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Yat or jat (Ѣ ѣ; italics: ''Ѣ ѣ'') is the thirty-second letter of the old Cyrillic alphabet and the Rusyn alphabet. There is also another version of yat, the iotified yat (majuscule: , minuscule: ), which is a Cyrillic character combining a decimal I and a yat. There was no numerical value for this letter and it was not in the Glagolitic alphabet. It was encoded in Unicode 5.1 at positions U+A652 and U+A653.


Usage

Yat represented a Common Slavic long
vowel A vowel is a syllabic speech sound pronounced without any stricture in the vocal tract. Vowels are one of the two principal classes of speech sounds, the other being the consonant. Vowels vary in quality, in loudness and also in quantity (leng ...
. It is generally believed to have represented the sound or , which was a
reflex In biology, a reflex, or reflex action, is an involuntary, unplanned sequence or action and nearly instantaneous response to a stimulus. Reflexes are found with varying levels of complexity in organisms with a nervous system. A reflex occurs ...
of earlier Proto-Slavic * and *. That the sound represented by yat developed late in the history of Common Slavic is indicated by its role in the Slavic second palatalization of the Slavic
velar consonant Velars are consonants articulated with the back part of the tongue (the dorsum) against the soft palate, the back part of the roof of the mouth (known also as the velum). Since the velar region of the roof of the mouth is relatively extensive an ...
s. Significantly, from the earliest texts, there was considerable confusion between the yat and the Cyrillic
iotified a Iotated A () is a letter of the Cyrillic script, used today only in Church Slavonic. It is unusual among early Cyrillic letters in having no direct counterpart in Glagolitic: Ⱑ ( jat’) is used for both /ě/ and /ja/. Accordingly, many early ...
. One explanation is that the dialect of
Thessaloniki Thessaloniki (; el, Θεσσαλονίκη, , also known as Thessalonica (), Saloniki, or Salonica (), is the second-largest city in Greece, with over one million inhabitants in its Thessaloniki metropolitan area, metropolitan area, and the capi ...
(on which the
Old Church Slavonic Old Church Slavonic or Old Slavonic () was the first Slavic languages, Slavic literary language. Historians credit the 9th-century Byzantine Empire, Byzantine missionaries Saints Cyril and Methodius with Standard language, standardizing the lan ...
literary language was based), and other South Slavic dialects shifted from to independently from the Northern and Western branches. The confusion was also possibly aggravated by Cyrillic
Little Yus Little yus (Ѧ ѧ) and big yus (Ѫ ѫ), or jus, are letters of the Cyrillic script representing two Common Slavonic nasal vowels in the early Cyrillic alphabet, early Cyrillic and Glagolitic alphabet, Glagolitic alphabets. Each can occu ...
looking very similar to the older Glagolitic alphabet's yat . An extremely rare "iotated yat" form also exists, documented only in Svyatoslav's Izbornik from 1073.


