Jaꞑalif, Yangalif or Yañalif (
Tatar
The Tatars ()[Tatar]
in the Collins English Dictionary is an umbrella term for different : jaꞑa əlifba/yaña älifba → jaꞑalif/yañalif, ,
Cyrillic
, bg, кирилица , mk, кирилица , russian: кириллица , sr, ћирилица, uk, кирилиця
, fam1 = Egyptian hieroglyphs
, fam2 = Proto-Sinaitic
, fam3 = Phoenician
, fam4 = G ...
: Яңалиф, "new alphabet") is the first
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 ...
used during the
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 ...
in the 1930s for the
Turkic languages
The Turkic languages are a language family of over 35 documented languages, spoken by the Turkic peoples of Eurasia from Eastern Europe and Southern Europe to Central Asia, East Asia, North Asia (Siberia), and Western Asia. The Turkic languag ...
. It replaced the
Yaña imlâ Arabic script
The Arabic script is the writing system used for Arabic and several other languages of Asia and Africa. It is the second-most widely used writing system in the world by number of countries using it or a script directly derived from it, and the ...
-based alphabet in 1928, and was replaced by the
Cyrillic alphabet
, bg, кирилица , mk, кирилица , russian: кириллица , sr, ћирилица, uk, кирилиця
, fam1 = Egyptian hieroglyphs
, fam2 = Proto-Sinaitic
, fam3 = Phoenician
, fam4 = G ...
in 1938–1940. After their respective independence in 1991, several former Soviet states in Central Asia switched back to Latin script, with slight modifications to the original Jaꞑalif.
There are 33
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 ...
in Jaꞑalif, nine of which are
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 ...
s. The
apostrophe
The apostrophe ( or ) is a punctuation mark, and sometimes a diacritical mark, in languages that use the Latin alphabet and some other alphabets. In English, the apostrophe is used for two basic purposes:
* The marking of the omission of one o ...
is used for the
glottal stop
The glottal plosive or stop is a type of consonantal sound used in many spoken languages, produced by obstructing airflow in the vocal tract or, more precisely, the glottis. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents thi ...
(həmzə or hämzä) and is sometimes considered a letter for the purposes of alphabetic sorting. Other characters may also be used in spelling foreign names. The lowercase form of letter B is ʙ, to prevent confusion with Ь ь.
Letter No. 33, similar to
Zhuang Ƅ, is not currently available as a Latin character in
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 ...
, but it looks exactly like Cyrillic
soft sign (Ь). Capital Ə also looks like Russian Э in some fonts.
History
The earliest written text in a
Kipchak language
Cuman or Kuman (also called Kipchak, Qypchaq or Polovtsian) was a Kipchak Turkic language spoken by the Cumans (Polovtsy, Folban, Vallany, Kun) and Kipchaks; the language was similar to today's various languages of the Kipchak-Cuman branch. Cu ...
, specifically the
Cuman language
Cuman or Kuman (also called Kipchak, Qypchaq or Polovtsian) was a Kipchak Turkic language spoken by the Cumans (Polovtsy, Folban, Vallany, Kun) and Kipchaks; the language was similar to today's various languages of the Kipchak-Cuman branch. Cu ...
, an ancestor of the modern Tatar language and written with Latin characters, is the
Codex Cumanicus
The Codex Cumanicus is a linguistic manual of the Middle Ages, designed to help Catholic missionaries communicate with the Cumans, a nomadic Turkic people. It is currently housed in the Library of St. Mark, in Venice (BNM ms Lat. Z. 549 (=1597 ...
, dated 1303. Such texts were used by
Catholic
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...
missionaries to the
Golden Horde
The Golden Horde, self-designated as Ulug Ulus, 'Great State' in Turkic, was originally a Mongols, Mongol and later Turkicized khanate established in the 13th century and originating as the northwestern sector of the Mongol Empire. With the fr ...
. Their Latin script ceased to be used after
Gazaria was taken over by the
Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman Empire, * ; is an archaic version. The definite article forms and were synonymous * and el, Оθωμανική Αυτοκρατορία, Othōmanikē Avtokratoria, label=none * info page on book at Martin Luther University) ...
in the 15th century.
