстана Сор, Kurdistana Sor was a Soviet administrative unit that existed for six years from 1923 to 1929 and included the distr ...
.
Hawar alphabet
The Kurmanji dialect of the Kurdish language is written in an extended
Latin alphabet
The Latin alphabet or Roman alphabet is the collection of letters originally used by the ancient Romans to write the Latin language. Largely unaltered with the exception of extensions (such as diacritics), it used to write English and the o ...
, consisting of the 26 letters of the
ISO basic Latin Alphabet
The ISO basic Latin alphabet is an international standard (beginning with ISO/IEC 646) for a Latin-script alphabet that consists of two sets (uppercase and lowercase) of 26 letters, codified in various national and international standards and u ...
with 5 letters with
diacritics, for a total of 31
letters
Letter, letters, or literature may refer to:
Characters typeface
* Letter (alphabet), a character representing one or more of the sounds used in speech; any of the symbols of an alphabet.
* Letterform, the graphic form of a letter of the alphabe ...
(each having an uppercase and a lowercase form):
In this alphabet the short vowels are E, I and U while the long vowels are A, Ê, Î, O and Û (see the IPA equivalents in the
Help:IPA/Kurdish table).
When presenting the alphabet in his magazine ''Hawar'', Celadet Alî Bedirxan proposed using for , , and , sounds which he judged to be "non-Kurdish" (se
page 12,13). These three glyphs do not have the official status of letters, but serve to represent these sounds when they are indispensable to comprehension.
Turkey
Turkey ( tr, Türkiye ), officially the Republic of Türkiye ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, links=no ), is a list of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolia, Anatolian Peninsula in Western Asia, with ...
does not recognize this alphabet. Using the letters Q, W, and X, which did not exist in the
Turkish alphabet
The Turkish alphabet ( tr, ) is a Latin-script alphabet used for writing the Turkish language, consisting of 29 letters, seven of which (Ç, Ğ, Dotless I, I, İ, Ö, Ş and Ü) have been modified from their Latin originals for the phonetic requ ...
until 2013, led to a trial in 2000 and 2003 (se
p. 8, an
. Since September 2003, many Kurds applied to the courts seeking to change their names to Kurdish ones written with these letters, but failed.
The Turkish government finally legalized the letters Q, W, and X as part of the Turkish alphabet in 2013.
Kurdish Latin alphabet
The Kurdish Latin alphabet was elaborated mainly by Celadet Bedirxan who initially had sought the cooperation of
Taufiq Wahby, Tawfiq Wahbi, who in 1931 lived in Iraq. But after not having received any responses by Wahbi for several months, he and his brother
Kamuran Alî Bedirxan decided to launch the Hawar alphabet in 1932. Celadet Bedirxan aimed to create an alphabet that didn't use two letters for representing one sound. As the
Kurds in Turkey
The Kurds are the largest ethnic minority in Turkey. According to various estimates, they compose between 15% and 20% of the population of Turkey.; ; Sandra Mackey , “The reckoning: Iraq and the legacy of Saddam”, W.W. Norton and Company, ...
already learned the
Turkish Latin alphabet, he created an alphabet which would specifically be accessible for the Kurds in Turkey. Some scholars have suggested making minor additions to Bedirxan's Hawar alphabet to make it more user-friendly. The additions correspond to sounds that are represented in the Central Kurdish alphabet, but not in the Hawar alphabet. These scholars suggest this extended alphabet be called the Kurdish Latin alphabet. The suggested additional characters are Ł, Ň, Ř and Ü. The velar Ł/ł which appears mostly in
Central Kurdish
Central Kurdish (), also called Sorani (), is a Kurdish dialect or a language that is spoken in Iraq, mainly in Iraqi Kurdistan, as well as the provinces of Kurdistan, Kermanshah, and West Azerbaijan in western Iran. Sorani is one of the two of ...
is for non-initial positions only; in Kurdish velar Ł never comes in initial position, except for in Kurmanji. The initial position in any Kurdish word beginning with r is pronounced and written as a trill Ř/ř. The letter Ü/ü is a new letter, which is sometimes written in the Central Kurdish alphabet, and represents the close front rounded vowel
''">'' used in the
Southern Kurdish dialects. The velar nasal consonant
''">'' is also a Kurdish phoneme which never comes in initial position, and it is written as Ň/ň. The Kurdish Latin alphabet consists of 35 letters in total.