Standard reflexes

In various modern
Slavic languages The Slavic languages, also known as the Slavonic languages, are Indo-European languages spoken primarily by the Slavic peoples and their descendants. They are thought to descend from a proto-language called Proto-Slavic, spoken during the Ear ...
, yat has reflected into various vowels. For example, the old Slavic root ''bělъ , бѣлъ'' (white) became: *''бел'' in
Standard Russian Russian (russian: русский язык, russkij jazyk, link=no, ) is an East Slavic language mainly spoken in Russia. It is the native language of the Russians, and belongs to the Indo-European language family. It is one of four living Eas ...
(dialectal , or even in some regions) *''біл'' in
Ukrainian Ukrainian may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to Ukraine * Something relating to Ukrainians, an East Slavic people from Eastern Europe * Something relating to demographics of Ukraine in terms of demography and population of Ukraine * So ...
and
Rusyn Rusyn may refer to: * Rusyns, Rusyn people, an East Slavic people ** Pannonian Rusyns, Pannonian Rusyn people, a branch of Rusyn people ** Lemkos, a branch of Rusyn (or Ukrainian) people ** Boykos, a branch of Rusyn (or Ukrainian) people * Rusyn l ...
*''бел'' in
Belarusian Belarusian may refer to: * Something of, or related to Belarus * Belarusians, people from Belarus, or of Belarusian descent * A citizen of Belarus, see Demographics of Belarus * Belarusian language * Belarusian culture * Belarusian cuisine * Byelor ...
*''бял'' ''/ бели'' in
Bulgarian Bulgarian may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to the country of Bulgaria * Bulgarians, a South Slavic ethnic group * Bulgarian language, a Slavic language * Bulgarian alphabet * A citizen of Bulgaria, see Demographics of Bulgaria * Bul ...
(''бел'' ''/ бели'' in Western dialects) *''бел'' in
Macedonian Macedonian most often refers to someone or something from or related to Macedonia. Macedonian(s) may specifically refer to: People Modern * Macedonians (ethnic group), a nation and a South Slavic ethnic group primarily associated with North M ...
*''beo / beli'' in Kajkavian,
Ekavian Shtokavian or Štokavian (; sh-Latn, štokavski / sh-Cyrl, italics=no, штокавски, ) is the prestige dialect of the pluricentric Serbo-Croatian language and the basis of its Serbian, Croatian, Bosnian and Montenegrin standards. ...
forms of
Serbo-Croatian Serbo-Croatian () – also called Serbo-Croat (), Serbo-Croat-Bosnian (SCB), Bosnian-Croatian-Serbian (BCS), and Bosnian-Croatian-Montenegrin-Serbian (BCMS) – is a South Slavic language and the primary language of Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia and ...
(Genitive ''belog / beloga'') *''bil / bili'' in
Ikavian Shtokavian or Štokavian (; sh-Latn, štokavski / sh-Cyrl, italics=no, штокавски, ) is the prestige dialect of the pluricentric Serbo-Croatian language and the basis of its Serbian, Croatian, Bosnian and Montenegrin standards. It ...
forms of
Serbo-Croatian Serbo-Croatian () – also called Serbo-Croat (), Serbo-Croat-Bosnian (SCB), Bosnian-Croatian-Serbian (BCS), and Bosnian-Croatian-Montenegrin-Serbian (BCMS) – is a South Slavic language and the primary language of Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia and ...
* ''bijel / bijeli'' in
Ijekavian Shtokavian or Štokavian (; sh-Latn, štokavski / sh-Cyrl, italics=no, штокавски, ) is the prestige dialect of the pluricentric Serbo-Croatian language and the basis of its Serbian, Croatian, Bosnian and Montenegrin standards. It ...
forms of
Serbo-Croatian Serbo-Croatian () – also called Serbo-Croat (), Serbo-Croat-Bosnian (SCB), Bosnian-Croatian-Serbian (BCS), and Bosnian-Croatian-Montenegrin-Serbian (BCMS) – is a South Slavic language and the primary language of Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia and ...
(Genitive ''bijelog / bijeloga'') *''bel / beli'' in
Slovenian Slovene or Slovenian may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to Slovenia, a country in Central Europe * Slovene language, a South Slavic language mainly spoken in Slovenia * Slovenes The Slovenes, also known as Slovenians ( sl, Sloven ...
*''biel / biały'' in
Polish Polish may refer to: * Anything from or related to Poland, a country in Europe * Polish language * Poles, people from Poland or of Polish descent * Polish chicken *Polish brothers (Mark Polish and Michael Polish, born 1970), American twin screenwr ...
*''běl / bílý'' in Czech *''biel / biely'' in Slovak.


Other reflexes

Other reflexes of yat exist; for example: *Proto-Slavic телѣга became таљиге (''taljige''; ѣ > i reflex) in
Serbo-Croatian Serbo-Croatian () – also called Serbo-Croat (), Serbo-Croat-Bosnian (SCB), Bosnian-Croatian-Serbian (BCS), and Bosnian-Croatian-Montenegrin-Serbian (BCMS) – is a South Slavic language and the primary language of Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia and ...
. *Proto-Slavic орѣхъ became орах (''orah''; ѣ > a reflex) in
Serbo-Croatian Serbo-Croatian () – also called Serbo-Croat (), Serbo-Croat-Bosnian (SCB), Bosnian-Croatian-Serbian (BCS), and Bosnian-Croatian-Montenegrin-Serbian (BCMS) – is a South Slavic language and the primary language of Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia and ...
.


Confusion with other letters

Due to these reflexes, yat no longer represented an independent phoneme but an already existing one, represented by another Cyrillic letter. As a result, children had to memorize by rote whether or not to write yat. Therefore, the letter was dropped in a series of orthographic reforms: in
Serbian Serbian may refer to: * someone or something related to Serbia, a country in Southeastern Europe * someone or something related to the Serbs, a South Slavic people * Serbian language * Serbian names See also

* * * Old Serbian (disambiguat ...
with the reform of
Vuk Karadžić Vuk Stefanović Karadžić ( sr-Cyrl, Вук Стефановић Караџић, ; 6 November 1787 (26 October OS)7 February 1864) was a Serbian philologist, anthropologist and linguist. He was one of the most important reformers of the mode ...
, in Ukrainian-Ruthenian with the reform of
Panteleimon Kulish Panteleimon Oleksandrovych Kulish (also spelled ''Panteleymon'' or ''Pantelejmon Kuliš'', uk, Пантелеймон Олександрович Куліш, August 7, 1819 – February 14, 1897) was a Ukrainian writer, critic, poet, folklori ...
, later in Russian and
Belarusian Belarusian may refer to: * Something of, or related to Belarus * Belarusians, people from Belarus, or of Belarusian descent * A citizen of Belarus, see Demographics of Belarus * Belarusian language * Belarusian culture * Belarusian cuisine * Byelor ...
with the Russian Spelling Reform of 1917, and in
Bulgarian Bulgarian may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to the country of Bulgaria * Bulgarians, a South Slavic ethnic group * Bulgarian language, a Slavic language * Bulgarian alphabet * A citizen of Bulgaria, see Demographics of Bulgaria * Bul ...
and Carpathian dialects of Ruthenian language as late as 1945. The letter is no longer used in the standard modern orthography of any of the Slavic languages written with 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, ...
, but survives in Ukrainian (Ruthenian) liturgical and church texts of Church Slavonic in Ruthenian (Ukrainian) edition and in some written in the Russian recension of
Church Slavonic Church Slavonic (, , literally "Church-Slavonic language"), also known as Church Slavic, New Church Slavonic or New Church Slavic, is the conservative Slavic liturgical language used by the Eastern Orthodox Church in Belarus, Bosnia and Herzeg ...
. It has, since 1991, found some favor in
advertising Advertising is the practice and techniques employed to bring attention to a product or service. Advertising aims to put a product or service in the spotlight in hopes of drawing it attention from consumers. It is typically used to promote a ...
to deliberately invoke an archaic or "old-timey" style.


