Mongolian script

Mongolian script
Script type	Alphabet
Time period	ca.1204 – today
Direction	Vertical left-to-right, left-to-right
Languages	Mongolian language Evenki language
Related scripts
Parent systems	Proto-Sinaitic alphabet Phoenician alphabet Aramaic alphabet Syriac alphabet Sogdian alphabet Old Uyghur alphabet Uyghurjin script Mongolian script
Child systems	Manchu script Clear script Vaghintara script
ISO 15924
ISO 15924	Mong (145), ​Mongolian
Unicode
Unicode alias	Mongolian
Unicode range	U+1800 – U+18AF

Mongolian script (in Mongolian script: (ᠮᠣᠩᠭᠣᠯ ᠪᠢᠴᠢᠭ᠌) Mongɢol bičig; in Mongolian Cyrillic: Монгол бичиг, Mongol bichig), or Hudum Mongolian script (in comparison with Todo Mongolian script), was the first of many writing systems created for the Mongolian language and the most successful until the introduction of Cyrillic to Mongolia in 1946. With minor modification, the classic vertical script is used in Inner Mongolia to this day to write both Mongolian and the Evenki language.

History

File:Genghis stone.jpg

The Stele of Yisüngge, possibly the oldest surviving monument, in Uyghur-Mongolian script. Hermitage Museum, Saint Petersburg, Russia.

The Mongolian vertical script was developed as an adaption of the Uyghur script to write the Mongolian language. It was introduced by the Uyghur scribe Tatar-Tonga, who had been captured by the Mongols during a war against the Naimans around 1204. There were no substantive changes to the Uyghur form for the first few centuries, so that, for example, initial yodh stood for both [dʒ] and [j], while medial tsadi stood for both [dʒ] and [tʃ], and there was no letter for [d] in initial position. Mongolian sources often distinguish the early forms by using the term Uyghurjin script (Chinese: 回鹘式蒙古文, Mongolian for Uyghur style script). Western sources tend to use this term as a synonym for all variations of the Mongolian script.

Eventually, minor concessions were made to the differences between the Uyghur and Mongol languages: In the 17th and 18th centuries, smoother and more angular versions of tsadi became associated with [dʒ] and [tʃ] respectively, and in the 19th century, the Manchu hooked yodh was adopted for initial [j]. Zain was dropped as it was redundant for [s]. Various schools of orthography, some using diacritics, were developed to avoid ambiguity.

Mongolian is written vertically. The Uyghur script and its descendants—Mongolian, Oirat Clear, Manchu, and Buryat—are the only vertical scripts written from left to right. This developed because the Uyghurs rotated their Sogdian-derived script, originally written right to left, 90 degrees counterclockwise to emulate Chinese writing, but without changing the relative orientation of the letters.

The characters

The word Monggol in the classic script

A KFC in Hohhot. All street signs must be bilingual in Mongol and Chinese.

File:Gaykhatu coin with Khagan's name.jpg

Coin bears the legend "Struck by Rinchindorji Gaykhatu in the name of Khagan" in Mongolian script. (Minted in Iran.)

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 Uyghur. The result is somewhat comparable to the situation of English, which must represent ten or more vowels with only five letters and uses the digraph th for two distinct sounds. Sometimes, ambiguity is avoided, because the requirements of vowel harmony and syllable sequence usually determine the right choice. Moreover, as there are few words with an exactly identical spelling, actual ambiguities are rare for a reader who knows the orthography.

Characters				Transliteration		Notes
initial	medial	final		Latin	Cyrillic
				a	А	Distinction usually by vowel harmony (see also q/γ and k/g below)
				e	Э
				i, yi	И,Й, Ы, Ь	At end of word today often absorbed into preceding syllable
				o, ʊ	О, У	Distinction depending on context.
File:Mg öü initial.png				ɵ, u	Ө, Ү	Distinction depending on context.
				n	Н	Distinction from medial and final a/e by position in syllable sequence.
				ng	Н, НГ	Only at end of word (medial for composites). Transcribes Tibetan ང; Sanskrit ङ.
				b	Б, В	In classical Mongolian v is used only for transcribing foreign words, so most "В (V)" in Cyrillic Mongolian become "Б (B)" in classical Mongolian.
				p	П	Only at the beginning of Mongolian words. Transcribes Tibetan པ;
				h	Х	Only with back vowels
				ɢ	Г	Only with back vowels. Between vowels pronounced as a long vowel in oral Mongolian. The "final" version only appears when followed by an a written detached from the word.
				k	Х	Only with front vowels, but 'ki/gi' can occur in both front and back vowel words Word-finally only g, not k. g between vowels pronounced as long vowel.
				g	Г
				m	М
				l	Л
				s	С
				š	Ш
				t, d	Т, Д	Distinction depending on context.
				č	Ч, Ц	Distinction between /tʃ'/ and /ts'/ in Khalkha Mongolian.
				j	Ж, З	Distinction by context in Khalkha Mongolian.
				y	-Й, Е*, Ё*, Ю*, Я*
				r	Р	Not normally at the beginning of words.
				v	В	Used to transcribe foreign words (Originally used to transcribe Sanskrit व)
				f	Ф	Used to transcribe foreign words
				ḳ	К	Used to transcribe foreign words
				(c)	(ц)	Used to transcribe foreign words (Originally used to transcribe Tibetan /ts'/ ཚ; Sanskrit छ)
				(z)	(з)	Used to transcribe foreign words (Originally used to transcribe Tibetan /dz/ ཛ; Sanskrit ज)
				(h)	(г, х)	Used to transcribe foreign words (Originally used to transcribe Tibetan /h/ ཧ, ྷ; Sanskrit ह)
				(zh)	(-,-)	Transcribes Chinese 'zhi' - used in Inner Mongolia
				(ř)	(-,-)	Transcribes Chinese 'ri' - used in Inner Mongolia
				(chi)	(-,-)	Transcribes Chinese 'chi' - used in Inner Mongolia

