Slavic Cyrillic alphabet. Slavic alphabet
On May 24 the Slavic world celebrates big celebration— 1150th anniversary of Slavic writing. The geography of the holiday, as always, is vast - all of Russia (not only its traditionally Slavic regions, this includes North Ossetia, Tatarstan, Chuvashia, etc.), Serbia and Montenegro and, of course, Bulgaria and Greece. In fact, the holiday will be celebrated wherever the Russian world is alive, where there are communities of people from Slavic countries who write in Cyrillic.
The importance of the Cyrillic alphabet is difficult to overestimate, because with the advent of common Slavic writing in the 9th century, a new, huge cultural space arose - the Cyrillic civilization. Only at first it consisted only of Slavs (and even then not all). Over time, many peoples who were far removed from the Slavs on the tree of humanity, but until that time did not have their own written language, became part of this unity.
The beginning of Slavic writing
The Slavic alphabet, which we still use today, arose on the basis of Greek. There is nothing unusual in this, because most of the alphabets in the world are secondary. The Greeks also did not invent their own writing, but created it on the basis of Phoenician, adapting it to their speech. Exactly the same story happened with the Slavic alphabet. As we know, the Latin alphabet also arose on the basis of the Greek letter, only earlier.
The first Slavic alphabet was invented by Byzantine missionaries - the brothers from Thessaloniki Constantine (when tonsured as a monk, before his death, he took the name Cyril, which was established in tradition) and Methodius. This legend is not disputed by any scientist now. However, the main inventor of the alphabet was still the younger of the two brothers, Kirill. Methodius became his faithful assistant, but his services to subsequent generations are no less, because after the death of his brother he continued his educational work, translating Greek books into the Slavic language.
Saints Cyril-Constantine and Methodius
The brothers came from Soluni (now Thessaloniki), from a very wealthy family, and received an excellent education. Constantine, already in childhood, showed his extraordinary mental abilities and was taken to court, where he studied with the famous scientist Photius, the future Patriarch of Constantinople. A brilliant career awaited Constantine at the imperial court, but he chose a different path, retiring to Mount Olympus and becoming a monk in the same monastery as his brother Methodius. Nevertheless, his abilities were in demand. As the best theologian, he is often sent to neighboring countries to participate in disputes, because for many surrounding nations the 9th century became the time of choosing a new faith. Life in constant travel undermined the already weak health of Constantine, who later received the very honorable nickname Philosopher. At 42, he became very ill and died on February 14, 869. This happened in Rome, where the brothers sought support from the Pope in the spread of Slavic writing. Methodius outlived his brother by 16 years. All these years he continued to translate holy books into Slavic and preach Orthodoxy among the Slavs.
And yet one mystery in the activities of the holy brothers has not been fully resolved. The fact is that all Slavic manuscripts that have reached us early period, and this is the X and XI centuries, are written in two different alphabets - Cyrillic and Glagolitic. Apparently, the Glagolitic alphabet arose earlier. Firstly, the language of texts in Glagolitic is more archaic. In addition, often in ancient times, when paper and parchment were at a special price, the old text was scraped off and a new one was written on top - such manuscripts are called palimpsests. So, all known Cyrillic-Glagolic palimpsests always contain Cyrillic text written over the erased Glagolitic alphabet and never vice versa. Consequently, the Glagolitic alphabet arose somewhat earlier.
Almost any of us, even without having special knowledge, will be able to read at least a few words from the Cyrillic text, the letters of which are very recognizable. The letters used in Glagolitic are very different from Cyrillic and are not similar to any other script. Over time, the Glagolitic alphabet was lost - among the Western Slavs and Croats, in whose lands it was widespread, it was replaced by the Latin alphabet.
So what kind of alphabet did Constantine the Philosopher invent? Today, most scientists are sure that it was Glagolitic. But does this mean that today we honor “the wrong saints”, because the Glagolitic alphabet, invented by the Slavic enlighteners, has gone into oblivion, while we, obviously, use a different invention? In fact, the merit of Cyril and Methodius is more than just the creation of the alphabet. After all, writing is, first of all, texts written using the alphabet. Cyril and Methodius were the first Slavic “scribes” - they translated the texts of the Holy Scriptures from Greek. In the process of translation, they enriched and modernized the Slavic language, finding the necessary correspondence to Greek words, sometimes inventing new terms, and sometimes, when there was no other possibility, introducing Greek words into Slavic speech. We still use many of them today.
