| Mongolian script | ||
|---|---|---|
| Type | Alphabet | |
| Languages | Mongolian language Evenk language |
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| Created by | Tatar-Tonga | |
| Time period | ca.1204 – today | |
| Parent systems | Proto-Canaanite alphabet → Phoenician alphabet → Aramaic alphabet → Syriac alphabet → Sogdian alphabet → Uyghur script → Mongolian script |
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| Child systems | Manchu script Clear script Vaghintara script |
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| Unicode range | U+1800 – U+18AF | |
| ISO 15924 | Mong | |
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| Note: This page may contain IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. | ||
The classical Mongolian script (Mongolian: монгол бичиг, mongol bichig) was the first of many writing systems created for the Mongolian language. With only minor modification, it is used in Inner Mongolia in China to this day to write Mongolian and the Evenk language. The script was created by the Uyghur scribe, Tatar-Tonga. He had been captured by the Mongols during a war against the Naimans around 1204, and Genghis Khan then ordered him to create a writing system for the Mongolian language. He did so by adapting the Uyghur alphabet, a descendant of the Syriac alphabet, via Sogdian. Its most salient feature is its vertical direction. It is one of the few vertical scripts written from left to right. Most other vertical writing systems are written right to left, but the medieval Uyghur alphabet and its descendants—the Mongolian, the Oirat Clear, the Manchu, and the Buryat alphabets—proceed from left to right. This is because the Uyghurs rotated their script 90 degrees counterclockwise to emulate the Chinese writing system. In 1587, Ayuush Güüsh (Аюуш гүүш) devised a number of extra characters to transcribe the sounds of foreign languages like Tibetan, Chinese, and Sanskrit. This extension is known under the name Ali-Gali (Али-гали).
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The characters
Characters take different shapes depending on their initial, medial, or final position within a word. In some cases, there are additional graphic variations, which are selected for better visual harmony with the subsequent character. The alphabet fails to make several vowel (o/u, ö/ü, final a/e) and consonant (t/d, k/g, sometimes ž/y) distinctions of Mongolian that were not required for Uighur{source}. The result is somewhat comparable to the situation of English, which must represent 10 or more vowels with only 5 letters, and uses the digraph th for two distinct sounds. It's relatively rare that this leads to actual ambiguity, because the requirements of vowel harmony and syllable sequence usually determine the right choice.
| Characters | Transliteration | Notes | ||||
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| initial | medial | final | Latin[1] | Cyrillic | ||
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a | А | Distinction usually by vowel harmony (see also q/γ and k/g below) | |
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e | Э | ||||
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i, yi | И,Й, Ы, Ь | At end of word today often absorbed into preceding syllable | |
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o, u | О, У | Distinction depending on context. | |
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ö, ü | Ө, Ү | Distinction depending on context. | |
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 [4]
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n | Н | Distinction from medial and final a/e by position in syllable sequence. | |
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ng | Н, НГ | Only at end of word (medial for composites). Transcribes Tibetan ང; Sanskrit ङ. |
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b | Б, В | ||
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p | П | Only at the beginning of Mongolian words. Transcribes Tibetan པ; |
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q | Х | Only with back vowels | |
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γ | Г | Only with back vowels. Between vowels today pronounced as long vowel.[6] |
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k | Х | Only with front vowels. g between vowels today pronounced as long vowel.[7] |
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| g | Г | |||||
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m | М | ||
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l | Л | ||
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s | С | ||
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š | Ш | Pronunciation of this character hasn't changed. | |
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t, d | Т, Д | Distinction depending on context. | |
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č | Ч, Ц | Originally no distinction between /tʃ'/ and /ts'/, today by context. | ||
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ǰ | Ж, З | Distinction by context.
Originally often interchanged with y below. |
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y | Е, Ё, И, Ю, Я | Part of diphthongs, although technically a consonant. | |
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r | Р | Not normally at the beginning of words.[8] | |
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v | В | Transcribes Sanskrit व. | ||
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f | Ф | Medieval Mongolian didn't use this sound. | ||
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ḳ | К | Transcribes Russian К. | ||
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(c) | (ц) | Transcribes Tibetan /ts'/ ཚ; Sanskrit छ. | ||
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(z) | (з) | Transcribes Tibetan /dz/ ཛ; Sanskrit ज. | ||
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(h) | Transcribes Tibetan /h/ ཧ, ྷ; Sanskrit ह. | |||
Examples
| Historical shapes | Modern print type | Transliterating first word: | |||||||||||||||||||||
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- transliteration: Vikipediya čilügetü nebterkei toli bičig bolai.
- Cyrillic: Википедиа Чөлөөт Нэвтэрхий Толь Бичиг Болой.
- Transcription: Vikipedia chölööt nevterkhii toli bichig boloi.
- Gloss: Wikipedia free omni-profound mirror scripture is.
- Translation: Wikipedia is the free encyclopedia.
Derivate scripts
Clear script
In 1648, the Oirat Buddhist monk Zaya-pandita Namkhaijamco created this variation with the goal of bringing the written language closer to the actual pronunciation, and to make it easier to transcribe Tibetan and Sanskrit. The script was used by Kalmyks of Russia until 1924, when it was replaced by the Cyrillic alphabet. In Xinjiang, China the Oirat people still use it.
Vaghintara script
Another variant was developed in 1905 by a Buryat monk named Agvan Dorjiev (1854–1938). It was meant to also reduce ambiguity, and to support the Russian language in addition to Mongolian. The most significant change however was the elimination of the positional shape variations. All characters were based on the medial variant of the original Mongol script. After a few years Agvan-Dorjiev ran out of funds to further promote his invention, so that less than a dozen books were printed using it.
Mongolian in Unicode
The Unicode Mongolian block is U+1800 – U+18AF.[9] It includes letters, digits and various punctuation marks for Mongolian, Todo script, Xibe, and Manchu, as well as extensions for transcribing Sanskrit and Tibetan.
Notes and references
- ^ Poppe, Nicolas Grammar of Written Mongolian 3rd ed. University of Washington, 1974.
- ^ Following a consonant, latin transliteration is i.
- ^ Following a vowel, latin transliteration is yi, with rare exceptions like naim (eight) or Naiman.
- ^ Character for front of syllable (n-<vowel>).
- ^ Character for back of syllable (<vowel>-n).
- ^ Examples: qa-γ-an (khan) is shortened to qaan. Some exceptions like tsa-g-aan (white) exist.
- ^ Example: de-g-er is shortened to deer. Some exceptions like ügüi (no) exist.
- ^ Transcribed foreign words usually get a vowel prepended. Example: Transcribing Русь (Russia) results in Oros.
- ^ Unicode block U+1800 – U+18AF; Mongolian.
External links
- Omniglot: Mongolian Alphabet
- The Silver Horde: Mongol Scripts
- Lingua Mongolia: Mongolian Alphabet, including tutorial
- GB18030 Support Package for Windows 2000/XP, including Chinese, Tibetan, Yi, Mongolian and Thai font by Microsoft
- Inkway Mongolian Calligraphy