Notes:

Examples

Historical shapes	Modern print type	Transliterating first word:
		v 　 i k i p e d i y a

• transliteration: Vikipediya čilugetu nebterkei toli bičig bolai.
• Cyrillic: Википедиа Чөлөөт Нэвтэрхий Толь Бичиг Болой.
• Transcription: Vikipedia chɵlɵɵt nevterkhii toli bichig boloi.
• Gloss: Wikipedia free omni-profound mirror scripture is.
• Translation: Wikipedia is the free encyclopedia.

Derived scripts

Galik script

Main article: Galik script

In 1587, the translator and scholar Ayuush Güüsh (Аюуш гүүш) created the Galik script (Али-гали), inspired by the 3. Dalai Lama, Sonam Gyatso. It primarily added extra characters for transcribing Tibetan and Sanskrit terms when translating religious texts, and later also from Chinese. Some of those characters are still in use today for writing foreign names (compare table above).

Clear script

Main article: Clear script

In 1648, the Oirat Buddhist monk Zaya-pandita Namkhaijamco created this variation with the goals of bringing the written language closer to the actual pronunciation and making 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.

Manchu script

Main article: Manchu alphabet

The Manchu script was developed from the Mongolian script in the early 17th century to write the Manchu language. A variant is still used to write the Xibe language.

Vaghintara script

Another variant was developed in 1905 by a Buryat monk named Agvan Dorjiev (1854–1938). It was also meant to 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 promote his invention further, so that fewer than a dozen books were printed using it.

Mongolian in Unicode

The Unicode Mongolian block is U+1800 – U+18AF. It includes letters, digits and various punctuation marks for Mongolian, Todo script, Xibe script, Ali Gali and Manchu, as well as extensions for transcribing Sanskrit and Tibetan.