Bulgarian

In
Bulgarian Bulgarian may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to the country of Bulgaria * Bulgarians, a South Slavic ethnic group * Bulgarian language, a Slavic language * Bulgarian alphabet * A citizen of Bulgaria, see Demographics of Bulgaria * Bul ...
the different reflexes of the yat form the so-called yat-border (ятова граница), running approximately from Nikopol on the
Danube The Danube ( ; ) is a river that was once a long-standing frontier of the Roman Empire and today connects 10 European countries, running through their territories or being a border. Originating in Germany, the Danube flows southeast for , pa ...
to Solun (
Thessaloniki Thessaloniki (; el, Θεσσαλονίκη, , also known as Thessalonica (), Saloniki, or Salonica (), is the second-largest city in Greece, with over one million inhabitants in its Thessaloniki metropolitan area, metropolitan area, and the capi ...
) on the
Aegean Sea The Aegean Sea ; tr, Ege Denizi (Greek language, Greek: Αιγαίο Πέλαγος: "Egéo Pélagos", Turkish language, Turkish: "Ege Denizi" or "Adalar Denizi") is an elongated embayment of the Mediterranean Sea between Europe and Asia. It ...
. West of that isogloss, old ''yat'' is always realized as (analogous to the Ekavian Serbian dialects further west). East of it, the reflexes of ''yat'' prototypically alternate between or (in stressed syllables when not followed by a
front vowel A front vowel is a class of vowel sounds used in some spoken languages, its defining characteristic being that the highest point of the tongue is positioned as far forward as possible in the mouth without creating a constriction that would otherw ...
) and (in all other cases). The division of the dialects of the
Eastern South Slavic The Eastern South Slavic dialects form the eastern subgroup of the South Slavic languages. They are spoken mostly in Bulgaria and North Macedonia, and adjacent areas in the neighbouring countries. They form the so-called Balkan Slavic lin ...
into western and eastern subgroup running along the yat-border is the most important dividing
isogloss An isogloss, also called a heterogloss (see Etymology below), is the geographic boundary of a certain linguistic feature, such as the pronunciation of a vowel, the meaning of a word, or the use of some morphological or syntactic feature. Major d ...
there. Some older Serbian scholars believed that the Yat border divides the Serbian and Bulgarian languages. However, modern Serbian linguists such as
Pavle Ivic Pavle ( Macedonian and sr-cyr, Павле; ka, პავლე) is a Serbian, Macedonian, Croatian and Georgian male given name corresponding to English Paul; the name is of biblical origin (cf. Saint Paul). People known mononymously as Pavle inc ...
have accepted that the main isoglosses bundle dividing Eastern and
Western South Slavic The South Slavic languages are one of three branches of the Slavic languages. There are approximately 30 million speakers, mainly in the Balkans. These are separated geographically from speakers of the other two Slavic branches (West and East) ...
runs from the mouth of the
Timok The Timok ( Serbian and Bulgarian: Тимок; ro, Timoc), sometimes also known as Great Timok ( sr, Велики Тимок, Veliki Timok; ro, Timocul Mare), is a river in eastern Serbia, a right tributary of the Danube. For the last 15 k ...
river alongside
Osogovo mountain Osogovo (Bulgarian/ Macedonian: ), or Osogovska Planina or Osogovski Planini (Осоговска Планина or Осоговски Планини), is a mountain range and ski resort between the south-western part of Bulgaria (Kyustendil Provi ...
and
Sar Mountain SAR or Sar may refer to: Places * Sar (river), Galicia, Spain * Sar, Bahrain, a residential district * Sar, Iran (disambiguation), several places in Iran * Sar, Tibet, Tibet Autonomous Region of China * Šar Mountains, in southeastern Europe * ...
. On the other hand, in Bulgaria the Timok-Osogovo-Sar isogloss is considered the eastern most border of the broader set of the transitional Torlakian dialects, described often as part of the Eastern South Slavic, (i.e. Bulgarian/Macedonian). Jouko Lindstedt has assumed that the dividing line between the Macedonian language, codified after WWII, and Bulgarian is in fact the yat border. It divides also the modern region of Macedonia running along the VelingradPetrich
Thessaloniki Thessaloniki (; el, Θεσσαλονίκη, , also known as Thessalonica (), Saloniki, or Salonica (), is the second-largest city in Greece, with over one million inhabitants in its Thessaloniki metropolitan area, metropolitan area, and the capi ...
line. In 1870
Marin Drinov Marin Stoyanov Drinov ( bg, Марин Стоянов Дринов, russian: Марин Степанович Дринов; 20 October 1838 - 13 March 1906) was a Bulgarian historian and philologist from the National Revival period who lived and w ...
, who played a decisive role in the standardization of the Bulgarian language, rejected the proposal of
Parteniy Zografski Parteniy Zografski or Parteniy Nishavski ( bg, Партений Зографски/Нишавски; mk, Партенија Зографски; 1818 – February 7, 1876) was a 19th-century Bulgarian cleric, philologist, and folklorist from G ...
and
Kuzman Shapkarev Kuzman Anastasov Shapkarev, ( bg, Кузман Анастасов Шапкарев), (1 January 1834 in Ohrid – 18 March 1909 in Sofia) was a Bulgarian folklorist, ethnographer and scientist from the Ottoman region of Macedonia, author of tex ...
for a mixed eastern and western Bulgarian/Macedonian foundation of the standard Bulgarian language. From the late 19th century until 1945, the standard Bulgarian orthography did not reflect this alternation and used the Cyrillic letter yat for both and in alternating roots. This was regarded as a way to maintain unity between Eastern and Western Bulgarians, as much of what was then, and is now, seen as Western Bulgarian dialects were in the Late Middle Ages partially under Serbian control. In 1945 the Yat-letter was removed from the Bulgarian alphabet and the spelling was changed to conform to the Eastern pronunciation. Some examples of the alternation in the standard language follow: * ''мляко'' (milk) . → ''млекар'' (milkman); ''млечен'' (milky), etc. * ''сядам'' (sit) b.→ ''седалка'' (seat); ''седалище'' (seat, e.g. of government), etc. * ''свят'' (world) .→ ''световен'' (worldly); ''светски'' (secular), etc.


