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58-500: The Arabic script is a modified abjad , where all letters are consonants, leading it up to the reader to fill in for vowel sounds. Short consonants and long vowels are represented by letters but short vowels and consonant length are not generally indicated in writing. Tashkīl is optional to represent missing vowels and consonant length. Modern Arabic is always written with the i‘jām —consonant pointing, but only religious texts, children's books and works for learners are written with

116-410: A maddah is placed on any other letter to denote the name of the letter, though some letters may take on a dagger alif . For example: ⟨ لٓمٓصٓ ⟩ ( lām - mīm - ṣād ) or ⟨ يـٰسٓ ⟩ ( yāʼ-sīn) The waṣlah ⟨ وَصْلَة ⟩ , alif waṣlah ⟨ أَلِف وَصْلَة ⟩ or hamzat waṣl ⟨ هَمْزَة وَصْل ⟩ looks like the head of

174-563: A shadda and a dagger alif above lām . There are two possible ways of representing the dagger alif in modern editions of Quran. In the editions printed in the Middle East the dagger alif is written with fatḥah : الرَّحْمَٰنِ (a)r-raḥmāni . In the editions printed in South Asia (Pakistan, India and Bangladesh) the dagger alif is written without fatḥah : الرَّحْمٰنِ (a)r-raḥmāni . This article related to

232-423: A , b , j , and d  —  to replace the more common terms "consonantary" and "consonantal alphabet" in describing the family of scripts classified as " West Semitic ". It is similar to other Semitic languages such as Phoenician , Hebrew and Semitic proto-alphabets: specifically, aleph , bet , gimel , dalet . In Indonesian and Malay , the term abjad is synonymous to alphabet . According to

290-616: A critic of Daniels and of the abjad terminology, argues that this terminology can confuse alphabets with "transcription systems", and that there is no reason to relegate the Hebrew, Aramaic or Phoenician alphabets to second-class status as an "incomplete alphabet". However, Daniels's terminology has found acceptance in the linguistic community. The first abjad to gain widespread usage was the Phoenician abjad . Unlike other contemporary scripts, such as cuneiform and Egyptian hieroglyphs ,

348-422: A diacritic over or under an alif , wāw , or yā . Which letter is to be used to support the hamzah depends on the quality of the adjacent vowels and its location in the word; Consider the following words: ⟨ أَخ ⟩ /ʔax/ ("brother"), ⟨ إسْماعِيل ⟩ /ʔismaːʕiːl/ ("Ismael"), ⟨ أُمّ ⟩ /ʔumm/ ("mother"). All three of above words "begin" with

406-804: A fully vocalised ( vowelised or vowelled ) Arabic from the Bismillah : بِسْمِ ٱللَّٰهِ ٱلرَّحْمَٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ bismi l-lāhi r-raḥmāni r-raḥīm In the name of God, the All-Merciful, the Especially-Merciful. Some Arabic textbooks for foreigners now use ḥarakāt as a phonetic guide to make learning reading Arabic easier. The other method used in textbooks is phonetic romanisation of unvocalised texts. Fully vocalised Arabic texts (i.e. Arabic texts with ḥarakāt /diacritics) are sought after by learners of Arabic. Some online bilingual dictionaries also provide ḥarakāt as

464-548: A grapheme denotes a complete syllable, that is, either a lone vowel sound or a combination of a vowel sound with one or more consonant sounds. The contrast of abjad versus alphabet has been rejected by other scholars because abjad is also used as a term for the Arabic numeral system. Also, it may be taken as suggesting that consonantal alphabets, in contrast to e.g. the Greek alphabet , were not yet true alphabets. Florian Coulmas ,

522-543: A letter, and represents a short /a/ (like the /a/ sound in the English word "cat"). The word fatḥah itself ( فَتْحَة ) means opening and refers to the opening of the mouth when producing an /a/ . For example, with dāl (henceforth, the base consonant in the following examples): ⟨ دَ ⟩ /da/ . When a fatḥah is placed before a plain letter ⟨ ا ⟩ ( alif ) (i.e. one having no hamza or vowel of its own), it represents