For centuries the
Tatar language
Tatar ( or ) is a Turkic languages, Turkic language spoken by Volga Tatars, Tatars mainly located in modern Tatarstan (European Russia), as well as Siberia. It should not be confused with Crimean Tatar language, Crimean Tatar or Siberian Tat ...
as well as other
Turkic languages
The Turkic languages are a language family of over 35 documented languages, spoken by the Turkic peoples of Eurasia from Eastern Europe and Southern Europe to Central Asia, East Asia, North Asia (Siberia), and Western Asia. The Turkic languag ...
used a modified
Arabic alphabet,
İske imlâ. The deficiencies of this alphabet were both technical (abundance of positional letterforms complicated adoption of modern technology such as
typewriter
A typewriter is a mechanical or electromechanical machine for typing characters. Typically, a typewriter has an array of keys, and each one causes a different single character to be produced on paper by striking an inked ribbon selectivel ...
s and
teleprinter
A teleprinter (teletypewriter, teletype or TTY) is an electromechanical device that can be used to send and receive typed messages through various communications channels, in both point-to-point and point-to-multipoint configurations. Initia ...
s) and linguistic (
Arabic language
Arabic (, ' ; , ' or ) is a Semitic language spoken primarily across the Arab world.Semitic languages: an international handbook / edited by Stefan Weninger; in collaboration with Geoffrey Khan, Michael P. Streck, Janet C. E.Watson; Walter ...
has only three vowel qualities, but Tatar has nine, which had to be mapped onto combinations and variations of the three existing vowel letters). Because of this some Turkic intelligentsia tended to use the Latin or
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, ...
. The first attempts appeared in the mid-19th century among
Azerbaijanis
Azerbaijanis (; az, Azərbaycanlılar, ), Azeris ( az, Azərilər, ), or Azerbaijani Turks ( az, Azərbaycan Türkləri, ) are a Turkic people living mainly in northwestern Iran and the Republic of Azerbaijan. They are the second-most numer ...
.
[ М.З. Закиев. Тюрко-татарское письмо. История, состояние, перспективы. Москва, "Инсан", 2005] At the same period the Russian missionary
Nikolay Ilminsky
Nikolai Ivanovich Il'minskii (russian: Николай Иванович Ильминский; 1822–1891) was a Russian professor of Turkish languages at Kazan University and known as "Enlightener of Natives".
Following a highly successful care ...
, along with followers, invented a modified
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 ...
for the Turkic peoples of
Idel-Ural
Idel-Ural ( tt-Cyrl, Идел-Урал, translit=Idel-Üral, russian: Идель-Урал), literally Volga-Ural, is a historical region in Eastern Europe, in what is today Russia. The name literally means ''Volga-Urals'' in the Tatar language. T ...
, for the purpose of Christianization; Muslim Tatars did not use his alphabet.
In 1908–1909 the Tatar poet
Säğit Rämiev started to use the Latin script in his works. He used several
digraphs: ''ea'' for
''eu'' for
''eo'' for
and ''ei'' for
Arabists turned down his project, preferring to reform
İske imlâ. The simplified Arabic script, known as
Yaña imlâ, was used in 1920–1927.
During the
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 ...
, a special ''Central Committee for a New Alphabet'' was established in
Moscow
Moscow ( , US chiefly ; rus, links=no, Москва, r=Moskva, p=mɐskˈva, a=Москва.ogg) is the capital and largest city of Russia. The city stands on the Moskva River in Central Russia, with a population estimated at 13.0 million ...
. The first project for a Tatar-Bashkir Latin alphabet was published in ئشچی (''Eşce'', "The Worker") newspaper on 18 July 1924.
Sounds specific to the
Bashkir language
Bashkir (, ; Bashkir: ''Bashqortsa'', ''Bashqort tele'', ) is a Turkic language belonging to the Kipchak branch. It is co-official with Russian in Bashkortostan. It is spoken by approximately 1.4 million native speakers in Russia, as well as i ...
were written with digraphs.
Following the publication, the ''Latin dustь'' ("friends of the Latin script") society was formed in Kazan on 16 November 1924. It suggested its own version of Tatar Latin alphabet, which didn't cover Bashkir sounds.
In 1926 the Congress of
Turkologists in
Baku
Baku (, ; az, Bakı ) is the capital and largest city of Azerbaijan, as well as the largest city on the Caspian Sea and of the Caucasus region. Baku is located below sea level, which makes it the lowest lying national capital in the world a ...
recommended to switch all Turkic
languages
Language is a structured system of communication. The structure of a language is its grammar and the free components are its vocabulary. Languages are the primary means by which humans communicate, and may be conveyed through a variety of met ...
to the
Latin script
The Latin script, also known as Roman script, is an alphabetic writing system based on the letters of the classical Latin alphabet, derived from a form of the Greek alphabet which was in use in the ancient Greek city of Cumae, in southern Italy ...