Russian

In Russian, written confusion between the yat and appears in the earliest records; when exactly the distinction finally disappeared in speech is a topic of debate. Some scholars, for example W. K. Matthews, have placed the merger of the two sounds at the earliest historical phases (the 11th century or earlier), attributing its use until 1918 to
Church Slavonic Church Slavonic (, , literally "Church-Slavonic language"), also known as Church Slavic, New Church Slavonic or New Church Slavic, is the conservative Slavic liturgical language used by the Eastern Orthodox Church in Belarus, Bosnia and Herzeg ...
influence. Within Russia itself, however, a consensus has found its way into university textbooks of historical grammar (e.g., V. V. Ivanov), that, taking all the dialects into account, the sounds remained predominantly distinct until the 18th century, at least under stress, and are distinct to this day in some localities. Meanwhile, the yat in
Ukrainian Ukrainian may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to Ukraine * Something relating to Ukrainians, an East Slavic people from Eastern Europe * Something relating to demographics of Ukraine in terms of demography and population of Ukraine * So ...
usually merged in sound with (see below), and therefore has remained distinct from . The story of the letter yat and its elimination from the
Russian alphabet The Russian alphabet (russian: ру́сский алфави́т, russkiy alfavit, , label=none, or russian: ру́сская а́збука, russkaya azbuka, label=none, more traditionally) is the script used to write the Russian language. I ...
makes for an interesting footnote in Russian cultural history. See
Reforms of Russian orthography The Russian orthography has been reformed officially and unofficially by changing the Russian alphabet over the course of the history of the Russian language. Several important reforms happened in the 18th–20th centuries. Early changes Old ...
for details. A full list of words that were written with the letter yat at the beginning of 20th century can be found in the Russian Wikipedia. A few inflections and common words were distinguished in spelling by / (for example: ѣсть / есть "to eat" / "(there) is"; лѣчу / лечу "I heal" / "I fly"; синѣ́е / си́нее , "bluer" / "blue" (n.); вѣ́дѣніе / веде́ніе , "knowledge" / "leadership"). Its retention without discussion in the Petrine reform of the Russian alphabet of 1708 indicates that it then still marked a distinct sound in the Moscow '' koiné'' of the time. By the second half of the 18th century, however, the
polymath A polymath ( el, πολυμαθής, , "having learned much"; la, homo universalis, "universal human") is an individual whose knowledge spans a substantial number of subjects, known to draw on complex bodies of knowledge to solve specific pro ...
Lomonosov Mikhail Vasilyevich Lomonosov (; russian: Михаил (Михайло) Васильевич Ломоносов, p=mʲɪxɐˈil vɐˈsʲilʲjɪvʲɪtɕ , a=Ru-Mikhail Vasilyevich Lomonosov.ogg; – ) was a Russian Empire, Russian polymath, s ...
(c. 1765) noted that the sound of was scarcely distinguishable from that of the letter , and a century later (1878) the philologist Grot stated flatly in his standard ''Russian orthography'' (, , ) that in the common language there was no difference whatsoever between their pronunciations. However,
dialect The term dialect (from Latin , , from the Ancient Greek word , 'discourse', from , 'through' and , 'I speak') can refer to either of two distinctly different types of Linguistics, linguistic phenomena: One usage refers to a variety (linguisti ...
al studies have shown that, in certain regional dialects, a degree of oral distinction is retained even today in syllables once denoted with . Calls for the elimination of ''yat'' from the Russian spelling began with Trediakovsky in the 18th century. A proposal for spelling reform from the Russian Academy of Science in 1911 included, among other matters, the systematic elimination of the yat, but was declined at the highest level. According to
Lev Uspensky Lev Vasilyevich Uspensky (russian: Лев Васильевич Успенский, 8 February 1900 – 18 December 1978) was a Russian writer and philologist, known for his popular science books in linguistics.popular linguistics book ''A Word On Words'' (Слово о словах), yat was "the monster-letter, the scarecrow-letter ... which was washed with the tears of countless generations of Russian schoolchildren". (This book was published in the Soviet period, and accordingly it expressed strong support towards the 1918 reform.) The schoolchildren had to memorize very long nonsense verses made up of words with : The spelling reform was finally promulgated by the
Provisional Government A provisional government, also called an interim government, an emergency government, or a transitional government, is an emergency governmental authority set up to manage a political transition generally in the cases of a newly formed state or f ...
in the summer of 1917. It appears not to have been taken seriously under the prevailing conditions, and two further decrees by the Soviet government in December 1917 and in 1918 were required.
Orthography An orthography is a set of conventions for writing a language, including norms of spelling, hyphenation, capitalization, word breaks, emphasis, and punctuation. Most transnational languages in the modern period have a writing system, and mos ...
thus became an issue of
politics Politics (from , ) is the set of activities that are associated with making decisions in groups, or other forms of power relations among individuals, such as the distribution of resources or status. The branch of social science that studies ...
, and the letter yat, a primary symbol. Émigré Russians generally adhered to the old spelling until after
World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
; long and impassioned essays were written in its defense, as by Ilyin in . Even in 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 ...
, it is said that some printing shops continued to use the eliminated letters until their blocks of type were forcibly removed; certainly, the Academy of Sciences published its annals in the old orthography until approximately 1924, and the
Russian Orthodox Church , native_name_lang = ru , image = Moscow July 2011-7a.jpg , imagewidth = , alt = , caption = Cathedral of Christ the Saviour in Moscow, Russia , abbreviation = ROC , type ...
, when printing its calendar for 1922, for the first time in the new orthography, included a note that it was doing so as a condition of receiving a license for impression. To the builders of the new regime, conversely, the new spelling visibly denoted the shining world of the future, and marked on paper the break with the old. The large-scale campaign for literacy in the early years of the Soviet government was, of course, conducted in accordance with the new norms. In objective terms, the elimination of the yat, together with the other spelling reforms, decisively broke the influence of
Church Slavonic Church Slavonic (, , literally "Church-Slavonic language"), also known as Church Slavic, New Church Slavonic or New Church Slavic, is the conservative Slavic liturgical language used by the Eastern Orthodox Church in Belarus, Bosnia and Herzeg ...
on the living literary language. After the
dissolution of the Soviet Union The dissolution of the Soviet Union, also negatively connoted as rus, Разва́л Сове́тского Сою́за, r=Razvál Sovétskogo Soyúza, ''Ruining of the Soviet Union''. was the process of internal disintegration within the Sov ...
, as a tendency occasionally to mimic the past appeared in
Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia, Northern Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the ...
, the old spelling became fashionable in some brand names and the like, as
archaism In language, an archaism (from the grc, ἀρχαϊκός, ''archaïkós'', 'old-fashioned, antiquated', ultimately , ''archaîos'', 'from the beginning, ancient') is a word, a sense of a word, or a style of speech or writing that belongs to a hi ...
s, specifically as "
sensational spelling Sensational spelling is the deliberate spelling of a word in a non-standard way for special effect. Branding Sensational spellings are common in advertising and product placement. In particular, brand names such as Krispy Kreme Doughnuts (''cri ...
s". For example, the name of the business newspaper '' Kommersant'' appears on its masthead with a word-final
hard sign The letter Ъ (italics ) of the Cyrillic script is known as er golyam (ер голям – "big er") in the Bulgarian alphabet, as the hard sign (russian: твёрдый знак, tvjórdyj znak, , rue, твердый знак, tverdyj znak) in ...
, which is superfluous in modern orthography: "Коммерсантъ". Calls for the reintroduction of the old spelling were heard, though not taken seriously, as supporters of the yat described it as "that most Russian of letters", and the "white swan" (бѣлый лебедь) of Russian spelling. These are usually associated with Russian monarchism, even though reform proposal was made years before monarchy was overthrown.