580-435: A long /aː/ (close to the sound of "a" in the English word "dad", with an open front vowel /æː/, not back /ɑː/ as in "father"). For example: ⟨ دَا ⟩ /daː/ . The fatḥah is not usually written in such cases. When a fathah is placed before the letter ⟨ ﻱ ⟩ (yā’), it creates an /aj/ (as in "l ie "); and when placed before the letter ⟨ و ⟩ (wāw), it creates an /aw/ (as in "c ow "). Although paired with

638-478: A long fatħah , was used for a contracted (assimilated) sin . Thus ⟨ ڛ سۣ سۡ سٚ ⟩ were all used to indicate that the letter in question was truly ⟨ س ⟩ and not ⟨ ش ⟩ . These signs, collectively known as ‘alāmātu-l-ihmāl , are still occasionally used in modern Arabic calligraphy , either for their original purpose (i.e. marking letters without i‘jām ), or often as purely decorative space-fillers. The small ک above

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696-412: A phonetic guide similarly to English dictionaries providing transcription. The ḥarakāt حَرَكَات , which literally means 'motions', are the short vowel marks. There is some ambiguity as to which tashkīl are also ḥarakāt ; the tanwīn , for example, are markers for both vowels and consonants. The fatḥah ⟨ فَتْحَة ⟩ is a small diagonal line placed above

754-421: A plain letter creates an open front vowel (/a/), often realized as near-open (/ æ /), the standard also allows for variations, especially under certain surrounding conditions. Usually, in order to have the more central (/ ä /) or back (/ ɑ /) pronunciation, the word features a nearby back consonant, such as the emphatics, as well as qāf , or rā’ . A similar "back" quality is undergone by other vowels as well in

812-462: A red dot placed above, below, or beside the rasm , and later consonant pointing was introduced, as thin, short black single or multiple dashes placed above or below the rasm . These i‘jām became black dots about the same time as the ḥarakāt became small black letters or strokes. Typically, Egyptians do not use dots under final yā’ ( ي ), which looks exactly like alif maqṣūrah ( ى ) in handwriting and in print. This practice

870-567: A secondary function as vowel markers, called matres lectionis . This practice was at first rare and limited in scope but became increasingly common and more developed in later times. In the 9th century BC the Greeks adapted the Phoenician script for use in their own language. The phonetic structure of the Greek language created too many ambiguities when vowels went unrepresented, so the script

928-410: A short /i/ (as in "me", "be") and its allophones [i, ɪ, e, e̞, ɛ] (as in "Tim", "sit"). For example: ⟨ دِ ⟩ /di/ . When a kasrah is placed before a plain letter ⟨ ﻱ ⟩ ( yā’ ), it represents a long /iː/ (as in the English word "steed"). For example: ⟨ دِي ⟩ /diː/ . The kasrah is usually not written in such cases, but if yā’

986-613: A slightly different route. The basic consonantal symbol was considered to have an inherent "a" vowel sound. Hooks or short lines attached to various parts of the basic letter modify the vowel. In this way, the South Arabian abjad evolved into the Ge'ez abugida of Ethiopia between the 5th century BC and the 5th century AD. Similarly, the Brāhmī abugida of the Indian subcontinent developed around

1044-404: A small ṣād on top of an alif ⟨ ٱ ⟩ (also indicated by an alif ⟨ ا ⟩ without a hamzah ). It means that the alif is not pronounced when its word does not begin a sentence. For example: ⟨ بِٱسْمِ ⟩ ( bismi ), but ⟨ ٱمْشُوا۟ ⟩ ( imshū not mshū ). This is because in Arabic, the first consonant in

1102-413: A superscript kaf or a small superscript hamza ( nabrah ), and lam with a superscript l-a-m ( lam-alif-mim ). Although normally it is sometimes not considered a letter of the alphabet, the hamza هَمْزة ( hamzah , glottal stop ), often stands as a separate letter in writing, is written in unpointed texts and is not considered a tashkīl . It may appear as a letter by itself or as

1160-431: A trend towards simplifying Arabic grammar. The sign ⟨ ـً ⟩ is most commonly written in combination with ⟨ ـًا ⟩ ( alif ), ⟨ ةً ⟩ ( tā’ marbūṭah ), ⟨ أً ⟩ (alif hamzah) or stand-alone ⟨ ءً ⟩ ( hamzah ). Alif should always be written (except for words ending in tā’ marbūṭah, hamzah or diptotes) even if an