One way or another, it was Cyril and Methodius who created the first Slavic alphabet. It is very likely that the brothers’ mother was Slavic, which is why they managed to cope perfectly with the difficult task of finding their letter designations for each of the sounds of the ancient Slavic language. Anyone who has studied English or French, the situation is familiar when half of the letters in a word are simply unreadable. This does not happen in our speech; we pronounce words the way they are written. And this is the merit of Cyril and Methodius, because the Cyrillic and Glagolitic alphabet differ almost exclusively in the style of the letters, but not in the composition of the alphabet.
In the end, it was they who stood at the origins of Slavic writing and in this sense are its symbols. Through the efforts of the holy brothers, over time, a cultural community arose with a single written language (Old Church Slavonic), which included Czechs and Slovaks in the west, Bulgarians, Serbs and Croats in the south, and the inhabitants of Kievan Rus in the east, who over time were divided into Belarusians, Russians and Ukrainians.
The emergence of the Cyrillic alphabet
If the Glagolitic alphabet was invented in the 60s of the 9th century, then the Cyrillic alphabet was invented several decades later. The center of the new alphabet was Preslav, the capital of the Bulgarian Tsar Simeon. Over time, the new script replaced the Glagolitic alphabet in all Slavic countries, and only the Croats in Dalmatia used it until the 17th century.
The appearance of the new alphabet is associated with the activities of the Bulgarian school of scribes. It is very likely that the main creator of the Cyrillic alphabet should be considered the student of the brothers Cyril and Methodius, Saint Clement of Ohrid (840-956), whose life directly states that it was he who invented the new writing. The rapid spread of a new, more convenient alphabet was also not an accident - the Cyrillic alphabet did not have to re-conquer the “minds and hearts” of the Slavs, because it already had a predecessor sister - the Glagolitic alphabet.
Heirs of the Cyrillic alphabet
The new letter was created on the basis of a very clear and understandable Greek statutory alphabet, supplemented by Glagolitic letters that denoted sounds that were absent in the Greek language. It is no coincidence that the first Cyrillic books were written in a straight font, in which the letters are located at equal distances from each other.
The oldest book in Rus' written in Cyrillic, the Ostromir Gospel, dates back to 1057. This Gospel is kept in St. Petersburg, in the library Russian Academy Sci.
From the middle of the 14th century, semi-ustav became widespread, which was less beautiful than the charter, but allowed you to write faster. In the 15th century, semi-ustav gave way to cursive writing. But all this is just a writing style, while the Cyrillic alphabet itself existed practically unchanged until the time of Peter the Great, during which changes were made to the style of some letters, and 11 letters were excluded from the alphabet. The new alphabet was simpler and better suited for printing various civil business papers, which is why it received the name “civil.” A new reform of the alphabet took place in 1918, when the Cyrillic alphabet lost four more letters.
IN last years In Russia, the Day of Slavic Literature and Culture is increasingly celebrated, although the holiday originated in Bulgaria back in the 19th century, and to this day it is celebrated especially solemnly in this country. We don’t have many common holidays that extend beyond the post-Soviet space. In fact, now this is all that remains of the once popular idea of Slavic brotherhood. Let now only a part of the Slavic peoples be included in this unity, but they are united not by an abstract idea, but by a concrete historical reality. For this reason alone, the importance of the Day of Slavic Literature and Culture is difficult to overestimate.
Alexander Ryazantsev
There is still a lot of uncertainty in the history of the origin of the Cyrillic alphabet. This is due, first of all, to the fact that very few monuments of ancient Slavic writing have reached us. Based on the available historical material, scientists build numerous theories, sometimes contradicting each other.
Traditionally, the appearance of writing among the Slavs is associated with the adoption of Christianity in the 10th century. But the book “The Legend of Slavic Letters,” which at the end of the 9th century. wrote the Bulgarian writer Chernigorizets Khrabr, proves that even in the pagan era the Slavs had their own letters and signs. With the adoption of Christianity, Latin and Greek letters appeared in Russian writing, which, however, could not convey many Slavic sounds (b, z, ts).
Creation harmonious system signs, fully corresponding to Slavic phonetics, we owe to the enlighteners brothers Cyril (Constantine) and Methodius. The compilation of such a system (alphabet) was required in order to translate Byzantine religious books into the Slavic language and spread Christianity. To create the alphabet, the brothers took the Greek alphabetic system as a basis. The alphabet, presumably developed by 863, was called Glagolitic (from the Slavic “glagolit” - to speak). The most important monuments of the Glagolitic alphabet are the Kyiv Leaves, the Sinai Psalter and some gospels.