Ukrainian

In
Ukrainian Ukrainian may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to Ukraine * Something relating to Ukrainians, an East Slavic people from Eastern Europe * Something relating to demographics of Ukraine in terms of demography and population of Ukraine * So ...
, yat has traditionally represented or . In modern Ukrainian orthography its reflexes are represented by or . As Ukrainian philologist Volodymyr Hlushchenko notes that initially in proto-Ukrainian tongues yat used to represent or which around 13th century transitioned into . Yet, in some phonetic Ukrainian orthographies from the 19th century, it was used to represent both or as well as . This corresponds more with the Russian pronunciation of yat rather than actual word etymologies. Return to or pronunciation was initiated by the Pavlovsky "Grammar of the Little Russian dialect" (1818) according to Hryhoriy Pivtorak. While in the same "Grammar" Pavlovsky states that among Little Russians "yat" is pronounced as (Ѣ произносится какъ Россїйское мягкое j. на пр: ні́жный, лі́то, слідъ, тінь, сі́но.).Alexey Pavlovsky
Grammar of the Little Russian dialect (ГРАММАТИКА МАЛОРОССІЙСКАГО НАРЂЧІЯ,)
'. Izbornyk.
The modern Ukrainian letter has the same phonetic function. Several Ukrainian orthographies with the different ways of using yat and without yat co-existed in the same time during the 19th century, and most of them were discarded before the 20th century. After the middle of the 19th century, orthographies without yat dominated in the Eastern part of Ukraine, and after the end of the 19th century they dominated in Galicia. However, in 1876–1905 the only Russian officially legalized orthography in the Eastern Ukraine was based on Russian phonetic system (with yat for ) and in the Western Ukraine (mostly in Carpathian Ruthenia) orthography with yat for was used before 1945; in the rest of the western Ukraine (not subjected to the limitations made by the Russian Empire) the so-called "orthographic wars" ended up in receiving a uniformed phonetic system which replaced yat with either < ї> or < і> (it was used officially for Ukrainian language in the Austrian Empire). 'New yat' is a reflex of (which merged with yat in Ukrainian) in closed syllables. New yat is not related to the Proto-Slavic yat, but it has frequently been represented by the same sign. Using yat instead of in this position was a common after the 12th century. With the later phonological evolution of Ukrainian, both yat and new yat evolved into or . Some other sounds also evolved to the sound so that some Ukrainian texts from between the 17th and 19th centuries used the same letter ( or yat) uniformly rather than variation between yat, new yat, , and reflex of in closed syllables, but using yat to unify all i-sounded vowels was less common, and so 'new yat' usually means letter yat in the place of i-sounded only. In some etymology-based orthography systems of the 19th century, yat was represented by and new yat was replaced with ( with circumflex). At this same time, the Ukrainian writing system replaced yat and new yat by or .


Rusyn

In
Rusyn Rusyn may refer to: * Rusyns, Rusyn people, an East Slavic people ** Pannonian Rusyns, Pannonian Rusyn people, a branch of Rusyn people ** Lemkos, a branch of Rusyn (or Ukrainian) people ** Boykos, a branch of Rusyn (or Ukrainian) people * Rusyn l ...
, yat was used until 1945. In modern times, some Rusyn writers and poets try to reinstate it, but this initiative is not really popular among Rusyn
intelligentsia The intelligentsia is a status class composed of the university-educated people of a society who engage in the complex mental labours by which they critique, shape, and lead in the politics, policies, and culture of their society; as such, the in ...
.


Romanian

In the old
Romanian Cyrillic alphabet Romanian may refer to: *anything of, from, or related to the country and nation of Romania **Romanians, an ethnic group **Romanian language, a Romance language ***Romanian dialects, variants of the Romanian language **Romanian cuisine, traditional ...
, the yat, called ''eati'', was used as the diphthong. It disappeared when Romanian adopted the transitional alphabet, first in
Wallachia Wallachia or Walachia (; ro, Țara Românească, lit=The Romanian Land' or 'The Romanian Country, ; archaic: ', Romanian Cyrillic alphabet: ) is a historical and geographical region of Romania. It is situated north of the Lower Danube and so ...
, then in
Moldova Moldova ( , ; ), officially the Republic of Moldova ( ro, Republica Moldova), is a Landlocked country, landlocked country in Eastern Europe. It is bordered by Romania to the west and Ukraine to the north, east, and south. The List of states ...
.


