Georgian scripts

Georgian alphabet
Script type	Alphabet
Time period	c. AD 430 to present
Direction	Left-to-right
Languages	South Caucasian (Kartvelian) languages
ISO 15924
ISO 15924	Geor (240), ​Georgian (Mkhedruli and Mtavruli)
Unicode
Unicode alias	Georgian

The Georgian alphabet (Georgian: ქართული დამწერლობა) is the writing system currently used to write the Georgian language and other South Caucasian (Kartvelian) languages (Mingrelian, Svan and sometimes Laz), and occasionally other languages of the Caucasus (such as Ossetic and Abkhaz in the 1940s). The Georgian language has phonemic orthography and the modern alphabet has thirty-three letters.

The Georgian word for "alphabet" is ანბანი (anbani), after the names of the first two letters of the Georgian alphabets.

The Georgian script makes no distinction between upper and lower case.

History of the Georgian alphabets

The three forms of the Georgian alphabet

Since its adaptation to a written form, the Georgian alphabet has progressed through three forms, that were originally distinct alphabets, even if they have been used together to write the same languages, and these alphabets share the same letter names. However, the last one contains more letters than the two historical ones, even if those extra letters are no longer needed for writing modern Georgian:

Asomtavruli ("capital"), the historical monumental alphabet

Ancient Asomtavruli version of Georgian alphabet in David Gareja Monastery.

Georgia (kingdom of Iberia) was converted to Christianity in the 330s. Scholars believe that the creation of a Georgian alphabet was instrumental in making the religious scripture more accessible to the Georgians. This happened in the 4th or 5th century, not long after the conversion. The oldest uncontroversial examples of Georgian writing are an asomtavruli inscription in a church in Bethlehem from 430 CE.

The examples of the earliest alphabet, asomtavruli (ასომთავრული; "capital letters") also known as mrgvlovani (მრგვლოვანი; "rounded"), are still preserved in monumental inscriptions, such as those of the Georgian church in Bethlehem (near Jerusalem, 430) and the church of Bolnisi Sioni near Tbilisi (4th-5th centuries).

Despite of its common Georgian name, this rounded alphabet was initially purely unicameral, just like the modern Georgian alphabet.

Georgian historical tradition attributes the invention of the Georgian alphabet to Parnavaz I of Iberia in the 3rd century BC. The modern Georgian scholar Levan Chilashvili, on the basis of dating the Nekresi inscription in eastern Georgia to the 1st-2nd century AD, claims that Parnavaz likely created the script in order to translate the Avesta (i.e., sacred Zoroastrian writings) into Georgian. However, the pre-Christian origin of the Georgian script has not yet been firmly supported by archaeology.

Yet, a unique local form of Aramaic known as "Armazuli" did exist as demonstrated by the 1940s discovery of a bilingual Greco-Aramaic insciption at Mtskheta, Georgia. It is conceivable that local pre-Christian records did exist, but were subsequently destroyed by zealous Christians. Many found more palatable the idea that the medieval Georgian chronicles actually refer to the introduction of a local form of written Aramaic during the reign of Parnavaz.

The earliest recorded account about the origin of the Georgian alphabet belongs to the 5th-century Armenian author Koryun, who attributes its creation to his mentor Saint Mesrop, the inventor of the Armenian alphabet.

None of above-mentioned traditions seems to have much currency as, in the view of modern scholars, the only convincing explanation for the similarities has to be the same influences rather than the same creator.

Asomtavruli letters
Ⴀ	Ⴁ	Ⴂ	Ⴃ	Ⴄ	Ⴅ	Ⴆ	Ⴡ	Ⴇ	Ⴈ	Ⴉ	Ⴊ	Ⴋ	Ⴌ
Ⴢ	Ⴍ	Ⴎ	Ⴏ	Ⴐ	Ⴑ	Ⴒ	Ⴣ	Ⴓ	Ⴔ	Ⴕ	Ⴖ	Ⴗ	Ⴘ
Ⴙ	Ⴚ	Ⴛ	Ⴜ	Ⴝ	Ⴞ	Ⴤ	Ⴟ	Ⴠ	Ⴥ
Note that some fonts for modern Georgian are not showing the actual Asomtavruli monumental letter forms for these letters, but are instead showing taller (capitalized) variants of the modern Mkhedruli alphabet (see below).

This unicameral alphabet is still used today in some section headings and book titles, and sometimes used in a pseudo-bicameral way by varying the glyph sizes for creating capitals. Since it is no longer used for writing Georgian, it has also been reused in a creative way for writing capital letters, along with letters of one of the two other Georgian alphabets.

Nuskhuri ("minuscule"), the ecclesiastical alphabet

The nuskhuri (ნუსხური; "minuscule") alphabet first appeared in the 9th century. It was mostly used in ecclesiastical works.

The forms of the Khutsuri letters may have been derived from the northern Arsacid variant of the Pahlavi (or Middle Iranian) script, which itself was derived from the older Aramaic, although the direction of writing (from left to right), the use of separate symbols for the vowel sounds, the numerical values assigned to the letters in earlier times, and the order of the letters all point to significant Greek influence on the script.

