Reformed Serbian based its alphabet on the previous 18th century Slavonic-Serbian script, following the principle of "write as you speak and read as it is written", removing obsolete letters and letters representing iotated vowels, introducing ⟨J⟩ from the Latin alphabet instead, and adding several consonant letters for sounds specific to Serbian phonology. During the same period, linguists led by Ljudevit Gaj adapted the Latin alphabet, in use in western South Slavic areas, using the same principles. As a result of this joint effort, Serbian Cyrillic and Gaj's Latin alphabets have a complete one-to-one congruence, with the Latin digraphs Lj, Nj, and Dž counting as single letters.
Serbian Cyrillic is an important symbol of Serbian identity.[4] In Serbia, official documents are printed in Cyrillic only[5] even though, according to a 2014 survey, 47% of the Serbian population write in the Latin alphabet whereas 36% write in Cyrillic.[6]
Modern alphabet
Example of typical cursive modern Serbian Cyrillic alphabetCapital letters of the Serbian Cyrillic alphabet Example of typical antique style in Serbian Cyrillic alphabet
The following table provides the upper and lower case forms of the Serbian Cyrillic alphabet, along with the equivalent forms in the Serbian Latin alphabet and the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) value for each letter. The letters do not have names, and consonants are normally pronounced as such when spelling is necessary (or followed by a short schwa, e.g. /fə/).:
According to tradition, Glagolitic was invented by the Byzantine Christian missionaries and brothers Saints Cyril and Methodius in the 860s, amid the Christianization of the Slavs. Glagolitic alphabet appears to be older, predating the introduction of Christianity, only formalized by Cyril and expanded to cover non-Greek sounds. The Glagolitic alphabet was gradually superseded in later centuries by the Cyrillic script, developed around by Cyril's disciples, perhaps at the Preslav Literary School at the end of the 9th century.[7]
The earliest form of Cyrillic was the ustav, based on Greek uncial script, augmented by ligatures and letters from the Glagolitic alphabet for consonants not found in Greek. There was no distinction between capital and lowercase letters. The standard language was based on the Slavic dialect of Thessaloniki.[7]
It's notable extensive use of diacritical signs by the Resava dialect and use of the djerv (Ꙉꙉ) for the Serbian reflexes of Pre-Slavic *tj and *dj (*t͡ɕ, *d͡ʑ, *d͡ʒ, and *tɕ), later the letter evolved to dje (Ђђ) and tshe (Ћћ) letters.
Karadžić's reform
Serbian linguist Vuk KaradžićSerbian Cyrillic Alphabet Script by Claude Duret, 16th centurySerbian Cyrillic Alphabet Script by Edmund Fry, 1799
Vuk Stefanović Karadžić fled Serbia during the Serbian Revolution in 1813, to Vienna. There he met Jernej Kopitar, a linguist with interest in slavistics. Kopitar and Sava Mrkalj helped Vuk to reform Serbian and its orthography. He finalized the alphabet in 1818 with the Serbian Dictionary.
Karadžić reformed standard Serbian and standardised the Serbian Cyrillic alphabet by following strict phonemic principles on the Johann Christoph Adelung' model and Jan Hus' Czech alphabet. Karadžić's reforms of standard Serbian modernised it and distanced it from Serbian and Russian Church Slavonic, instead bringing it closer to common folk speech, specifically, to the dialect of Eastern Herzegovina which he spoke. Karadžić was, together with Đuro Daničić, the main Serbian signatory to the Vienna Literary Agreement of 1850 which, encouraged by Austrian authorities, laid the foundation for Serbian, various forms of which are used by Serbs in Serbia, Montenegro, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Croatia today. Karadžić also translated the New Testament into Serbian, which was published in 1868.
He wrote several books; Mala prostonarodna slaveno-serbska pesnarica and Pismenica serbskoga jezika in 1814, and two more in 1815 and 1818, all with the alphabet still in progress. In his letters from 1815 to 1818 he used: Ю, Я, Ы and Ѳ. In his 1815 song book he dropped the Ѣ.[8]
The alphabet was officially adopted in 1868, four years after his death.[9]
From the Old Slavic script Vuk retained these 24 letters:
Orders issued on the 3 and 13 October 1914 banned the use of Serbian Cyrillic in the Kingdom of Croatia-Slavonia, limiting it for use in religious instruction. A decree was passed on January 3, 1915, that banned Serbian Cyrillic completely from public use. An imperial order on October 25, 1915, banned the use of Serbian Cyrillic in the Condominium of Bosnia and Herzegovina, except "within the scope of Serbian Orthodox Church authorities".[10][11]
The Serbian Cyrillic script was one of the two official scripts used to write Serbo-Croatian in Yugoslavia since its establishment in 1918, the other being Gaj's Latin alphabet (latinica).