Serbo-Croatian

The Old Serbo-Croatian ''yat'' phoneme is assumed to have a phonetic value articulatory between the vowels and . In the
Štokavian Shtokavian or Štokavian (; sh-Latn, štokavski / sh-Cyrl, italics=no, штокавски, ) is the prestige dialect of the pluricentric Serbo-Croatian language and the basis of its Serbian, Croatian, Bosnian and Montenegrin standards. It ...
and Čakavian vowel systems, this phoneme lost a back vowel parallel; the tendency towards articulatory symmetry led to its merging with other phonemes. On the other hand, most Kajkavian dialects did have a back vowel parallel (a reflex of *ǫ and *l̥), and both the front and back vowels were retained in most of these dialects' vowel system before merging with a reflex of a vocalized
Yer A yer is either of two letters in Cyrillic alphabets, ъ (ѥръ, ''jerŭ'') and ь (ѥрь, ''jerĭ''). The Glagolitic alphabet used, as respective counterparts, the letters (Ⱏ) and (Ⱐ). They originally represented phonemically the "ult ...
(*ь). Thus the Kajkavian vowel system has a symmetry between front and back closed vocalic phonemes: */ẹ/ (< */ě/, */ь/) and */ọ/ (< */ǫ/, */l̥/). Čakavian dialects utilized both possibilities of establishing symmetry of vowels by developing Ikavian and Ekavian reflexes, as well as "guarding the old yat" at northern borders (Buzet dialect). According to yat reflex Čakavian dialects are divided to Ikavian (mostly South Čakavian), Ekavian (North Čakavian) and mixed Ikavian-Ekavian (Middle Čakavian), in which mixed Ikavian-Ekavian reflex is conditioned by following phonemes according to the
Jakubinskij's law Jakubinskij's law, or Meyer–Jakubinskij's law, is a sound law that operated in the Croatian Chakavian dialect in the 12th–13th century, named after Lav Jakubinski who discovered it in 1925, and sometimes also after K. H. Meyer who expanded an ...
(e.g. ''sled'' : ''sliditi'' < PSl. *slědъ : *slěditi; ''del'' : ''diliti'' < *dělъ : *děliti). Mixed Ikavian-Ekavian Čakavian dialects have been heavily influenced by
analogy Analogy (from Greek ''analogia'', "proportion", from ''ana-'' "upon, according to" lso "against", "anew"+ ''logos'' "ratio" lso "word, speech, reckoning" is a cognitive process of transferring information or meaning from a particular subject ( ...
(influence of nominative form on
oblique case In grammar, an oblique (abbreviated ; from la, casus obliquus) or objective case (abbr. ) is a nominal case other than the nominative case, and sometimes, the vocative. A noun or pronoun in the oblique case can generally appear in any role exc ...
s, infinitive on other verbal forms, word stem onto derivations etc.). The only exception among Čakavian dialects is
Lastovo Lastovo (; it, Lagosta, german: Augusta, la, Augusta Insula, el, Ladestanos, Illyrian: ''Ladest'') is an island municipality A municipality is usually a single administrative division having corporate status and powers of self-governm ...
island and the village of
Janjina Janjina ( it, Iagnina) is a village and a municipality located right in the center of the Pelješac peninsula, in the Dubrovnik-Neretva County, Croatia. Village The village of Janjina includes a tiny fishing harbor and a hamlet called Zabrež ...
, with Jekavian reflex of yat. The most complex development of yat has occurred in Štokavian, namely Ijekavian Štokavian dialects which are used as a dialectal basis for modern standard Serbo-Croatian variants, and that makes the reflexes of yat one of the central issues of Serbo-Croatian orthoepy and orthography. In most Croatian Štokavian dialects yat has yielded diphthongal sequence of in long and short syllables. The position of this diphthong is equally unstable as that of closed *, which has led to its dephonologization. Short diphthong has thus turned to diphonemic sequence , and long to disyllabic (triphonemic) , but that outcome is not the only one in Štokavian dialects, so the pronunciation of long yat in Neo-Štokavian dialects can be both monosyllabic (diphthongal or triphthongal) and disyllabic (triphonemic). However, that process has been completed in dialects which serve as a dialectal basis for the orthographical codification of Ijekavian Serbo-Croatian. In writing, the diphthong is represented by the trigraph – this particular inconsistency being a remnant of the late 19th century codification efforts, which planned to redesign common standard language for Croats and Serbs. This culminated in the Novi Sad agreement and "common" orthography and dictionary. Digraphic spelling of a diphthong as e.g. was used by some 19th-century Croat writers who promoted so-called "etymological orthography" – in fact
morpho-phonemic orthography A phonemic orthography is an orthography (system for writing a language) in which the graphemes (written symbols) correspond to the phonemes (significant spoken sounds) of the language. Natural languages rarely have perfectly phonemic orthographi ...
which was advocated by some Croatian philological schools of the time (
Zagreb philological school Zagreb philological school ( sh, Zagrebačka filološka škola) was a 19th-century philological school that operated in Zagreb, offering a set of solutions for the issues involved in the standardization of Croatian literary language. It was led by A ...
