The Russian alphabet is the writing system used to write the Russian language.
The modern Russian alphabet consists of 33 letters: twenty consonants (, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ), ten vowels (, , , , , , , , , ), a semivowel / consonant (), and two modifier letters or "signs" (, ) that alter pronunciation of a preceding consonant or a following vowel.
History Old Church Slavonic emerged as a standard language in the 9th century as a result of the efforts of Cyril and Methodius; it was the first Slavic literary language. A new script, later known as Glagolitic, was based on Greek cursive but included new letters for vowels that did not exist in Greek. This script was soon replaced by Cyrillic in the 10th century, likely developed by the disciples of Cyril and Methodius and likewise based on the Greek alphabet. The earliest evidence of Russian writing culture comes from birch-bark manuscripts dating to the 11th–15th centuries and written by laypeople.
The early Cyrillic alphabet had 44 letters, many of which were used for numerals. The alphabet was adapted to Russian from Old Church Slavonic, but over time it came to contain several redundant and superfluous letters as a result of phonological changes in Russian, including the loss of yers. Peter the Great made the first attempt to reform Russian orthography in 1708–1710. The last major reform took place in 1917–1918.
Letters Letter Cursive Italics Name Old Church Slavonic word-name IPA Common transliteration Approximate English equivalent Examples No. Unicode (Hex) А а a father dva"two" 1 U+0410 / U+0430 Б б or b bad óba"both" U+0411 / U+0431 В в or v vine vodá"water" 2 U+0412 / U+0432 Г г or g go god"year" 3 U+0413 / U+0433 Д д or d do da"yes" 4 U+0414 / U+0434 Е е , or ye, je, e yes ne"not" 5 U+0415 / U+0435 Ё ё – or yo, jo, ëyogurt yozh"hedgehog" U+0401 / U+0451 Ж ж zh, ž measure zhuk"beetle" U+0416 / U+0436 З з or z zoo znoy"heat" 7 U+0417 / U+0437 И и , , or i police íli"or" 8 U+0418 / U+0438 Й й 'short i' y, i, j you or toy moy"my, mine" U+0419 / U+0439 К к or k kept kto"who" 20 U+041A / U+043A Л л or l feel or lamp luch"ray" 30 U+041B / U+043B М м or m map mech"sword" 40 U+041C / U+043C Н н or n not no"but" 50 U+041D / U+043D О о o more on"he" 70 U+041E / U+043E П п or p pet pod"under" 80 U+041F / U+043F Р р or r rolled r reká"river" 100 U+0420 / U+0440 С с or s set yésli"if" 200 U+0421 / U+0441 Т т or t top tot"that" 300 U+0422 / U+0442 У у u tool kust"bush" 400 U+0423 / U+0443 Ф ф or f face féya"fairy" 500 U+0424 / U+0444 Х х or kh, h like Scottish "loch", ugh dukh"spirit" 600 U+0425 / U+0445 Ц ц ts, c sits konéts"end" 900 U+0426 / U+0446 Ч ч ch, č check chas"hour" 90 U+0427 / U+0447 Ш ш sh, š similar to "sh" in hush vash"yours" U+0428 / U+0448 Щ щ , shch, sch, šč, śś similar to a long "sh" as in push ships or a short "sh" as in sheep śeká"cheek" U+0429 / U+0449 Ъ ъ 'hard sign' ʺ silent, prevents palatalization of the preceding consonant obʺyékt"object" U+042A / U+044A Ы ы or y General American roses (rough equivalent) ty"you" U+042B / U+044B Ь ь 'soft sign' </td> ʹ silent, palatalizes the preceding consonant (if phonologically possible) gusʹ"goose" U+042C / U+044C Э э 'rotated «э»' or e, è met èto"this" U+042D / U+044D Ю ю or yu, juuse or youth yug"south" U+042E / U+044E Я я or ya, jayard ryad"row" U+042F / U+044F An alternative form of the letter De (Д д) closely resembles the Greek letter delta (Δ δ). An alternative form of the letter El (Л л) closely resembles the Greek letter lambda (Λ λ).
Historic letters Letters eliminated in 1917–1918
LetterCursiveItalicsOld nameIPACommon transliterationSimilar Russian letterExamplesNo.Unicode (Hex) , , i Like or стихотворенія (now стихотворения) stikhotvoréniya"poems, (of) poem" 10 U+0406 / U+0456 , ě Like Алексѣй (now Алексей) AleksěyAlexey U+0462 / U+0463 , , /θ/ f Like орѳографія (now орфография) orfográfiya"orthography, spelling" 9 U+0472 / U+0473 , y or í Usually like , see below мѵро (now миро) myro or míro"chrism (myrrh)" 400 U+0474 / U+0475
— Identical in pronunciation to , it was used exclusively immediately before other vowels and the ("Short I") (for example, , 'patriarch') and in the word ('world') and its derivatives, to distinguish it from the word ('peace') (the two words are actually etymologically cognate, and not arbitrarily homonyms). ѣ — Originally had a distinct sound, but by the middle of the eighteenth century, it had become identical in pronunciation to in the standard language. Since its elimination in 1918, it has remained a political symbol of the old orthography. ѳ — From the Greek theta, it was identical to in pronunciation, but it was used etymologically (for example, "Theodore" became "Fyodor"). ѵ — From the Greek upsilon, usually identical to in pronunciation, as in Byzantine Greek, it was used etymologically for Greek loanwords, like Latin Y (as in synod, myrrh); by 1918, it had become very rare. In spellings of the eighteenth century, it was also used after some vowels, where it has since been replaced with or (rarely) . For example, a Greek prefix originally spelled (equivalent to English ) is now spelled in most cases and as a component in some compound words.