. In April 1926 the ''Jaꞑa tatar əlifʙasь'' / ''Yaña tatar älifbası'' / ''Яңа татар әлифбасы'' (New Tatar alphabet) society started its work at
Kazan
Kazan ( ; rus, Казань, p=kɐˈzanʲ; tt-Cyrl, Казан, ''Qazan'', IPA: ɑzan is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Tatarstan in Russia. The city lies at the confluence of the Volga and the Kazanka rivers, covering a ...
.
On July 3, 1927,
Tatarstan
The Republic of Tatarstan (russian: Республика Татарстан, Respublika Tatarstan, p=rʲɪsˈpublʲɪkə tətɐrˈstan; tt-Cyrl, Татарстан Республикасы), or simply Tatarstan (russian: Татарстан, tt ...
officials declared Jaꞑalif the official script of the
Tatar language
Tatar ( or ) is a Turkic languages, Turkic language spoken by Volga Tatars, Tatars mainly located in modern Tatarstan (European Russia), as well as Siberia. It should not be confused with Crimean Tatar language, Crimean Tatar or Siberian Tat ...
, replacing the
Yaña imlâ script. The first variant of Jaꞑalif did not have separate letters for K and Q (realized as K) and for G and Ğ (realized as G), V and W (realized as W). Ş (sh) looked like the Cyrillic letter
Ш (she). C and Ç were realized as in Turkish and the modern Tatar Latin alphabet and later were transposed in the final version of Jaꞑalif.
In 1928 Jaꞑalif was reformed and remained in active use for 12 years. Some sources claim that this alphabet had 34 letters, but the last was a digraph ''Ьj'', used for the corresponding Tatar
diphthong
A diphthong ( ; , ), also known as a gliding vowel, is a combination of two adjacent vowel sounds within the same syllable. Technically, a diphthong is a vowel with two different targets: that is, the tongue (and/or other parts of the speech o ...
.
Another source states that the 34th letter was an
apostrophe
The apostrophe ( or ) is a punctuation mark, and sometimes a diacritical mark, in languages that use the Latin alphabet and some other alphabets. In English, the apostrophe is used for two basic purposes:
* The marking of the omission of one o ...
. They also give another sorting of the alphabet. (Ə after A, Ь after E)
After the introduction of Jaꞑalif most of the books which were printed in the Arabic alphabet were withdrawn from libraries.
''Eşce'' (1924) alphabetical order:
: A B C Ç D Dh E F G Ĝ H I J K L M N Ꞑ O Ö P Q R S T Th U Ü W V X Y Z Ƶ Ə Э
''Latin dustь'' (1924) alphabetical order:
: A B Ĝ Ç D E Ä Y F Gh G H I J Q K L M N Ng Ö O P R S T U Ü W X Z Ƶ Ş
Original Jaꞑalif (1927) alphabetical order:
: A B C Ç D E É Э F G H I J K L M N Ꞑ O Ó P R S T U V X Y Z Ƶ Ш W
Decline
Using two different alphabets for Russian and Turkic languages was problematic: people had to learn two different alphabets, confusing letters of one alphabet for letters from another, and Turkic languages had to use specific typewriters instead of sharing typewriters with Russian. In order to overcome these issues, a decision was made to convert Turkic languages to Cyrillic. In 1939 the
Stalinist
Stalinism is the means of governing and Marxist-Leninist policies implemented in the Soviet Union from 1927 to 1953 by Joseph Stalin. It included the creation of a one-party totalitarian police state, rapid industrialization, the theory o ...
government prohibited Jaꞑalif and it remained in use until January 1940. Jaꞑalif was also used in
Nazi
Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in ...
gazettes for prisoners of war and
propaganda
Propaganda is communication that is primarily used to influence or persuade an audience to further an agenda, which may not be objective and may be selectively presenting facts to encourage a particular synthesis or perception, or using loaded ...
during
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 ...
. The alphabet served until the 1950s, because most of the schoolbooks were printed before World War II. Some Tatar diasporas also used Jaꞑalif outside 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 ...