The origin of the second Slavic alphabet of the Cyrillic alphabet (from the name Kirill) is very vague. It is traditionally believed that the followers of Cyril and Methodius created at the beginning of the 10th century. a new alphabet based on the Greek alphabet with the addition of letters from the Glagolitic alphabet. The alphabet consisted of 43 letters, of which 24 were borrowed from the Byzantine charter letter, and 19 were reinvented. The oldest monument of the Cyrillic alphabet is considered to be an inscription on the ruins of a temple in Preslav (Bulgaria), dating back to 893. The writing of the letters of the new alphabet was simpler, so over time the Cyrillic alphabet became the main alphabet, and the Glagolitic alphabet fell out of use.
From X to XIV centuries. The Cyrillic alphabet had a form of writing called the charter. Distinctive features of the charter were clarity and straightness, lower elongation of letters, large size and the absence of spaces between words. The most striking monument of the charter is considered to be the book “Ostromir Gospels”, written by Deacon Gregory in 1056-1057. This book is a genuine work of ancient Slavic book art, as well as a classic example of writing of that era. Among the significant monuments it is also worth noting the “Arkhangelsk Gospel” and “Izbornik” of Grand Duke Svyatoslav Yaroslavovich.
From the charter, the following form of Cyrillic script developed - semi-ustav. The half-shafts were distinguished by more rounded, sweeping letters of a smaller size with many lower and upper extensions. A system of punctuation marks and superscripts has appeared. Half-chart was actively used in the XIV-XVIII centuries. along with cursive and script.
The appearance of cursive writing is associated with the unification of Russian lands into a single state and, as a result, more rapid development of culture. There was a growing need for a simplified, user-friendly writing style. Cursive writing, which took shape in the 15th century, made it possible to write more fluently. The letters, partially connected to each other, became rounded and symmetrical. Straight and curved lines have acquired balance. Along with cursive writing, ligature was also common. It was characterized by an ornate combination of letters and an abundance of decorative lines. Elm was used mainly for the design of titles and highlighting single words in the text.
The further development of the Cyrillic alphabet is associated with the name of Peter I. If Ivan the Terrible in the 16th century. laid the foundations of book printing in Russia, Peter I brought the country's printing industry to the European level. He carried out a reform of the alphabet and fonts, as a result of which a new civil font was approved in 1710. The civil script reflected both changes in the spelling of letters and changes in the alphabet. Most letters have the same proportions, which makes reading much easier. The Latin s and i were introduced into use. The letters of the Russian alphabet, which do not have a correspondence in the Latin (ъ, ь and others), differed in height.
From the middle of the 18th to the beginning of the 20th centuries. There was further development of the Russian alphabet and civil style. In 1758, the extra letters “zelo”, “xi” and “psi” were removed from the alphabet. The old “io” was replaced by ё at Karamzin’s suggestion. The Elizabethan typeface developed, which was distinguished by its great compactness. The modern spelling of the letter b was finally established in it. In 1910, an academic font was developed at the Bertgold foundry, combining elements of Russian fonts of the 18th century and the style of the Latin Sorbonne font. A little later, the use of Russian modifications of Latin fonts took shape in a trend that dominated Russian printing until the October Revolution.
The change in the social system in 1917 did not spare the Russian font. As a result of a broad spelling reform, the letters i, ъ (yat) and Θ (fita) were removed from the alphabet. In 1938, a font laboratory was created, which would later be transformed into the Department of New Fonts at the Scientific Research Institute of Printing Engineering. Talented artists such as N. Kudryashov, G. Bannikov, E. Glushchenko worked in the department to create fonts. It was here that the heading fonts for the newspapers Pravda and Izvestia were developed.
Currently, no one disputes the significance of the font. Many works have been written about the role of font in the perception of information, the fact that every font carries an emotional component and how this can be applied in practice. Artists actively use the centuries-old experience of book printing to create more and more new fonts, and designers skillfully manage the abundance of graphic forms in order to make the text more readable.
“The history of the emergence of writing in the Old Church Slavonic language is connected with the names of the Byzantine missionary brothers -
Constantine and Methodius. Their activities as Slavic educators took place in two Slavic principalities - in Great Moravia and Pannonia (Principality of Blaten). Both of these principalities in the second half of the 9th century. were already Christian and, in church-administrative terms, were part of the Salzburg (Bavarian) archbishopric, which performed Christian worship in a language alien and incomprehensible to the Slavs Latin. This language was literary, ecclesiastical and scientific, the language medieval Europe, and therefore it was on it that the German bishops celebrated the Christian cult in Great Moravia and Pannonia.