1800 ᠀ Birga

1801 ᠁ Ellipsis

1802 ᠂ Comma

1803 ᠃ Full Stop

1804 ᠄ Colon

1805 ᠅ Four Dots

1806 ᠆ Todo Soft Hyphen

1807 ᠇ Sibe Syllable Boundary Marker

1808 ᠈ Manchu Comma

1809 ᠉ Manchu Full Stop

180A ᠊ Nirugu

180B ᠋ Free Variation Selector One

180C ᠌ Free Variation Selector Two

180D ᠍ Free Variation Selector Three

180E ᠎ Vowel Separator

1810 ᠐ Zero

1811 ᠑ One

1812 ᠒ Two

1813 ᠓ Three

1814 ᠔ Four

1815 ᠕ Five

1816 ᠖ Six

1817 ᠗ Seven

1818 ᠘ Eight

1819 ᠙ Nine

1820 ᠠ A

1821 ᠡ E

1822 ᠢ I

1823 ᠣ O

1824 ᠤ U

1825 ᠥ Oe

1826 ᠦ Ue

1827 ᠧ Ee

1828 ᠨ Na

1829 ᠩ Ang

182A ᠪ Ba

182B ᠫ Pa

182C ᠬ Qa

182D ᠭ Ga

182E ᠮ Ma

182F ᠯ La

1830 ᠰ Sa

1831 ᠱ Sha

1832 ᠲ Ta

1833 ᠳ Da

1834 ᠴ Cha

1835 ᠵ Ja

1836 ᠶ Ya

1837 ᠷ Ra

1838 ᠸ Wa

1839 ᠹ Fa

183A ᠺ Ka

183B ᠻ Kha

183C ᠼ Tsa

183D ᠽ Za

183E ᠾ Haa

183F ᠿ Zra

1840 ᡀ Lha

1841 ᡁ Zhi

1842 ᡂ Chi

1843 ᡃ Todo Long Vowel Sign

1844 ᡄ Todo E

1845 ᡅ Todo I

1846 ᡆ Todo O

1847 ᡇ Todo U

1848 ᡈ Todo Oe

1849 ᡉ Todo Ue

184A ᡊ Todo Ang

184B ᡋ Todo Ba

184C ᡌ Todo Pa

184D ᡍ Todo Qa

184E ᡎ Todo Ga

184F ᡏ Todo Ma

1850 ᡐ Todo Ta

1851 ᡑ Todo Da

1852 ᡒ Todo Cha

1853 ᡓ Todo Ja

1854 ᡔ Todo Tsa

1855 ᡕ Todo Ya

1856 ᡖ Todo Wa

1857 ᡗ Todo Ka

1858 ᡘ Todo Gaa

1859 ᡙ Todo Haa

185A ᡚ Todo Jia

185B ᡛ Todo Nia

185C ᡜ Todo Dza

185D ᡝ Sibe E

185E ᡞ Sibe I

185F ᡟ Sibe Iy

1860 ᡠ Sibe Ue

1861 ᡡ Sibe U

1862 ᡢ Sibe Ang

1863 ᡣ Sibe Ka

1864 ᡤ Sibe Ga

1865 ᡥ Sibe Ha

1866 ᡦ Sibe Pa

1867 ᡧ Sibe Sha

1868 ᡨ Sibe Ta

1869 ᡩ Sibe Da

186A ᡪ Sibe Ja

186B ᡫ Sibe Fa

186C ᡬ Sibe Gaa

186D ᡭ Sibe Haa

186E ᡮ Sibe Tsa

186F ᡯ Sibe Za

1870 ᡰ Sibe Raa

1871 ᡱ Sibe Cha

1872 ᡲ Sibe Zha

1873 ᡳ Manchu I

1874 ᡴ Manchu Ka

1875 ᡵ Manchu Ra

1876 ᡶ Manchu Fa

1877 ᡷ Manchu Zha

1880 ᢀ Ali Gali Anusvara One

1881 ᢁ Ali Gali Visarga One

1882 ᢂ Ali Gali Damaru

1883 ᢃ Ali Gali Ubadama

1884 ᢄ Ali Gali Inverted Ubadama

1885 ᢅ Ali Gali Baluda

1886 ᢆ Ali Gali Three Baluda

1887 ᢇ Ali Gali A

1888 ᢈ Ali Gali I

1889 ᢉ Ali Gali Ka

188A ᢊ Ali Gali Nga

188B ᢋ Ali Gali Ca

188C ᢌ Ali Gali Tta

188D ᢍ Ali Gali Ttha

188E ᢎ Ali Gali Dda

188F ᢏ Ali Gali Nna

1890 ᢐ Ali Gali Ta

1891 ᢑ Ali Gali Da

1892 ᢒ Ali Gali Pa

1893 ᢓ Ali Gali Pha

1894 ᢔ Ali Gali Ssa

1895 ᢕ Ali Gali Zha

1896 ᢖ Ali Gali Za

1897 ᢗ Ali Gali Ah

1898 ᢘ Todo Ali Gali Ta

1899 ᢙ Todo Ali Gali Zha

189A ᢚ Manchu Ali Gali Gha

189B ᢛ Manchu Ali Gali Nga

189C ᢜ Manchu Ali Gali Ca

189D ᢝ Manchu Ali Gali Jha

189E ᢞ Manchu Ali Gali Tta

189F ᢟ Manchu Ali Gali Ddha

18A0 ᢠ Manchu Ali Gali Ta

18A1 ᢡ Manchu Ali Gali Dha

18A2 ᢢ Manchu Ali Gali Ssa

18A3 ᢣ Manchu Ali Gali Cya

18A4 ᢤ Manchu Ali Gali Zha

18A5 ᢥ Manchu Ali Gali Za

18A6 ᢦ Ali Gali Half U

18A7 ᢧ Ali Gali Half Ya

18A8 ᢨ Manchu Ali Gali Bha

18A9 ᢩ Ali Gali Dagalga

18AA ᢪ Manchu Ali Gali Lha

Issues

Although the Mongolian script has been defined in Unicode since 1999, there was no support for Unicode Mongolian from the major vendors until the release of the Windows Vista operating system in 2007, and so Unicode Mongolian is not yet widely used. In China, legacy encodings such as the Private Use Area (PUA) Unicode mappings and GB18030 mappings of the Menksoft IMEs (espc. Menksoft Mongolian IME) are more commonly used than Unicode for writing web pages and electronic documents in Mongolian.

The inclusion of a Unicode Mongolian font and keyboard layout in Windows Vista has meant that Unicode Mongolian is now gradually becoming more popular, but the complexity of the Unicode Mongolian encoding model and the lack of a clear definition for the use variation selectors are still barriers to its widespread adoption.

Moreover, there are bugs in Microsoft's Mongolian Baiti font.

External links

• Sample text of Uyghurjin script - printing ()
• Sample text of Uyghurjin script - handwriting (cursive)
• Omniglot: Mongolian Alphabet
• The Silver Horde: Mongol Scripts
• Lingua Mongolia: Mongolian Alphabet, including tutorial
• Inkway Mongolian calligraphy