Kurdish alphabets

Kurdish alphabets
The Kurdish languages are written in either of two alphabets: a Latin alphabet introduced by Celadet Alî Bedirxan in 1932 called the Bedirxan alphabet or Hawar alphabet (after the Hawar magazine) and an 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, Turkey and Armenia; the Central Kurdish in Iraq and Iran. Two additional alphabets, based on the Armenian alphabet and the Cyrillic script, were once used by Kurds in the Soviet Union, most notably in the Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic and Kurdistansky Uyezd.
Hawar alphabet
Usually it is the northern languages spoken by Kurds, Zazaki and Kurmanji, that are written in the extended Latin alphabet consisting of the 26 letters of the ISO basic Latin Alphabet with 5 letters with diacritics, for a total of 31 letters (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 diacritics on to distinguish the Arabic and sounds (see page 12, 13). These are not considered letters, but are used to disambiguate loanwords that would otherwise be conflated.
Turkey does not recognize this alphabet. Using the letters Q, W, and X, which did not exist in the Turkish alphabet until 2013, led to a trial in 2000 and 2003 (see , p. 8, and ). 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.
History
The Kurdish Latin alphabet was elaborated mainly by Celadet Bedirxan who initially had sought the cooperation of 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 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 alphabet to make it more user-friendly.
Sorani alphabet
Many Kurdish languages, mainly Sorani, are written using a modified Persian alphabet with 33 letters introduced by Sa'id Kaban Sedqi. Unlike the Persian alphabet, which is an abjad, Central Kurdish is almost a true alphabet in which vowels are given the same treatment as 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 consonants, as well as a voiced velar fricative, 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 and Iran 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 some letters in English, both (u) and (î) 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
An old Kurdish alphabet is documented by the 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 alphabet
A third system, used for the few (Kurmanji-speaking) Kurds in the former Soviet Union, especially in Armenia, used a Cyrillic alphabet, consisting of 40 letters. It was designed in 1946 by Heciyê Cindî.
Armenian alphabet
From 1921 to 1929, a modified version of the Armenian alphabet was used for Kurmanji, in the Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic.
It was then replaced with a Yañalif-like Latin alphabet during the campaigns for Latinisation in the Soviet Union.
Soviet Latin alphabet
In 1928, Kurdish languages in all of the Soviet Union, 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:
The Yezidi script is written from right to left and was used to write in Kurdish, specifically in the Kurmanji dialect (also called Northern Kurdish). The script has a long history, according to some data, it can be dated back to 13th-14th centuries, however, some scholars trace the creation of this script to 17th-18th centuries. The author of the script is unknown, but it was used for two manuscripts, Meṣḥefa Reş and Kitêba Cilwe, first published by Anastase Marie in 1911.
It is believed that historically, there existed two sacred Yezidi manuscripts known as Meshefa Reş and Kitêba Cilwe, but the originals were lost. Later copies of these manuscripts were found, written in a special Yezidi alphabet, however, their contents was distorted. As a result, while the Yazidi clergy do recognize the Yezidi alphabet, they do not consider the content of these two manuscripts to be sources of the Yezidi religion.
In 2013, the Spiritual Council of Yazidis in Georgia decided to revive the Yezidi script and use it for writing prayers, religious books, on the organization letterhead and in the Yazidi heraldry. Today, it is used by the Yazidi clergymen in the Yazidi temple of Sultan Ezid at Tbilisi, where the names of the Yazidi saints are written on walls in this alphabet. Furthermore, Dua'yêd Êzdiyan, a book containing a collection of Yazidi prayers, was written and published in the Yezidi alphabet.
Comparison of Kurdish alphabets
See also
Kurdish typography
Help:IPA/Kurdish
Notes
References
External links
KAL – A table of the various Kurdish alphabets
Omniglot: Kurdish language, alphabet and pronunciation
Kurdish Unicode Fonts
Latin alphabets
Arabic alphabets
Persian alphabets
Kurdish language
Writing systems of Asia
Cyrillic letters
Cyrillic alphabets