| Hebrew Alphabet |
Article Index for Hebrew |
Website Links For Hebrew Alphabet |
Information AboutHebrew Alphabet |
The Hebrew alphabet ( "Alefbet" is commonly written in Israeli Hebrew without the ''maqaf'' (מקף, hyphen), אלפבית עברי, as opposed to with the hyphen, אלף־בית עברי, ''alefbet ’ivri'') consists of 22 letters used for writing the Hebrew Language . Five of these letters have a different form when appearing as the last letter in a word. The Hebrew letters are used in mildly adapted forms for writing several languages of the Jewish diaspora, most famously Yiddish , Ladino , and Judeo-Arabic (for a full and detailed list, see Jewish Languages ). Hebrew is written from Right To Left . The Hebrew word for " Alphabet " is אלףבית (''alefbet''), named after the first two letters of the Hebrew alphabet. The Hebrew alphabet is an Abjad , having letters for Consonant s, but means were later devised to indicate vowels by separate vowel points or Niqqud . In rabbinic Hebrew, the alefbet is used as an alphabet by using the consonant letters אהוי as Matres Lectionis . The number of letters in the Hebrew alphabet, their order, their names, and their phonetic values are virtually identical to those of the Aramaic Alphabet , as both Hebrews and Arameans borrowed the Phoenician Alphabet for their uses during the end of the 2nd Millennium BC . The origin of the Hebrew alphabet is believed to have been given by God to Moses on Mount Sinai what is called the Ashuri Alphabet . The modern ''script'' used for writing Hebrew (usually called the Jewish script by scholars, and also traditionally known as the '''square script''', '''block script''', or '''Assyrian script''' — not to be confused with the Eastern variant of the Syriac Alphabet ) evolved during the 3rd Century BC from the Aramaic Script , which was used by Jew s for writing Hebrew since the 6th Century BC . Prior to that, Hebrew was written using the Old '''Hebrew Script''' , which evolved during the 10th Century BC from the Phoenician script; the Samaritan s still write Hebrew in a variant of this script for religious works (see Samaritan Alphabet ). HISTORY The original Hebrew script developed alongside others in the region during the course of the late second and first millennia BCE; it is closely related to the and Judah until they fell in the 8th and 6th centuries BCE, respectively. It is not straightforward, however, to distinguish Israelite/Judahite scripts from others which were in use in the immediate area, most notably by the Moabites and Ammonites. Following the Babylonian Exile , Jew s gradually stopped using the Hebrew script, and instead adopted the Aramaic Script (another offshoot of the same family of scripts). This script, used for writing Hebrew, later evolved into the Jewish, or "square" script, that is still used today. Closely related scripts were in use all over the Middle East for several hundred years, but following the rise of Christianity (and later, the rise of Islam ), they gave way to the Roman and Arabic alphabets, respectively. The Hebrew alphabet was later adapted in order to write down the languages of the Jewish diaspora ( Karaim , Judæo-Arabic , Ladino , Yiddish , etc.). The Hebrew alphabet was retained as the alphabet used for writing down the Hebrew Language during its rebirth in the 18th to 19th Century . SHORT TABLE The Hebrew alphabet consists of the following letters. Five letters have a different form (known as the final form) at the ends of words: these are shown in the table below the normal form. DESCRIPTION Both the old Hebrew script and the modern Hebrew script have only one may be inserted (in dictionaries or learning books) to know which pronunciation applies: בּ = ''b'' and '''ב''' = ''v'', '''כּ''' = ''k'' and '''כ''' = ''kh'', '''פּ''' =''p'' and '''פ''' = ''f''., ם → מ ''(mem)'', ן → נ ''(nun)'', ף → פ ''(pe ''and ''fe)'', ץ → צ ''(tsadi ''or'' tsade)''. The Hebrew alphabet is an s are normally not indicated. Where they are, it is because a weak Consonant such as ''alef'', hey, ''vav'' or ''yod'' has combined with a previous vowel and become silent, or by imitation of such cases in the spelling of other forms. When used to write Yiddish , the Hebrew writing system uses consonants to indicate all the vowels (see Yiddish Orthography ), except where Hebrew words are written in Yiddish. To preserve the proper vowel sounds, scholars developed several different sets of vocalisation and diacritical symbols called '', and his family for several generations, are credited for refining and maintaining the system. These points are normally used only for special purposes, such as Biblical books intended for study, in Poetry or when teaching the language to children. The Tiberian system also includes a set of Cantillation marks used to indicate how scriptural passages should be chanted, used in synagogue recitations of scripture (although these marks do not appear in the scrolls), called "Trope". Hebrew letters may also be used as Number s; see the entry on Hebrew Numerals . This use of letters as numbers is common in Kabbalah ( Jewish Mysticism ) in a practice known as Gematria . MAIN TABLE The following table is a breakdown of each letter in the Hebrew alphabet, describing