Following the breakup of Yugoslavia in the 1990s, Serbian Cyrillic is no longer used in Croatia on national level, while in Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Montenegro it remained an official script.[16]
Serbian Cyrillic, from Comparative orthography of European languages. Source: Vuk Stefanović Karadžić "Srpske narodne pjesme" (Serbian folk poems), Vienna, 1841
⟨Ћ⟩ was adopted by Karadžić to represent the voiceless alveolo-palatal affricate (IPA: /tɕ/). The letter was based on, but different in appearance to, the letter Djerv, which is the 12th letter of the Glagolitic alphabet; that letter had been used in written Serbian since the 9th century, to represent /ɡʲ/, /dʲ/ and /dʑ/.
Karadžić adopted a design by Serbian poet, prose writer, polyglot, and Serbian Orthodox bishop Lukijan Mušicki for the letter ⟨Ђ⟩. It was based on the letter ⟨Ћ⟩, as adapted by Karadžić.
⟨Ј⟩ was adopted from the Latin alphabet, apparently in preference to ⟨Й⟩.
Alternate Bulgarian (Western) upright forms in the middle.
Alternate Serbian (Southern) italic forms on the right.
Serbian Cyrillic does not use several letters encountered in other Slavic Cyrillic alphabets. It does not use hard sign (ъ) and soft sign (ь), particularly due to a lack of distinction between iotated consonants and non-iotated consonants, but the aforementioned soft-sign ligatures instead. It does not have Russian/Belarusian Э, Ukrainian/Belarusian І, the semi-vowels Й or Ў, nor the iotated letters Я (Russian/Bulgarian ya), Є (Ukrainian ye), Ї (yi), Ё (Russian yo) or Ю (yu), which are instead written as two separate letters: Ја, Је, Ји, Јо, Ју. Ј can also be used as a semi-vowel, in place of й. The letter Щ is not used. When necessary, it is transliterated as either ШЧ, ШЋ or ШТ.
Serbian italic and cursive forms of lowercase letters б, г, д, п, and т (Russian Cyrillic alphabet) differ from those used in other Cyrillic alphabets: б, г, д, п, and т (Serbian Cyrillic alphabet). The regular (upright) shapes are generally standardized among languages and there are no officially recognized variations.[18][19] That presents a challenge in Unicode modeling, as the glyphs differ only in italic versions, and historically non-italic letters have been used in the same code positions. Serbian professional typography uses fonts specially crafted for the language to overcome the problem, but texts printed from common computers contain East Slavic rather than Serbian italic glyphs. Cyrillic fonts from Adobe,[20] Microsoft (Windows Vista and later) and a few other font houses[citation needed] include the Serbian variations (both regular and italic).
If the underlying font and Web technology provides support, the proper glyphs can be obtained by marking the text with appropriate language codes. Thus, in non-italic mode:
<span lang="sr">бгдпт</span>, produces in Serbian language script: бгдпт, same (except for the shape of б) as
<span lang="ru">бгдпт</span>, producing in Russian language script: бгдпт
whereas:
<span lang="sr" style="font-style: italic">бгдпт</span> gives in Serbian language script: бгдпт, and
<span lang="ru" style="font-style: italic">бгдпт</span> produces in Russian language script: бгдпт.
Since Unicode unifies different glyphs in same characters,[21] font support must be present to display the correct variant.
^ abCubberley, Paul (1996) "The Slavic Alphabets". in Daniels, Peter T., and William Bright, eds. (1996). The World's Writing Systems. Oxford University Press. ISBN0-19-507993-0.
^The life and times of Vuk Stefanović Karadžić, p. 387
Isailović, Neven G.; Krstić, Aleksandar R. (2015). "Serbian Language and Cyrillic Script as a Means of Diplomatic Literacy in South Eastern Europe in 15th and 16th Centuries". Literacy Experiences concerning Medieval and Early Modern Transylvania. Cluj-Napoca: George Bariţiu Institute of History. pp. 185–195.
Sir Duncan Wilson, The life and times of Vuk Stefanović Karadžić, 1787-1864: literacy, literature and national independence in Serbia, p. 387. Clarendon Press, 1970. Google Books
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