However, the Georgian linguist Tamaz Gamkrelidze argues that the forms of the letters are freely invented in imitation of the Greek model rather than directly based upon earlier forms of the Aramaic alphabet, even though the Georgian phonological inventory is very different from Greek.

Just like the monumental asomtavruli alphabet, this squared alphabet was initially purely unicameral.

However, it has also been used also along with the asomtavruli alphabet (serving as capital letters in religious manuscripts) to form the khutsuri (ხუცური; "church script") bicameral style that is still used sometimes today.

Mkhedruli ("secular"), the current alphabet

The currently used alphabet, called mkhedruli (მხედრული, "secular" or "military writing"), first appeared in the 11th century. It was used for non-religious purposes up until the eighteenth century, when it completely replaced the khutsuri style (that used the two previous alphabets).

Mkhedruli letters
ა	ბ	გ	დ	ე	ვ	ზ	ჱ	თ	ი	კ	ლ	მ	ნ
ჲ	ო	პ	ჟ	რ	ს	ტ	ჳ	უ	ფ	ქ	ღ	ყ	შ
ჩ	ც	ძ	წ	ჭ	ხ	ჴ	ჯ	ჰ	ჵ	ჶ	ჷ	ჸ

Seven of the original forty mkhedruli letters are now obsolete.

Just like the two other alphabets, the mkhedruli alphabet is purely unicameral. However, certain modern writers have experimented with using the obsolete asomtavruli letters (see above) as capitals.

Just like with the khutsuri script style, it is also sometimes used in a bicameral way along with the monumental asomtavruli (serving as capital letters), however this appears most often results from the confusion introduced by the religious khutsuri style and ignorance rather than the result of a creative design choice. Georgians often consider this as an error, given that some old Mkhedruli letters don't have any mapping to the monumental alphabet. Others are just using the Mkhedruli alphabet alone in a pseudo-bicameral way, by just adapting its letter sizes to create pseudo-capital letters.

Transcription

This table only lists the modern (monocameral) mkhedruli alphabet (i.e. 33 letters that are also convertible to the other two alphabets, excluding the 7 additional mkhedruli letters that are now obsolete).

Letters	Unicode	Name	National	ISO 9984	BGN	IPA
ა	U+10D0	an	A a	A a	А а	/ɑ/
ბ	U+10D1	ban	B b	B b	B b	/b/
გ	U+10D2	gan	G g	G g	G g	/ɡ/
დ	U+10D3	don	D d	D d	D d	/d/
ე	U+10D4	en	E e	E e	E e	/ɛ/
ვ	U+10D5	vin	V v	V v	V v	/v/
ზ	U+10D6	zen	Z z	Z z	Z z	/z/
თ	U+10D7	t'an	T t	T' t'	T' t'	/tʰ/
ი	U+10D8	in	I i	I i	I i	/i/
კ	U+10D9	kan	K' k'	K k	K k	/kʼ/
ლ	U+10DA	las	L l	L l	L l	/l/
მ	U+10DB	man	M m	M m	M m	/m/
ნ	U+10DC	nar	N n	N n	N n	/n/
ო	U+10DD	on	O o	O o	O o	/ɔ/
პ	U+10DE	par	P' p'	P p	P p	/pʼ/
ჟ	U+10DF	žan	Zh zh	Ž ž	Zh zh	/ʒ/
რ	U+10E0	rae	R r	R r	R r	/r/
ს	U+10E1	san	S s	S s	S s	/s/
ტ	U+10E2	tar	T' t'	T' t'	T t	/tʼ/
უ	U+10E3	un	U u	U u	U u	/u/
ფ	U+10E4	p'ar	P p	P' p'	P' p'	/pʰ/
ქ	U+10E5	kan	K k	K' k'	K' k'	/kʰ/
ღ	U+10E6	ḡan	Gh gh	Ḡ ḡ	Gh gh	/ɣ/
ყ	U+10E7	qar	Q' q'	Q q	Q q	/qʼ/
შ	U+10E8	šin	Sh sh	Š š	Sh sh	/ʃ/
ჩ	U+10E9	č'in	Ch ch	Č' č'	Ch' ch'	/tʃ/
ც	U+10EA	c'an	Ts ts	C' c'	Ts' ts'	/ts/
ძ	U+10EB	jil	Dz dz	J j	Dz dz	/dz/
წ	U+10EC	cil	Ts' ts'	C c	Ts ts	/tsʼ/
ჭ	U+10ED	čar	Ch' ch'	Č č	Ch ch	/tʃʼ/
ხ	U+10EE	xan	Kh kh	X x	Kh kh	/x/
ჯ	U+10EF	ǰan	J j	J̌ ǰ	J j	/dʒ/
ჰ	U+10F0	hae	H h	H h	H h	/h/

See also

• Georgian national system of romanization
• ISO 9984
• BGN/PCGN romanization
• Genealogy of scripts derived from Proto-Sinaitic
• History of the alphabet
• Armenian alphabet

External links

• Georgian Website / Portal with info on Georgian culture and language
• Direct transliteration latin ↔ georgian
• Georgian fonts, compliant with Unicode 4.0, also available for MAC OS 9 or X
• Template:PDFlink
• Template:PDFlink