An intelligent and far-sighted politician, the Great Moravian prince Rostislav well understood the danger to the independence of his principality posed by the Bavarian churchmen who pursued the aggressive policy of the German feudal lords. He also knew that in another center of Christianity - in Byzantium, which was distant from his principality and therefore did not pose an immediate threat to him, preaching the Christian religion in the local language was not alienated. Thus, many peoples who adopted Christianity from the Greeks, for example the Syrians (Aramaic Christians), Copts (Egyptian Christians), Armenians and Georgians, had writing and rich literature in their languages.
Therefore, Rostislav decides to send an embassy to Emperor Michael III to Byzantium with a request to send missionary teachers to Great Moravia who could preach the Christian religion in the local language.
Rostislav's request was granted, and the brothers Konstantin and Methodius, who knew the Slavic language well, since they were natives of the city, were placed at the head of the Slavic mission
Solunya. Ancient Thessaloniki (modern Thessaloniki) was a bilingual city, in which, in addition to the Greek language, another Slavic dialect was heard, since there were Slavic settlements around Thessaloniki.
It is known that before leaving for Moravia, while still in Byzantium, the youngest of the brothers, Constantine, nicknamed by his contemporaries for his learning as the Philosopher, compiled the Slavic alphabet and began translating the Greek service gospel into Slavic.
Arriving in Great Moravia in 863, the brothers recruited assistants, taught them Slavic writing and continued with them the translation of Greek liturgical books. Here they completed the translation of the Gospel, the Apostle, the Psalter and some other liturgical books. However, from the very beginning, their activities were met with hostility by the Bavarian clergy, who, naturally, saw rivals in Constantine and Methodius and tried in every possible way to obstruct their cause. Therefore, the brothers, after working in Great Moravia for about three years, were forced to seek support and help from the Pope. Their path to Rome, where they went with their many disciples, lay through Pannonia, a Slavic principality inhabited by the ancestors of modern Slovenes. The Pannonian prince Kbtsel, who, like Rostislav, understood how important writing in their native language was for the Slavs, sent 50 students to study under Constantine and Methodius. After working for some time in Pannonia, the brothers continued their journey to Rome, where they arrived in 867. In Rome, the cause of Constantine and Methodius received support from Pope Adrian II, who sought to strengthen his influence in the Saavian principalities.
Church writing in the Slavic language was officially recognized, and the disciples of Constantine and Methodius were ordained as clergy. Here in Rome, Constantine fell ill and died in 869. Before his death, he became a monk and received the name Cyril.
The pope appointed Methodius bishop of Moravia and Pannonia.
However, this appointment did not protect Methodius from the machinations of the German clergy. All subsequent activities of Methodius in Pannonia, where he returned after the death of his brother, and then in Moravia took place in continuous clashes with the German bishops. Having won over to his side the new Moravian prince Svyatopolk, nephew
Rostislav, they arranged a trial of Methodius and... Having slandered him, they imprisoned him, where Methodius spent more than two years. Despite the fact that, by order of Pope John VIII, Methodius was released from prison and again took the episcopal throne in Moravia, the intrigues and slander of his enemies continued until his death. It is known that at the end of his life Methodius again turned to translation work and, together with three of his students, translated almost all the biblical books, a collection of church laws (nomocanon) and some kind of church teaching work, called “books of the fathers” in the Life of Methodius. In 885 Methodius died.
After the death of Methodius, his opponents sought from Pope Stephen V a ban on Slavic worship and expelled the disciples of Cyril and Methodius from Moravia. However, despite severe persecution, Slavic worship and writing were preserved for some time in Moravia and the Czech Republic.
Expelled from the borders of Moravia, the disciples of the Thessalonica brothers headed to the Slavic south - to Macedonia, Bulgaria,
Croatia and Serbia. In Macedonia, where the activities of two disciples of Cyril and Methodius - Clement and Nahum - took place, the traditions of Cyril and Methodius translations are stubbornly preserved in language and writing. In Bulgaria, where there were especially favorable conditions For further development writing in the Old Church Slavonic language, since at a church council in 893 the Old Church Slavonic language was proclaimed the language of the church and state, the Cyril and Methodius traditions were violated. Perhaps in the same year 893 in Bulgaria, the disciple of Cyril and Methodius, Presbyter Constantine, carried out a “translation of the books,” which can be understood as a change in writing. In addition, the Bulgarian scribes introduced new features into the language of the Cyril and Methodius translations, which were especially clearly manifested in the vocabulary of Old Church Slavonic monuments.