its written Glyph or glyphs, its name or names, its numerical values, and its Latin Script Transliteration values used in academic work. If two glyphs are shown for a letter, then the left-most glyph — usually the taller of the two glyphs — is the terminal form of the letter (or right-most glyph if your browser doesn't support right-to-left text layout). # unwritten in initial and final positions, though often not written at all # unwritten in final positions # "h" initial or after consonants, "ch" everywhere else # "i" in final positions or before consonants # often not written at all PRONUNCIATION The following table contains the Pronunciation of the Hebrew letters in reconstructed historical forms and Dialect s using the International Phonetic Alphabet . # Velarized or Pharyngealized # pharyngealized # sometimes said to be Ejective but more likely Glottalized . Matres lectionis See Also: Mater lectionis ''alef'', ''he'', ''vav'' and ''yod'' are consonants that can sometimes fill the position of a vowel. ''vav'' and ''yod'' in particular are more often vowels than they are consonants. NIQQUDOT See Also: Niqqud Niqqud is the system of dots the help determine vowels and consonants. In Hebrew, all forms of niqqud are often omitted in writing, except for children's books, prayer books, foreign words, and words which would be ambiguous to pronounce. Shin and sin ''Shin'' and ''sin'' are represented by the same letter, , but are two separate Phoneme s. They are not mutually Allophonic . When vowel diacritics are used, the two phonemes are differentiated with a ''shin-dot'' or ''sin-dot''; the shin-dot is above the upper-right side of the letter, and sin-dot is above the upper-left side of the letter. Dagesh See Also: Dagesh Historically, the consonants ''bet'', ''gimel'', ''dalet'', ''kaf'', ''pe'' and ''tav'' each had two sounds: one hard ( Plosive Consonant ), and one soft ( Fricative Consonant ), depending on the position of the letter and other factors. When vowel diacritics are used, the hard sounds are indicated by a central dot called ''dagesh'' (), while the soft sounds lack a ''dagesh''. In modern Hebrew, however, the ''dagesh'' only changes the pronunciation of ''bet'', ''kaf'', ''pe'', and ''tav'' (''tav'' only changes in Ashkenazic pronunciation).
Vowel points Israeli Hebrew has five vowel phonemes, /i e a o u/, but many more written symbols for them: Note Ⅰ: The letter "'''O'''" represents whatever Hebrew letter is used. Note Ⅱ: The ''dagesh'', ''mappiq'', and ''shuruk'' have different functions, even though they look the same . Note Ⅲ: The letter "''' ו '''" (''vav'') is used since it can only be represented by that letter. Sh'va See Also: Sh'va By adding two vertical dots (called '' Sh'va '') underneath the letter, the vowel is made very short. Comparison table Not used in Hebrew GERSHAYIM See Also: Gershayim The symbol is called a Gershayim and is a punctuation mark used in the Hebrew language to denote acronyms. It is written before the last letter in the acronym. Gershayim is also the name of a note of cantillation in the reading of the Torah , printed above the accented letter. LOANWORDS The sounds /tʃ, dʒ, ʒ, w/, written 'וו ,ז' , ג' , צ, are found in many loanwords that are part of the everyday Hebrew colloquial vocabulary, even among people who don't know the source languages. In addition, there are ways of writing some sounds in words that are truly foreign, not part of Israeli Hebrew: Transliteration of foreign sounds When Transliterating foreign words, for example in Israeli bilingual dictionaries, special combinations of letters and ''niqqudot'' are used —in addition to those given above — to indicate their pronunciation. These are approximative equivalents only, not Phonetical signs, as different Vowel Roundedness amounts are generally not taken into account. SAME PRONUNCIATION In Israel 's general population, many consonants have merged to the same pronunciation. They are:
PRONUNCIATION OF ANCIENT HEBREW Some of the variations in sound mentioned above are due to a systematic feature of Ancient Hebrew . The six consonants /b g d k p t/ were pronounced differently depending on their position. These letters were also called BeGeDKePHeT ( Pronounced ) letters. (The full details are very complex; this summary omits some points.) They were pronounced as stops g d k p t at the beginning of a syllable, or when doubled. They were pronounced as Fricative s — IPA when preceded by a vowel. The stop and double pronunciations were indicated by the ''dagesh''. In Modern Hebrew the sounds and have reverted to and [g respectively, and has become [t], so only the remaining three consonants /b k p/ show variation.
UNICODE AND HTML See Also: Unicode and HTML for the Hebrew alphabet The Unicode Hebrew block extends from U+0590 to U+05FF and from U+FB1D to U+FB40. It includes Letter s, Ligature s, Combining Diacritical Mark s ('' Niqqud '' and Cantillation marks) and Punctuation . The Numeric Character References is included for HTML. These can be used in many markup languages, and they are often used in Wiki to create the Hebrew Glyphs compatible with the majority of web browsers. TRIVIA
SEE ALSO
NOTES REFERENCES Roots of the Hebrew Alphabet
EXTERNAL LINKS |
|
|