), and which was even official during the brief period of the fascist
Independent State of Croatia The Independent State of Croatia ( sh, Nezavisna Država Hrvatska, NDH; german: Unabhängiger Staat Kroatien; it, Stato indipendente di Croazia) was a World War II-era puppet state of Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy (1922–1943), Fascist It ...
(1941–1945). In standard Croatian, although standard orthography is for long yat, standard pronunciation is . Serbian has two standards: Ijekavian is for long yat and Ekavian which uses for short and for long yat. Standard Bosnian and Montenegrin use for short and for long yat. Dephonologization of diphthongal yat reflex could also be caused by
assimilation Assimilation may refer to: Culture *Cultural assimilation, the process whereby a minority group gradually adapts to the customs and attitudes of the prevailing culture and customs **Language shift, also known as language assimilation, the progre ...
within diphthong itself: if the first part of a diphthong assimilates secondary part, so-called ''secondary Ikavian reflex'' develops; and if the second part of a diphthong assimilates the first part ''secondary Ekavian reflex'' develops. Most Štokavian Ikavian dialects of Serbo-Croatian are exactly such – secondary Ikavian dialects, and from Ekavian dialects secondary are the Štokavian Ekavian dialects of Slavonian Podravina and most of Serbia. They have a common origin with Ijekavian Štokavian dialects in a sense of developing yat reflex as diphthongal reflex. Some dialects also "guard" older yat sound, and some reflexes are probably direct from yat. Direct Ikavian, Ekavian and mixed reflexes of yat in Čakavian dialects are a much older phenomenon, which has some traces in written monuments and is estimated to have been completed in the 13th century. The practice of using old yat phoneme in Glagolitic and Bosnian Cyrillic writings in which Serbo-Croatian was written in the centuries that followed was a consequence of conservative scribe tradition. Croatian linguists also speak of two Štokavians, Western Štokavian (also called Šćakavian) which retained yat longer, and Eastern Štokavian which "lost" yat sooner, probably under (western) Bulgarian influences. Areas which bordered Kajkavian dialects mostly retained yat, areas which bordered Čakavian dialects mostly had secondary Ikavisation, and areas which bordered (western) Bulgarian dialects mostly had secondary Ekavisation. "Core" areas remained Ijekavian, although western part of the "core" became monosyllabic for old long yat. Reflexes of yat in Ijekavian dialects are from the very start dependent on syllable quantity. As it has already been said, standard Ijekavian Serbo-Croatian writes trigraph at the place of old long yat, which is in standard pronunciation manifested disyllabically (within Croatian standard monosyllabic pronunciation), and writes at the place of short yat. E.g. ''bijȇl'' < PSl. *bělъ, ''mlijéko'' < *mlěko < by liquid metathesis from *melkò, ''brijȇg'' < *brěgъ < by liquid metathesis from *bȇrgъ, but ''mjȅsto'' < *mě̀sto, ''vjȅra'' < *vě̀ra, ''mjȅra'' < *mě̀ra. There are however some limitations; in front of and (< word-final ) yat has a reflex of short . In scenarios when is not substituted by , i.e. not word-finally (which is a common Štokavian isogloss), yat reflex is also different. E.g. ''grijati'' < *grějati, ''sijati'' < *sějati, ''bijaše'' < *bějaše; but ''htio'' : ''htjela'' < *htělъ : *htěla, ''letio'' : ''letjela'' (< *letělъ : *letěla). The standard language also allows some doublets to coexist, e.g. ''cȉo'' and ''cijȇl'' < *cě̑lъ, ''bȉo'' and ''bijȇl'' < *bě́lъ. Short yat has reflexes of and behind in consonant clusters, e.g. ''brȅgovi'' and ''brjȅgovi'', ''grehòta'' and ''grjehòta'', ''strèlica'' and ''strjèlica'', etc. If short syllable with yat in the word stem lengthens due to the phonetic or morphological conditions, reflex of is preserved, e.g. ''djȅlo'' – ''djȇlā'', ''nèdjelja'' – ''nȅdjēljā''. In modern standard Ijekavian Serbo-Croatian varieties syllables that carry yat reflexes are recognized by alternations in various inflected forms of the same word or in different words derived from the same stem. These alternating sequences ''ije''/''je'', ''ije''/''e'', ''ije''/''i'', ''ije''/''Ø'', ''je''/''i'', ''je''/''ije'', ''e''/''ije'', ''e''/''je'', ''i''/''ije'' are dependent on syllable quantity. Beside modern reflexes they also encompass apophonic alternations inherited from Proto-Slavic and
Indo-European The Indo-European languages are a language family native to the overwhelming majority of Europe, the Iranian plateau, and the northern Indian subcontinent. Some European languages of this family, English, French, Portuguese, Russian, Dutch ...
times, which were also conditioned by quantitative alternations of root syllable, e.g. ''ùmrijēti'' – ''ȕmrēm'', ''lȉti'' – ''lijévati'' etc. These alternations also show the difference between the diphthongal syllables with Ijekavian reflex of yat and syllables with primary phonemic sequence of ''ije'', which has nothing to do with yat and which never shows alternation in inflected forms, e.g. ''zmìje'', ''nijèdan'', ''òrijent'' etc.