The heyday of writing in the Old Church Slavonic language began in Bulgaria during the reign of the Bulgarian Tsar Simeon (893-927), when not only numerous copies of Cyril and Methodius originals were compiled and new Greek books were translated, but also original works were created in the Old Church Slavonic language. It is not for nothing that these years are called the “golden age” of ancient Bulgarian literature. However, from the second half of the 10th century. in Bulgaria, due to the loss of its state independence and its transformation into a province of Byzantium, there is a gradual decline in writing in the Old Church Slavonic language.
Center of Slavic writing from the end of the 10th century. moves to the Slavic East, to Kievan Rus, where Christianity becomes the state religion. Under Yaroslav the Wise, according to the Tale of Bygone Years, in 1037 “many scribes” were assembled, who made new translations from Greek and compiled lists from South Slavic books. Such lists of South Slavic (Bulgarian) books are almost all of the oldest surviving monuments of Russian writing from the 11th century. Such are, for example, the Ostromir Gospel A056-1057) and the Izbornik of Svyatoslav (1073), which is a collection of texts of various contents, translated from Greek in Simeon’s time for the Bulgarian king.
Naturally, under the pen of East Slavic copyists, the Old Church Slavonic language underwent further changes. In the phonetics and grammar of Old Church Slavonic monuments written in Rus', the features of the Old Russian language clearly appear. So, for example, in monuments of Russian origin, the loss of nasal vowels, full voice, replacement of the ending of the 3rd person of the verb - tb ending - and other features of the Russian language of the 11th century were reflected. Therefore, in relation to later monuments of the Old Church Slavonic language, which reflect the significant influence of one or another Slavic language, it is customary to talk about editions of the Old Church Slavonic language, i.e. about its local varieties. In addition to the Russian version, Bulgarian, Serbian, Croatian and Czech versions are also known. In contrast to the Old Church Slavonic (Old Church Slavonic) language, the language of monuments from different versions is usually called the Church Slavonic language.”
The composition of the original Cyrillic alphabet is unknown to us; The “classical” Old Church Slavonic Cyrillic alphabet of 43 letters probably partly contains later letters. The Cyrillic alphabet entirely includes the Greek alphabet (24 letters), but some purely Greek letters (xi, psi, fita, izhitsa) are not in their original place, but are moved to the end. To these were added 19 letters to represent sounds specific to the Slavic language and absent in Greek. Before the reform of Peter I, there were no lowercase letters in the Cyrillic alphabet; all text was written in capitals. Some letters of the Cyrillic alphabet, absent in the Greek alphabet, are close in outline to Glagolitic ones. “C” and “Ш” are externally similar to some letters of a number of alphabets of that time (Aramaic letter, Ethiopic letter, Coptic letter, Hebrew letter, Brahmi) and it is not possible to unambiguously establish the source of the borrowing. The principles of creating digraphs in the Cyrillic alphabet generally follow the Glagolitic ones.
Cyrillic letters are used to write numbers in the Greek system. Instead of a pair of completely archaic signs - sampi and stigma - which are not even included in the classical 24-letter Greek alphabet, other Slavic letters are adapted - “C” (900) and “S” (6); subsequently, the third such sign, kolpa, originally used in the Cyrillic alphabet to designate 90, was replaced by the letter “Ch”. Some letters that are not in the Greek alphabet (for example, “B”, “F”) have no numerical value. This distinguishes the Cyrillic alphabet from the Glagolitic alphabet, where the numerical values did not correspond to the Greek ones and these letters were not skipped.
The characters of the Greek statutory alphabet served as a model for writing Cyrillic letters.
The first books in Cyrillic were also written in the charter. Ustava is a letter where the letters are written straight at the same distance from each other, without tilting - they seem to be “arranged”. The letters are strictly geometric, vertical lines are usually thicker than horizontal ones, and there is no space between words. Old Russian manuscripts of the 9th-14th centuries were written in the charter.
In Cyrillic writing, capital letters were used only at the beginning of a paragraph. The large capital letter was intricately painted, so the first line of the paragraph was called red (that is, a beautiful line). Old Russian handwritten books are works of art: bright multi-colored initial letters (capital letters at the beginning of a paragraph), brown columns of text on pinkish-yellow parchment. Emeralds and rubies were ground into the finest powder, and paints were prepared from them, which still do not wash off or fade. The initial letter was not only decorated, its very outline conveyed a certain meaning.
From the middle of the 14th century, semi-ustav became widespread, which was less beautiful than the charter, but allowed you to write faster. A slant has appeared in the letters, their geometricity is not so noticeable; the ratio of thick and thin lines has ceased to be maintained; the text has already been divided into words.
