Cyrillic alphabet

Cyrillic Alphabet

The Cyrillic alphabet is a writing system developed in the First Bulgarian Empire during the 9th century AD. It is used in various forms in over 50 languages, primarily in Eastern Europe and Northern and Central Asia. The alphabet is named after Saint Cyril, who, along with his brother Saint Methodius, created the Glagolitic alphabet, which is considered a precursor to Cyrillic.

History

The Cyrillic script was developed in the Preslav Literary School in the First Bulgarian Empire. It was created to facilitate the spread of Christianity among the Slavic peoples. The script was based on the Greek alphabet with additional letters to represent Slavic sounds not found in Greek.

The earliest form of the Cyrillic alphabet was used for the Old Church Slavonic language, the liturgical language of the Orthodox Slavs. Over time, the alphabet was adapted to write various other Slavic languages, as well as non-Slavic languages.

Structure

The modern Cyrillic alphabet consists of 33 letters in its Russian form, though the number of letters can vary in other languages. The alphabet includes:

• 21 consonants
• 10 vowels
• 1 semivowel
• 1 hard sign (ъ)
• 1 soft sign (ь)

Letters

The following is a list of the letters in the Russian Cyrillic alphabet:

Uppercase	Lowercase	Name	Pronunciation
А	а	A	/a/
Б	б	Be	/b/
В	в	Ve	/v/
Г	г	Ge	/ɡ/
Д	д	De	/d/
Е	е	Ye	/je/
Ё	ё	Yo	/jo/
Ж	ж	Zhe	/ʐ/
З	з	Ze	/z/
И	и	I	/i/
Й	й	Short I	/j/
К	к	Ka	/k/
Л	л	El	/l/
М	м	Em	/m/
Н	н	En	/n/
О	о	O	/o/
П	п	Pe	/p/
Р	р	Er	/r/
С	с	Es	/s/
Т	т	Te	/t/
У	у	U	/u/
Ф	ф	Ef	/f/
Х	х	Kha	/x/
Ц	ц	Tse	/ts/
Ч	ч	Che	/tʃ/
Ш	ш	Sha	/ʂ/
Щ	щ	Shcha	/ɕː/
Ы	ы	Y	/ɨ/
Э	э	E	/ɛ/
Ю	ю	Yu	/ju/
Я	я	Ya	/ja/
Ъ	ъ	Hard sign	Silent
Ь	ь	Soft sign	Silent

Usage

The Cyrillic alphabet is used in many languages, including but not limited to:

• Russian
• Bulgarian
• Serbian
• Ukrainian
• Macedonian
• Belarusian

In addition to these, it is also used in various non-Slavic languages such as Kazakh, Kyrgyz, and Tajik.

Modern Reforms

Throughout history, the Cyrillic alphabet has undergone several reforms. The most significant reform was carried out in Russia in 1918, which simplified the alphabet and removed several obsolete letters. Other countries have also made modifications to suit their linguistic needs.

See Also

• Greek alphabet
• Glagolitic alphabet
• Orthodox Christianity

References

• "Cyrillic alphabet". Encyclopaedia Britannica. Retrieved 2023-10-15.