Computing codes


See also

* Ѧ ѧ :
Yus Little yus (Ѧ ѧ) and big yus (Ѫ ѫ), or jus, are letters of the Cyrillic, Cyrillic script representing two Proto-Slavic, Common Slavonic nasal vowels in the early Cyrillic alphabet, early Cyrillic and Glagolitic alphabet, Glagolitic ...
* Ҍ ҍ : Cyrillic letter Semisoft sign * Ә ә : Cyrillic schwa, used in Turkic languages and Kalmyk to transcribe the
near-open front unrounded vowel The near-open front unrounded vowel, or near-low front unrounded vowel, is a type of vowel sound, used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is , a lowercase of the ligature. Bot ...
(/æ/) * Ӓ ӓ : Cyrillic letter A with diaeresis, used in Mari to transcribe the
near-open front unrounded vowel The near-open front unrounded vowel, or near-low front unrounded vowel, is a type of vowel sound, used in some spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents this sound is , a lowercase of the ligature. Bot ...
(/æ/) * Ě ě : Latin letter E with caron - a Czech and Sorbian letter


References


Further reading

* {{cite book , last= Barić , first= Eugenija , author2=Mijo Lončarić , author3=Dragica Malić , author4=Slavko Pavešić , author5=Mirko Peti , author6=Vesna Zečević , author7=Marija Znika , title=Hrvatska gramatika , publisher= Školska knjiga , year= 1997 , isbn= 953-0-40010-1 History of the Bulgarian language