In the 15th century, semi-ustav gave way to cursive writing. Manuscripts written in “quick custom” are distinguished by the coherent writing of adjacent letters and the sweep of the letter. In cursive writing, each letter had many different spellings. As speed develops, signs of individual handwriting appear.
In the 10th century, Bulgaria became the center of the spread of Slavic writing and books. It is from here that Slavic literacy and Slavic books come to the Russian land. The oldest Slavic written monuments that have survived to this day were written in not one, but two varieties of Slavic writing. These are two alphabets that existed simultaneously: CYRILLIC(named Kirill) and GLAGOLITIC(from the word “verb”, i.e. “to speak”).
The question of what kind of alphabet Cyril and Methodius created has occupied scientists for a very long time, but they have not come to a consensus. There are two main hypotheses. According to the first, Cyril and Methodius created the Cyrillic alphabet, and the Glagolitic alphabet arose in Moravia after the death of Methodius during the period of persecution. Methodius's disciples came up with a new alphabet, which became the Glagolitic alphabet. It was created on the basis of the Cyrillic alphabet by changing the spelling of the letters in order to continue the work of spreading the Slavic letter.
Proponents of the second hypothesis believe that Cyril and Methodius were the authors of the Glagolitic alphabet, and the Cyrillic alphabet appeared in Bulgaria as a result of the activities of their students.
The question of the relationship between alphabets is complicated by the fact that not a single source telling about the activities of the Thessaloniki brothers contains examples of the writing system that they developed. The first inscriptions in Cyrillic and Glagolitic that have reached us date back to the same time - the turn of the 9th-10th centuries.
An analysis of the language of the oldest Slavic written monuments showed that the first Slavic alphabet was created for the Old Church Slavonic language. Old Church Slavonic is not colloquial Slavs of the 9th century, but a language specifically created for translations of Christian literature and the creation of their own Slavic religious works. It was different from the living spoken language of the time, but was understandable to everyone who spoke Slavic languages.
The Old Church Slavonic language was created on the basis of the dialects of the southern group of Slavic languages, then it began to spread to the territory of the Western Slavs, and by the end of the 10th century the Old Church Slavonic language also spread to the East Slavic territory. The language spoken by the Eastern Slavs at that time is usually called Old Russian. After the baptism of Rus', two languages already “live” on its territory: the living spoken language of the Eastern Slavs - Old Russian and the literary written language - Old Church Slavonic.
What were the first Slavic alphabet? Cyrillic and Glagolitic are very similar: they have almost the same number of letters - 43 in Cyrillic and 40 in Glagolitic, which are named the same and are located in the same alphabet. But the style (image) of the letters is different.
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Glagolitic letters are characterized by many curls, loops and other complex elements. Only those letters that were specially created to convey the special sounds of the Slavic language are close in writing form to the Cyrillic alphabet. The Glagolitic alphabet was used by the Slavs in parallel with the Cyrillic alphabet, and in Croatia and Dalmatia it existed until the 17th century. But the simpler Cyrillic alphabet replaced the Glagolitic alphabet in the east and south, and in the west it was replaced by the Latin alphabet.
The Cyrillic letters are based on several sources. First, the Greek alphabet (Greek was official language Byzantine Empire). Greek writing in Byzantium had two forms: the strict and geometrically correct uncial and the faster cursive. The Cyrillic alphabet was based on the uncial, from which 26 letters were borrowed. Oh, how complicated this alphabet was, if you compare it with our modern alphabet!
The letter “N” (our) was written as “N”, and the letter “I” (like) as “N”. And several identical sounds were denoted by two different letters. So the sound “Z” was conveyed by the letters “Earth” and “Zelo”, the sound “I” - the letters “Izhe” “I”, the sound “O” - “He” “Omega”, the two letters “Fert” and “Fita” gave sound "F". There were letters to designate two sounds at once: the letters “Xi” and “Psi” meant a combination of the sounds “KS” and “PS”. And another letter could give different sounds: for example, “Izhitsa” meant in some cases “B”, in others it conveyed the sound “I”. The four letters for the Cyrillic alphabet were created from the letters of the Hebrew alphabet. These letters denoted hissing sounds, which did not exist in the Greek language. These are the letters “Worm”, “Tsy”, “Sha” and “Sha” for the sounds “Ch, Ts, Sh, Shch”. Finally, several letters were created individually - “Buki”, “Zhivete”, “Er”, “Ery”, “Er”, “Yat”, “Yus small” and “Yus big”. The table shows that each Cyrillic letter had its own name, some of which formed interesting semantic series. The students memorized the alphabet like this: Az Buki Vedi - I know the letters, i.e. I know the Verb Good Is; How People Think, etc.