1218-399: A vocalised text, they may be written even if they are not pronounced (see pausa ). See i‘rāb for more details. In many spoken Arabic dialects, the endings are absent. Many Arabic textbooks introduce standard Arabic without these endings. The grammatical endings may not be written in some vocalized Arabic texts, as knowledge of i‘rāb varies from country to country, and there is

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1276-470: A vowel opening the syllable, and in each case, alif is used to designate the initial glottal stop (the actual beginning). But if we consider middle syllables "beginning" with a vowel: ⟨ نَشْأة ⟩ /naʃʔa/ ("origin"), ⟨ أَفْئِدة ⟩ /ʔafʔida/ ("hearts"—notice the /ʔi/ syllable; singular ⟨ فُؤاد ⟩ /fuʔaːd/ ), ⟨ رُؤُوس ⟩ /ruʔuːs/ ("heads", singular ⟨ رَأْس ⟩ /raʔs/ ),

1334-469: A word must always be followed by a vowel sound: If the second letter from the waṣlah has a kasrah, the alif-waslah makes the sound /i/. However, when the second letter from it has a dammah, it makes the sound /u/. It occurs only in the beginning of words, but it can occur after prepositions and the definite article. It is commonly found in imperative verbs, the perfective aspect of verb stems VII to X and their verbal nouns ( maṣdar ). The alif of

1392-449: Is a small curl-like diacritic placed above a letter to represent a short /u/ (as in "duke", shorter "you") and its allophones [u, ʊ, o, o̞, ɔ] (as in "put", or "bull"). For example: ⟨ دُ ⟩ /du/ . When a ḍammah is placed before a plain letter ⟨ و ⟩ ( wāw ), it represents a long /uː/ (like the 'oo' sound in the English word "swoop"). For example: ⟨ دُو ⟩ /duː/ . The ḍammah

1450-520: Is also used in copies of the muṣḥaf ( Qurʾān ) scribed by ‘Uthman Ṭāhā . The same unification of yā and alif maqṣūrā has happened in Persian , resulting in what the Unicode Standard calls " Arabic Letter Farsi Yeh ", that looks exactly the same as yā in initial and medial forms, but exactly the same as alif maqṣūrah in final and isolated forms. At

1508-454: Is in children's literature. Moreover, ḥarakāt are used in ordinary texts in individual words when an ambiguity of pronunciation cannot easily be resolved from context alone. Arabic dictionaries with vowel marks provide information about the correct pronunciation to both native and foreign Arabic speakers. In art and calligraphy , ḥarakāt might be used simply because their writing is considered aesthetically pleasing. An example of

1566-417: Is not. Grammatical cases and tanwīn endings in indefinite triptote forms: The shadda or shaddah ⟨ شَدَّة ⟩ ( shaddah ), or tashdid ⟨ تَشْدِيد ⟩ ( tashdīd ), is a diacritic shaped like a small written Latin " w ". It is used to indicate gemination (consonant doubling or extra length), which is phonemic in Arabic. It is written above the consonant which

1624-469: Is optional and not the dominant (or literate) form. Abugidas mark all vowels (other than the "inherent" vowel ) with a diacritic , a minor attachment to the letter, a standalone glyph , or (in Canadian Aboriginal syllabics ) by rotation of the letter. Some abugidas use a special symbol to suppress the inherent vowel so that the consonant alone can be properly represented. In a syllabary ,

1682-445: Is pronounced as a diphthong /aj/ , fatḥah should be written on the preceding letter to avoid mispronunciation. The word kasrah means 'breaking'. Kasrah s are encoded U+061A ؚ ARABIC SMALL KASRA , U+0650 ِ ARABIC KASRA , U+FE7A ﹺ ARABIC KASRA ISOLATED FORM , or U+FE7B ﹻ ARABIC KASRA MEDIAL FORM . The ḍammah ⟨ ضَمَّة ⟩

1740-744: Is to be doubled. It is the only ḥarakah that is commonly used in ordinary spelling to avoid ambiguity . For example: ⟨ دّ ⟩ /dd/ ; madrasah ⟨ مَدْرَسَة ⟩ ('school') vs. mudarrisah ⟨ مُدَرِّسَة ⟩ ('teacher', female). Note that when the doubled letter bears a vowel, it is the shaddah that the vowel is attached to, not the letter itself: ⟨ دَّ ⟩ /dda/ , ⟨ دِّ ⟩ /ddi/ . Shaddah s are encoded U+0651 ّ ARABIC SHADDA , U+FE7C ﹼ ARABIC SHADDA ISOLATED FORM , or U+FE7D ﹽ ARABIC SHADDA MEDIAL FORM . The i‘jām ( إِعْجَام ; sometimes also called nuqaṭ ) are