Sorani alphabet
Central Kurdish
Central Kurdish (), also called Sorani (), is a Kurdish dialect or a language that is spoken in Iraq, mainly in Iraqi Kurdistan, as well as the provinces of Kurdistan, Kermanshah, and West Azerbaijan in western Iran. Sorani is one of the two of ...
(''Sorani'') is mainly written using a modified
Persian alphabet
The Persian alphabet ( fa, الفبای فارسی, Alefbâye Fârsi) is a writing system that is a version of the Arabic script used for the Persian language spoken in Iran ( Western Persian) and Afghanistan (Dari Persian) since the 7th cent ...
with 33 letters introduced by Sa'id Kaban Sedqi. Unlike the Persian alphabet, which is an
abjad
An abjad (, ar, أبجد; also abgad) is a writing system in which only consonants are represented, leaving vowel sounds to be inferred by the reader. This contrasts with other alphabets, which provide graphemes for both consonants and vowels ...
, Central Kurdish is almost a true
alphabet
An alphabet is a standardized set of basic written graphemes (called letters) that represent the phonemes of certain spoken languages. Not all writing systems represent language in this way; in a syllabary, each character represents a syll ...
in which vowels are treated like consonants. Central Kurdish does not have a complete representation of Kurmanji Kurdish sounds, as it lacks ''i''. Written Central Kurdish also relies on vowel and consonant context to differentiate between the phonemes u/w and î/y instead of using separate letters. It does show the two
pharyngeal consonant
A pharyngeal consonant is a consonant that is articulated primarily in the pharynx. Some phoneticians distinguish upper pharyngeal consonants, or "high" pharyngeals, pronounced by retracting the root of the tongue in the mid to upper pharynx, ...
s, as well as a
voiced velar fricative
The voiced velar fricative is a type of consonantal sound that is used in various spoken languages. It is not found in Modern English but existed in Old English. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is , ...
, used in Kurdish. Reformed Central Kurdish does have glyphs for the "i" ⟨⟩ and it is able to successfully differentiate between the consonant "w" and the short vowel "u" by representing "w" with a ⟨⟩. It is also able to successfully differentiate between the consonant "y" and the long vowel "î" by representing "î" with a ⟨⟩ and the long vowel "û" can be represented with a ⟨⟩ or ⟨⟩ instead of double ⟨⟩.
A new sort order for the alphabet was proposed some time ago by the
Kurdish Academy as the new standard, all of which are letters accepted included in the Central Kurdish Unicode Keyboard:
The alphabet is represented by 34 letters including
which is given its own position. Kurds in
Iraq
Iraq,; ku, عێراق, translit=Êraq officially the Republic of Iraq, '; ku, کۆماری عێراق, translit=Komarî Êraq is a country in Western Asia. It is bordered by Turkey to Iraq–Turkey border, the north, Iran to Iran–Iraq ...
and
Iran
Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkmeni ...
use this alphabet. The standardization by
Kurdistan Region uses (Unicode 06A9) instead of (Unicode 0643) for letter Kaf (22 in above table), as listed in the Unicode table on the official home page for the standard.
However, the latter glyph is still in use by various individuals and organizations.
Vowels
Central Kurdish has eight vowels, whilst only seven are represented by letters:
Similar to English "Y" in by and you, both (u) and (i) can become consonants. In the words (Wan) and (play), and are consonants. Central Kurdish stipulates that syllables must be formed with at least one vowel, whilst a maximum of two vowels is permitted.
Historical alphabets
Old Kurdish script
![Masî soratî](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c9/Mas%C3%AE_sorat%C3%AE.PNG)
An old Kurdish alphabet is documented by the well known Muslim author
Ibn Wahshiyya in his book (Shawq al-Mustaham) written in 856 A.D. Ibn Wahshiyya writes: "I saw thirty books in Baghdad in this alphabet, out of which I translated two scientific books from Kurdish into Arabic; one of the books on the culture of the vine and the palm tree, and the other on water and the means of finding it out in unknown ground." It has also been claimed that the Old Kurdish script, like several other scripts found in Ibn Washiyya's book, are fantastical inventions.