, for example the Tatar bureau of
Radio Free Europe
Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) is a United States government funded organization that broadcasts and reports news, information, and analysis to countries in Eastern Europe, Central Asia, Caucasus, and the Middle East where it says tha ...
.
For 12 years of usage the Latin script, Arabic script (and not only Jaña imlâ, but İske imlâ too) also were used. One of the
Musa Cälil
Musa Cälil ( tt-Cyrl, Муса Җәлил, translit=Musa Çəlil, ; russian: Муса Джалиль; 25 August 1944) was a Soviet–Tatar poet and resistance fighter. He is the only poet of the Soviet Union awarded simultaneously the Hero of t ...
's
Moabit Notebooks was written in Jaꞑalif, and another was written in Arabic letters. Both notebooks were written in German prison, after 1939, the year when the Cyrillic script was established.
Restoring Jañalif
In the 1990s some wanted to restore Jaꞑalif, or Jaꞑalif+W, as being appropriate for the modern Tatar phonetics. But technical problems, such as font problems and the disuse of
Uniform Turkic alphabet
A uniform is a variety of clothing worn by members of an organization while participating in that organization's activity. Modern uniforms are most often worn by armed forces and paramilitary organizations such as police, emergency services, ...
among other peoples, forced the use of a "
Turkish-based alphabet". In 2000 such an alphabet was adopted by the Tatarstan government, but in 2002 it was abolished by the
Russian Federation
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 ...
.
Inalif
The "Internet-style" alphabet named ''Inalif'' after ''
Internet
The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a '' network of networks'' that consists of private, pub ...
'' and ''älifba'' was convented in 2003 and partly it was inspired by Jaꞑalif. The main purpose of this alphabet was standardization of texts, which are typed on a standard English keyboard, without any diacritical marks. But this is not a simple transliteration of non-English symbols of Jaꞑalif or modern alphabet. Sounds absent from English are represented with digraphs; soft vowels are represented as a combination of the pairmate and
apostrophe
The apostrophe ( or ) is a punctuation mark, and sometimes a diacritical mark, in languages that use the Latin alphabet and some other alphabets. In English, the apostrophe is used for two basic purposes:
* The marking of the omission of one o ...
, apart from , corresponding to ⟨ь⟩ in Jaꞑalif, which is represented as ⟨y⟩, probably under influence of
transliteration of Russian
The romanization of the Russian language (the transliteration of Russian text from the Cyrillic script into the Latin script), aside from its primary use for including Russian names and words in text written in a Latin alphabet, is also essential ...
. Like in Jaꞑalif, ⟨j⟩ represent , and ⟨zh⟩ is used for , corresponding to ⟨ƶ⟩ in Jaꞑalif. ⟨x⟩ isn't used in Inalif, and ⟨kh⟩ is used instead. Other changes include: ⟨ä⟩ → ⟨a'⟩; ⟨ö⟩ → ⟨o'⟩; ⟨ü⟩ → ⟨u'⟩; ⟨ç⟩ → ⟨ch⟩; ⟨ğ⟩ → ⟨gh⟩; ⟨ñ⟩ → ⟨ng⟩; ⟨ş⟩ → ⟨sh⟩. The sorting order of Inalif isn't specified, but in practice, the English sorting order is used. Inalif is used only on the Internet.
Sources
See also
*
Tatar alphabet
Two scripts are currently used for the Tatar language: Arabic (in China) and Cyrillic (in Russia and Kazakhstan).
History of Tatar writing
Before 1928, the Tatar language was usually written using alphabets based on the Arabic alphabet: İske ...
*
Tatar language
Tatar ( or ) is a Turkic languages, Turkic language spoken by Volga Tatars, Tatars mainly located in modern Tatarstan (European Russia), as well as Siberia. It should not be confused with Crimean Tatar language, Crimean Tatar or Siberian Tat ...
*
Uniform Turkic Alphabet
A uniform is a variety of clothing worn by members of an organization while participating in that organization's activity. Modern uniforms are most often worn by armed forces and paramilitary organizations such as police, emergency services, ...
External links
Tatar Cyrillic-Latin text and website converter
{{DEFAULTSORT:Janalif
Tatar language
Latin alphabets
Alphabets used by Turkic languages
History of Tatarstan
Romanization
Writing systems introduced in 1924
1940 disestablishments in the Soviet Union
1924 establishments in the Soviet Union