1798-662: Is usually not written in such cases, but if wāw is pronounced as a diphthong /aw/ , fatḥah should be written on the preceding consonant to avoid mispronunciation. The word ḍammah (ضَمَّة) in this context means rounding , since it is the only rounded vowel in the vowel inventory of Arabic. Ḍammah s are encoded U+0619 ؙ ARABIC SMALL DAMMA , U+064F ُ ARABIC DAMMA , U+FE78 ﹸ ARABIC DAMMA ISOLATED FORM , or U+FE79 ﹹ ARABIC DAMMA MEDIAL FORM . The superscript (or dagger) alif ⟨ أَلِف خَنْجَرِيَّة ⟩ ( alif khanjarīyah ),

Arabic diacritics - Misplaced Pages Continue

1856-422: Is usually produced automatically by entering alif lām lām hāʾ . The word consists of alif + ligature of doubled lām with a shaddah and a dagger alif above lām , followed by ha' . The maddah ⟨ مَدَّة ⟩ is a tilde -shaped diacritic, which can only appear on top of an alif (آ) and indicates a glottal stop /ʔ/ followed by a long /aː/ . In theory,

1914-482: Is written as a short vertical stroke on top of an Arabic letter . It indicates a long /aː/ sound where alif is normally not written, e.g. هَٰذَا hādhā or رَحْمَٰن raḥmān . The dagger alif occurs in only a few modern words, but these include some common ones; it is seldom written, however, even in fully vocalised texts, except in the Qur'an . As Wright notes "[alif] was at first more rarely marked than

1972-498: Is written as short vertical stroke on top of a letter. It indicates a long /aː/ sound for which alif is normally not written. For example: ⟨ هَٰذَا ⟩ ( hādhā ) or ⟨ رَحْمَٰن ⟩ ( raḥmān ). The dagger alif occurs in only a few words, but they include some common ones; it is seldom written, however, even in fully vocalised texts. Most keyboards do not have dagger alif . The word Allah ⟨ الله ⟩ ( Allāh )

2030-466: Is written without ḥarakāt (or short vowels). However, they are commonly used in texts that demand strict adherence to exact pronunciation. This is true, primarily, of the Qur'an ⟨ ٱلْقُرْآن ⟩ ( al-Qurʾān ) and poetry . It is also quite common to add ḥarakāt to hadiths ⟨ ٱلْحَدِيث ⟩ ( al-ḥadīth ; plural: al-ḥādīth ) and the Bible . Another use

2088-409: The kāf in its final and isolated forms ⟨ ك  ـك ⟩ was originally an ‘alāmatu-l-ihmāl that became a permanent part of the letter. Previously this sign could also appear above the medial form of kāf , when that letter was written without the stroke on its ascender . When kaf was written without that stroke, it could be mistaken for lam , thus kaf was distinguished with

2146-621: The 3rd century BC (from the Aramaic abjad , it has been hypothesized). The other major family of abugidas, Canadian Aboriginal syllabics , was initially developed in the 1840s by missionary and linguist James Evans for the Cree and Ojibwe languages. Evans used features of Devanagari script and Pitman shorthand to create his initial abugida. Later in the 19th century, other missionaries adapted Evans's system to other Canadian aboriginal languages. Canadian syllabics differ from other abugidas in that

2204-466: The Arabic and Hebrew scripts sometimes perform the role of true alphabets rather than abjads when used to write certain Indo-European languages , including Kurdish , Bosnian , Yiddish , and some Romance languages such as Mozarabic , Aragonese , Portuguese , Spanish and Ladino . Dagger alif The dagger alif ( Arabic : ألف خنجرية alif khanjarīyah ) or superscript alif