Many modern Slavic alphabets were created on the basis of the Cyrillic alphabet, but the Glagolitic alphabet was gradually supplanted and became a “dead” alphabet, from which none of them “grew” modern systems letters.
). The name goes back to the name of Cyril (before accepting monasticism - Constantine), an outstanding educator and preacher of Christianity among the Slavs. The question of the time of creation of the Cyrillic alphabet and its chronological relationship with the Glagolitic alphabet cannot be considered finally resolved. Some researchers suggest that the Cyrillic alphabet was created by Cyril and his brother Methodius (“first Slavic teachers”) in the 9th century, earlier than the Glagolitic alphabet. However, most experts believe that the Cyrillic alphabet is younger than the Glagolitic alphabet and that the first Slavic alphabet, which was created by Cyril and Methodius in 863 (or 855), was Glagolitic. The creation of the Cyrillic alphabet dates back to the era of the Bulgarian Tsar Simeon (893-927); it was probably compiled by the students and followers of Cyril and Methodius (Clement of Ohrid?) on the basis of the Greek (Byzantine) solemn uncial letter. The letter composition of the ancient Cyrillic alphabet generally corresponded to the ancient Bulgarian speech.
To convey ancient Bulgarian sounds, the uncial letter was supplemented with a number of letters (for example, Ж, Ш, ъ, ь, Ѫ, Ѧ, etc.). The graphic appearance of Slavic letters is stylized according to the Byzantine model. The Cyrillic alphabet included “extra” uncial letters (doublets: i - і, o - ѡ, letters found only in borrowed words: f, ѳ, etc.). In the Cyrillic alphabet, according to the rules of uncial writing, superscripts were used: aspirations, accents, abbreviations of words with titles and ascenders. Aspiration signs (from the 11th to the 18th centuries) changed functionally and graphically. Cyrillic letters were used in numerical meaning (see table), in this case a title sign was placed above the letter, and two dots or one on its sides.
Written monuments from the era of the creation of the Cyrillic alphabet have not survived. The composition of the letters of the original Cyrillic alphabet is also not entirely clear; perhaps some of them appeared later (for example, the letters of iotized vowels). The Cyrillic alphabet was used by the southern, eastern and, obviously, for some time among the western Slavs; in Rus' it was introduced in the 10th-11th centuries. in connection with Christianization. The Cyrillic alphabet among the eastern and southern Slavs has a long tradition, as evidenced by numerous written monuments. The oldest of them date back to the 10th-11th centuries. Precisely dated ones include ancient Bulgarian inscriptions on stone slabs from the 10th century: Dobrudzhanskaya (943) and Tsar Samuil (993). Handwritten books or fragments of them written on parchment have been preserved since the 11th century. The time and place of creation of the most ancient of them is determined by paleographic and linguistic signs. 11th century or perhaps the end of the 10th century. The book of Savvina (a collection of Gospel readings - aprakos) dates back to the 11th century. include the “Suprasl Manuscript”, “Eninsky Apostle”, etc. The earliest dated and localized East Slavic manuscript is the “Ostromir Gospel” (aprakos, 1056-57). East Slavic manuscripts have survived in greater numbers than South Slavic ones. The oldest business documents on parchment date back to the 12th century, the Old Russian charter of Prince Mstislav (c. 1130), the charter of the Bosnian ban Kulin (1189). Serbian handwritten books have been preserved since the end of the 12th century: “Miroslav’s Gospel” (Aprakos, 1180-90), “Vukanovo Gospel” (Aprakos, ca. 1200). Dated Bulgarian manuscripts date back to the 13th century: “Bologna Psalter” (1230-42), “Tarnovo Gospel” (tetra, 1273).
Cyrillic 11th-14th centuries. was characterized by a special type of writing - a charter with geometrical lettering. From the end of the 13th century. among the southern Slavs and from the mid-14th century. Among the Eastern Slavs, the letters of the Cyrillic alphabet lose their strict geometric appearance, variants of the outline of one letter appear, the number of abbreviated words increases, this type of writing is called semi-ustav. From the end of the 14th century. The charter and semi-charter are being replaced by cursive writing.