Letters eliminated before 1750 LetterCursiveItalicsOld nameIPACommon transliterationSimilar Russian letterExamplesNo.Unicode (Hex) – Ѕ ѕ , z (obsolete stem, now ) "very" 6 U+0405, U+0455 – Ѯ ѯ , x, ks кс Алеѯандръ (now Александр) "Alexander" 60 U+046E, U+046F – Ѱ ѱ , ps пс ѱаломъ (now псалом) "psalm" 700 U+0470, U+0471 – Ѡ ѡ o, w ѡбразъ (now образ) "image, icon" 800 U+0460, U+0461 Ѫ ѫ , ą , пѫть (now путь) "way" U+046A, U+046B Ѧ ѧ ę пѧть (now пять) "five" 900 U+0466, U+0467 – Ѭ ѭ yą знаѭ (now знаю) "(I) know" U+046C, U+046D – Ѩ ѩ yę ѩзыкъ (now язык) "tongue, language" U+0468, U+0469
corresponded to a more archaic pronunciation, already absent in East Slavic at the start of the historical period, but kept by tradition in certain words until the eighteenth century in secular writing and in Church Slavonic and Macedonian to the present day. and derived from Greek letters xi and psi. It was used etymologically, though inconsistently, in secular writing until the eighteenth century and more consistently to the present day in Church Slavonic. is the Greek letter omega, identical in pronunciation to . It was used in secular writing until the eighteenth century, but in the present day in Church Slavonic, it was mostly used to distinguish inflexional forms otherwise written identically. Two "yuses", "big" and "small" , used to stand for nasalized vowels and . According to linguistic reconstruction, both became irrelevant for East Slavic phonology at the beginning of the historical period but were introduced along with the rest of the Cyrillic script. The iotated yuses, and , had largely vanished by the twelfth century. The uniotated continued to be used, etymologically, until the sixteenth century. Thereafter it was restricted to being a dominical letter in the Paschal tables. The seventeenth-century usage of and survives in contemporary Church Slavonic, and the sounds (but not the letters) in Polish. The letter was adapted to represent the iotated in the middle or end of a word; the modern letter is an adaptation of its cursive form of the seventeenth century, enshrined by the typographical reform of 1708. Until 1708, the iotated was written at the beginning of a word. This distinction between and survives in Church Slavonic.
Although it is usually stated that the letters in the table above were eliminated in the typographical reform of 1708, reality is somewhat more complex. The letters were indeed originally omitted from the sample alphabet, printed in a western-style serif font, presented in Peter edict, along with the letters (replaced by ), and (the diacriticized letter was also removed), but were reinstated except and under pressure from the Russian Orthodox Church in a later variant of the modern typeface (1710). Nonetheless, since 1735, the Russian Academy of Sciences began to use fonts without , and ; however, was sometimes used again since 1758.
Consonants +ConsonantsEitherhard (default)or softБ, В, Г,Д, З, К,Л, М, Н,П, Р, С,Т, Ф, ХAlways hardЖ, Ш, ЦAlways softЙ, Ч, Щ
Most consonants can represent both "soft" (palatalized, represented in the IPA with a ) and "hard" consonant phonemes.Russian language course "Russo Sem Mestre" (Portuguese for Russian without Master), by Custódio Gomes Sobrinho If consonant letters are followed by vowel letters, the soft/hard quality of the consonant depends on whether the vowel is meant to follow "hard" consonants or "soft" consonants . A soft sign indicates palatalization of the preceding consonant without adding a vowel.
However, in modern Russian, six consonant phonemes do not have phonemically distinct "soft" and "hard" variants (except in foreign proper names) and do not change "softness" in the presence of other letters: are always hard; are always soft. (Before 1950, Russian linguists considered a semivowel rather than a consonant.)
Vowels +VowelsHardАЭЫОУSoftЯЕИЁЮEach row is roughly analogousto the Latin A, E, I, O, U. The Russian alphabet contains 10 vowel letters. They are grouped into soft and hard vowels.Russian language course "Russo Sem Mestre" (Portuguese for Russian without Master), by Custódio Gomes Sobrinho The soft vowels, , either indicate a preceding palatalized consonant, or (with the exception of ) are iotated (pronounced with a preceding ) in all other cases. The IPA vowels shown are a guideline only and sometimes are realized as different sounds, particularly when unstressed. However, may be used in words of foreign origin without palatalization (), and is often realized as between soft consonants, such as in ('toy ball').
Individual vowels is an old Proto-Slavic close central vowel, thought to have been preserved better in modern Russian than in other Slavic languages. It was originally nasalized in certain positions: Old Russian ; Modern Russian ('rock'). Its written form developed as follows: + → → .
was introduced in 1708 to distinguish the non-iotated/non-palatalizing from the iotated/palatalizing one. The original usage had been for the uniotated , or for the iotated, but had dropped out of use by the sixteenth century. In native Russian words, is found only at the beginnings of a few words 'this (is) (m./f./n.)', 'these', 'what a', 'that way', 'sort of', and interjections like 'hey') or in compound words (e.g., 'therefore' = + , where is the dative case of ). In words that come from foreign languages in which iotated is uncommon or nonexistent (such as English), is usually written in the beginning of words and after vowels except (e.g., , 'poet'), and after and consonants. However, the pronunciation is inconsistent. Many of these borrowed words, especially monosyllables, words ending in and many words where follows , , , , or , are pronounced with without palatalization or iotation: (seks — 'sex'), (model — 'model'), (kafe — 'café'), (proekt — 'project'; here, the spelling is etymological: German Projekt was adopted from Latin proiectum, so the word is spelled with to reflect the original and not with as usual after vowels; but the pronunciation is counter-etymological: a hypercorrection that has become standard). But many other words are pronounced with : (syekta — 'sect'), (dyebyut — 'debut').