2262-559: The Arabic root ك‌ت‌ب K-T-B (to write) can be derived the forms كَتَبَ kataba (he wrote), كَتَبْتَ katabta (you (masculine singular) wrote), يَكْتُبُ⁩ yaktubu (he writes), and مَكْتَبَة⁩ maktabah (library). In most cases, the absence of full glyphs for vowels makes the common root clearer, allowing readers to guess the meaning of unfamiliar words from familiar roots (especially in conjunction with context clues) and improving word recognition while reading for practiced readers. By contrast,

2320-469: The Phoenician script consisted of only a few dozen symbols. This made the script easy to learn, and seafaring Phoenician merchants took the script throughout the then-known world. The Phoenician abjad was a radical simplification of phonetic writing, since hieroglyphics required the writer to pick a hieroglyph starting with the same sound that the writer wanted to write in order to write phonetically, much as man'yōgana ( kanji used solely for phonetic use)

2378-407: The centuries. The literal meaning of تَشْكِيل tashkīl is 'variation'. As the normal Arabic text does not provide enough information about the correct pronunciation, the main purpose of tashkīl (and ḥarakāt ) is to provide a phonetic guide or a phonetic aid; i.e. show the correct pronunciation for children who are learning to read or foreign learners. The bulk of Arabic script

Arabic diacritics - Misplaced Pages Continue

2436-463: The definite article is considered a waṣlah . It occurs in phrases and sentences (connected speech, not isolated/dictionary forms): Like the superscript alif, it is not written in fully vocalized scripts, except for sacred texts, like the Quran and Arabized Bible. The sukūn ⟨ سُكُونْ ⟩ is a circle-shaped diacritic placed above a letter (  ْ ). It indicates that

2494-465: The diacritic points that distinguish various consonants that have the same form ( rasm ), such as ⟨ ص ⟩ /sˤ/ , ⟨ ض ⟩ /dˤ/ . Typically i‘jām are not considered diacritics but part of the letter. Early manuscripts of the Quran did not use diacritics either for vowels or to distinguish the different values of the rasm . Vowel pointing was introduced first, as

2552-412: The diphthong ay ( IPA /aj/ ). A fatḥah , followed by the letter ⟨ ﻭ ⟩ ( wāw ) with a sukūn , ( ـَوْ ) indicates /aw/ . Sukūn s are encoded U+0652 ْ ARABIC SUKUN , U+FE7E ﹾ ARABIC SUKUN ISOLATED FORM , or U+FE7F ﹿ ARABIC SUKUN MEDIAL FORM . The sukūn may have also an alternative form of

2610-399: The formulations of Peter T. Daniels , abjads differ from alphabets in that only consonants, not vowels, are represented among the basic graphemes . Abjads differ from abugidas , another category defined by Daniels, in that in abjads, the vowel sound is implied by phonology , and where vowel marks exist for the system, such as nikkud for Hebrew and ḥarakāt for Arabic , their use

2668-410: The full tashkīl —vowel guides and consonant length. It is however not uncommon for authors to add diacritics to a word or letter when the grammatical case or the meaning is deemed otherwise ambiguous. In addition, classical works and historic documents rendered to the general public are often rendered with the full tashkīl , to compensate for the gap in understanding resulting from stylistic changes over

2726-434: The letter to which it is attached is not followed by a vowel, i.e., zero -vowel. It is a necessary symbol for writing consonant-vowel-consonant syllables, which are very common in Arabic. For example: ⟨ دَدْ ⟩ ( dad ). The sukūn may also be used to help represent a diphthong. A fatḥah followed by the letter ⟨ ﻱ ⟩ ( yā’ ) with a sukūn over it ( ـَيْ ) indicates

2784-485: The other long vowels, and hence it happens that, at a later period, after the invention of the vowel-points, it was indicated in some very common words merely by a fatḥa [i.e. the dagger alif.]" Most keyboards do not have dagger alif. The word الله ( Allāh ) is usually produced automatically by entering " alif lām lām hāʾ ", or in Arabic: "ا ل ل ه". The word consists of alif + ligature of doubled lām with

2842-448: The presence of such consonants, however not as drastically realized as in the case of fatḥah . Fatḥah s are encoded U+0618 ؘ ARABIC SMALL FATHA , U+064E َ ARABIC FATHA , U+FE76 ﹶ ARABIC FATHA ISOLATED FORM , or U+FE77 ﹷ ARABIC FATHA MEDIAL FORM . A similar diagonal line below a letter is called a kasrah ⟨ كَسْرَة ⟩ and designates