In the writing of the Eastern and Southern Slavs, the shape of the Cyrillic letters changed, the composition of the letters and their sound meaning changed. Changes were caused by linguistic processes in living Slavic languages. Thus, in ancient Russian manuscripts of the 12th century. the letters iotated yus and yus large are falling out of use, in their place they write “Ꙗ”, Ѧ or “yu”, “ou”, respectively; the letter yusa small gradually acquires the meaning [’a] with the previous softness or combination ja. In manuscripts of the 13th century. the letters ъ, ь may be omitted, reflecting the mutual exchange of the letters ъ - o and ь - e. In some manuscripts, starting from the 12th century, the letter Ѣ is written in place of the letter “e” (southwestern, or Galician-Volyn sources), in a number of Old Russian manuscripts there is a mutual exchange of the letters ts - ch (Novgorod manuscripts from the 11th century), exchanges s - sh, z - zh (Pskov). In the 14th-15th centuries. manuscripts appear (Central Russian), where it is possible to change the letters ѣ - е and ѣ - и, etc.
In Bulgarian manuscripts from the 12th-13th centuries. Mutual exchange of yuses, large and small, is common; iotized yuses are falling out of use; It is possible to change the letters Ѣ - Ꙗ, ъ - ь. One-dimensional sources appear: either “ъ” or “ь” are used. It is possible to interchange the letters “ъ” and “ус” (large). The letter Ѫ existed in the Bulgarian alphabet until 1945. The letters of iotized vowels in the position after the vowels (moa, dobraa) are gradually falling out of use, and the letters ы - i are often mixed up.
In Serbian manuscripts, at an early stage, the letters of nasal vowels are lost, the letter “ъ” falls out of use, and the letter “ь” is often doubled. From the 14th century It is possible to exchange the letters ъ - ь with the letter “a”. In the 14th-17th centuries. The population of modern Romania used the Cyrillic alphabet and Slavic orthography. On the basis of the Cyrillic alphabet, the modern Bulgarian and Serbian alphabets, the Russian, Ukrainian and Belarusian alphabets and, through the Russian alphabet, the alphabets of other peoples of the USSR were historically formed.
| Typeface letters |
Letter name | Sound meaning letters |
Digital meaning |
Typeface letters |
Letter name | Sound meaning letters |
Digital meaning |
|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| az | [A] | 1 | dick | [X] | 600 | |||
| bows | [b] | from (omega)* | [O] | 800 | ||||
| lead | [V] | 2 | qi | [ts’] | 900 | |||
| verbs | [G] | 3 | worm or worm | [h’] | 90 | |||
| good | [d] | 4 | sha | [w’] | ||||
| is or is** | [e] | 5 | piece** | [sh’͡t’], [sh’ch’] | ||||
| live | [and'] | |||||||
| Ѕ - green* | [d'͡z'] | S=6 | ѥръ | [ъ] | ||||
| earthꙗ | [h] | 7 | eras | [s] | ||||
| Izhei** | [And] | 8 | ѥрь | [b] | ||||
| like* | [And] | 10 | There are no | [æ], [ê] | ||||
| kako | [To] | 20 | ['u], | |||||
| people | [l] | 30 | and iotized* | ['a], | ||||
| think | [m] | 40 | e iotized* | ['e], | ||||
| ours** | [n] | 50 | small us* | originally [ę] |
900 | |||
| he | [O] | 70 | small us iotized* |
originally [ę], |
||||
| chambers | [P] | 80 | jus big* | originally [ǫ] |
||||
| rtsi | [R] | 100 | jus big iotized* |
originally [’ǫ], |
||||
| word | [With] | 200 | xi* | [ks] | 60 | |||
| solid and solid | [T] | 300 | psi* | [ps] | 700 | |||
| ok** | [y] | 400 | Fita* | [f] | 9 | |||
| fuck or fuck | [f] | 500 | Izhitsa* | [and], [in] | 400 |
- Lavrov P. A., Paleographical review of the Cyrillic letter, P., 1914;
- Lowkotka Ch., Development of writing, trans. from Czech, M., 1950;
- Istrin V. A., 1100 years of the Slavic alphabet, M., 1963 (lit.);
- Shchepkin V.N., Russian paleography, 2nd ed., M., 1967;
- Karsky E. F., Slavic Kirillovsky paleography, 2nd ed., M., 1979;
- A legend about the beginning of Slavic writing. [Commented edition of the text of ancient sources. Introductory article, translation and comments by B. N. Flory], M., 1981;
- Bernstein S. B., Konstantin-Philosof and Methodius, M., 1984;
- Ђhorђiћ Petar, History of Srpske Cyrillic, Beograd, 1971;
- Bogdan Damian P., Paleografia româno-slavă, Buc., 1978.