Cyrillic script
A third system, used for the few (Kurmanji-speaking) Kurds in the former
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...
, especially in Armenia, used a
Cyrillic alphabet, consisting of 40 letters.
It was designed in 1946 by
Heciyê Cindî
Heciyê Cindî ( hy, Հաջիե Ջնդի Ջաուարի; 1908–1990) was a Kurdish linguist and researcher from Armenia.
Cindî was born into a Yazidi Kurdish family in the village of Yemençayir (Emançayîr) near Kars in modern Turkey. Dur ...
:
Armenian alphabet
From 1921 to 1929, a modified version of the
Armenian alphabet
The Armenian alphabet ( hy, Հայոց գրեր, ' or , ') is an alphabetic writing system used to write Armenian language, Armenian. It was developed around 405 AD by Mesrop Mashtots, an Armenian linguist and wikt:ecclesiastical, ecclesiast ...
was used for Kurmanji, in the
Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic
The Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic,; russian: Армянская Советская Социалистическая Республика, translit=Armyanskaya Sovetskaya Sotsialisticheskaya Respublika) also commonly referred to as Soviet A ...
:
It was then replaced with a
Yañalif-like Latin alphabet during the campaigns for
Latinisation in the Soviet Union
In the USSR, latinisation or latinization (russian: латиниза́ция, ') was the name of the campaign during the 1920s–1930s which aimed to replace traditional writing systems for all languages of the Soviet Union with systems that wo ...
.
Soviet Latin alphabet
In 1928, Kurdish languages in all of the
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...
, including the Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic, were switched to a Latin alphabet containing some Cyrillic characters: a, b, c, ç, d, e, ә, f, g, г, h, i, ь, j, k, ʀ, l, m, ɴ, o, ө, w, p, n, q, ч, s, ш, ц, t, u, y, v, x, z, ƶ. In 1929 it was reformed and was replaced by the following alphabet:
:
Yazidi alphabet
The
Yazidi
Yazidis or Yezidis (; ku, ئێزیدی, translit=Êzidî) are a Kurmanji-speaking endogamous minority group who are indigenous to Kurdistan, a geographical region in Western Asia that includes parts of Iraq, Syria, Turkey and Iran. The majo ...
script was used to write in Kurdish, specifically in the
Kurmanji dialect (also called Northern Kurdish). The script was found in historical manuscripts
''Meṣḥefa Reş'' and
''Kitêba Cilwe'', these two manuscripts are largely considered to be western forgeries mixed with some authentic traditions.
In 2013, the Spiritual Council of Yazidis in
Georgia decided to revive the Yazidi script.
[Rovenchak, A., Pirbari, D., & Karaca, E. (2019)]
L2/19-051R ''Proposal for encoding the Yezidi script in the SMP of the UCS''
[Rovenchak, A. (2019)]
''Information on Yezidi UUM and hamza''
It is written from right to left. The modern version of Yazidi is an alphabet and does not use ligatures.
The Yezidi script was added to
Unicode
Unicode, formally The Unicode Standard,The formal version reference is is an information technology Technical standard, standard for the consistent character encoding, encoding, representation, and handling of Character (computing), text expre ...
version 13.0 in March 2020. 47 characters are located in the
Yezidi
Yazidis or Yezidis (; ku, ئێزیدی, translit=Êzidî) are a Kurmanji-speaking endogamous minority group who are indigenous to Kurdistan, a geographical region in Western Asia that includes parts of Iraq, Syria, Turkey and Iran. The majo ...
block:
Comparison of Kurdish alphabets
See also
*
Kurdish typography
*
Help:IPA/Kurdish
References
External links
KAL – A table of the various Kurdish alphabets* Omniglot
Kurdish Unicode Fonts
{{DEFAULTSORT:Kurdish Alphabet
Latin alphabets
Arabic alphabets
Persian alphabets
Kurdish language
Writing systems of Asia
Cyrillic letters
Cyrillic alphabets