2900-524: The same sequence /ʔaː/ could also be represented by two alif s, as in * ⟨ أَا ⟩ , where a hamza above the first alif represents the /ʔ/ while the second alif represents the /aː/ . However, consecutive alif s are never used in the Arabic orthography. Instead, this sequence must always be written as a single alif with a maddah above it, the combination known as an alif maddah . For example: ⟨ قُرْآن ⟩ /qurˈʔaːn/ . In Quranic writings,

2958-440: The situation is different, as noted above. See the comprehensive article on hamzah for more details. Abjad An abjad ( / ˈ æ b dʒ æ d / , Arabic : أبجد , Hebrew : אבגד), also abgad , is a writing system in which only consonants are represented, leaving the vowel sounds to be inferred by the reader. This contrasts with alphabets , which provide graphemes for both consonants and vowels. The term

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3016-778: The small high head of ḥāʾ ( U+06E1 ۡ ARABIC SMALL HIGH DOTLESS HEAD OF KHAH ), particularly in some Qurans. Other shapes may exist as well (for example, like a small comma above ⟨ʼ⟩ or like a circumflex ⟨ˆ⟩ in nastaʿlīq ). The three vowel diacritics may be doubled at the end of a word to indicate that the vowel is followed by the consonant n . They may or may not be considered ḥarakāt and are known as tanwīn ⟨ تَنْوِين ⟩ , or nunation. The signs indicate, from left to right, -an, -in, -un . These endings are used as non-pausal grammatical indefinite case endings in Literary Arabic or classical Arabic ( triptotes only). In

3074-468: The time when the i‘jām was optional, unpointed letters were ambiguous. To clarify that a letter would lack i‘jām in pointed text, the letter could be marked with a small v- or seagull -shaped diacritic above, also a superscript semicircle (crescent), a subscript dot (except in the case of ⟨ ح ⟩ ; three dots were used with ⟨ س ⟩ ), or a subscript miniature of the letter itself. A superscript stroke known as jarrah , resembling

3132-550: The vowel is indicated by rotation of the consonantal symbol, with each vowel having a consistent orientation. The abjad form of writing is well-adapted to the morphological structure of the Semitic languages it was developed to write. This is because words in Semitic languages are formed from a root consisting of (usually) three consonants , the vowels being used to indicate inflectional or derived forms. For instance, according to Classical Arabic and Modern Standard Arabic , from

3190-415: The vowel phonemes, although the said non-diacritic vowel letters are also used to write certain consonants, particularly approximants that sound similar to long vowels. A "pure" abjad is exemplified (perhaps) by very early forms of ancient Phoenician , though at some point (at least by the 9th century BC) it and most of the contemporary Semitic abjads had begun to overload a few of the consonant symbols with

3248-539: Was introduced in 1990 by Peter T. Daniels . Other terms for the same concept include partial phonemic script , segmentally linear defective phonographic script , consonantary , consonant writing , and consonantal alphabet . Impure abjads represent vowels with either optional diacritics , a limited number of distinct vowel glyphs, or both. The name abjad is based on the Arabic alphabet 's first (in its original order ) four letters —  corresponding to

3306-651: Was modified. They did not need letters for the guttural sounds represented by aleph , he , heth or ayin , so these symbols were assigned vocalic values. The letters waw and yod were also adapted into vowel signs; along with he , these were already used as matres lectionis in Phoenician. The major innovation of Greek was to dedicate these symbols exclusively and unambiguously to vowel sounds that could be combined arbitrarily with consonants (as opposed to syllabaries such as Linear B which usually have vowel symbols but cannot combine them with consonants to form arbitrary syllables). Abugidas developed along

3364-705: Was used to represent Japanese phonetically before the invention of kana . Phoenician gave rise to a number of new writing systems, including the widely used Aramaic abjad and the Greek alphabet . The Greek alphabet evolved into the modern western alphabets, such as Latin and Cyrillic , while Aramaic became the ancestor of many modern abjads and abugidas of Asia. Impure abjads have characters for some vowels, optional vowel diacritics, or both. The term pure abjad refers to scripts entirely lacking in vowel indicators. However, most modern abjads, such as Arabic , Hebrew , Aramaic , and Pahlavi , are "impure" abjads – that is, they also contain symbols for some of

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