Armenian alphabet

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History of the Alphabet
Middle Bronze Age 19-15th c. BC Proto-Canaanite 14th c. BC Ugaritic 13th c. BC Phoenician 11th c. BC Samaritan 6th c. BC Aramaic 9th c. BC Brāhmī 6th c. BC Hebrew 3rd c. BC Syriac 2nd c. BC Avestan 3th c. Arabic 4th c. Greek 8th c. BC Old Italic 8th c. BC Latin 7th c. BC Runes 2nd c. Gothic 4th c. Armenian 405 Glagolitic 862 Cyrillic 10th c. Iberian Celtiberian South Arabian 9th c. BC Ge'ez 3rd-4th c.
Meroitic 3rd c. BC
Complete genealogy

The Armenian alphabet is an alphabet used for writing the Armenian language, created by Saint Mesrop Mashtots in AD 406.

The Armenian alphabet is one of six European alphabetic scripts identified in the Unicode standard (see Unicode Code Charts and Unicode Standard, Chapter 7).

Various scripts have been credited with being the prototype for the Armenian alphabet, including Pahlavi, Syriac, and Phoenician. However, the order of the letters, the use of the digraph ou for the vowel [u], and a noticeable similarity of letter forms to cursive Greek suggests that it was likely based on the Greek alphabet.

As Bedross Der Matossian from Columbia University informs, for about 250 years, from the early 18th century until around 1950, more than 2000 books were printed in the Turkish language using letters of the Armenian alphabet. Not only Armenians read Armeno-Turkish, but also the non-Armenian (including the Ottoman Turkish) elite.

Image:Matenadaran Armenian alphabet.jpg

Armenian has two different dialects: Eastern and Western. Both use the same alphabet, however some of the letters have different names and pronunciations. For example, the second letter in Eastern Armenian is "ben" and makes a 'b' sound while in Western Armenian, the second letter is "pen" and makes a 'p' sound.

**Alphabet:**
	Name Eastern/Western	Lowercase	Uppercase	Transliteration Eastern/Western	num. Value
1	Ayb/Ayp	ա	Ա	a	1
2	Ben/Pen	բ	Բ	b/p	2
3	Gim/Keem	գ	Գ	g/k	3
4	Da/Ta	դ	Դ	d/t	4
5	Yech`	ե	Ե	ye/ye	5
6	Za	զ	Զ	z	6
7	Eh	է	Է	ē/eh	7
8	Ët`/Ut	ը	Ը	ə/ut	8
9	T`o/Toh	թ	Թ	t῾/t	9
10	Zhe	ժ	Ժ	ž/zh (as in azure)	10
11	Ini/Eenee	ի	Ի	i/i or e	20
12	Liun	լ	Լ	l	30
13	Xeh/Kheh (aspirated)	խ	Խ	x/kh	40
14	C'a/Dzah	ծ	Ծ	tz/dz	50
15	Ken/Gen (hard g)	կ	Կ	k/g	60
16	Ho	հ	Հ	h	70
17	Dz'a/Tsah	ձ	Ձ	dz/ts	80
18	Ghat/Ghad (French r)	ղ	Ղ	ł/gh (French r)	90
19	Cheh/Djeh	ճ	Ճ	č/j	100
20	Men	մ	Մ	m	200
21	Yi/Hee	յ	Յ	y/h or combined with other letters	300
22	Nu	ն	Ն	n	400
23	Sha	շ	Շ	sh/sh	500
24	Vo	ո	Ո	vo/vo or o	600
25	Ch`a	չ	Չ	ch/ch	700
26	Peh/Beh	պ	Պ	p/b	800
27	Jheh/Cheh	ջ	Ջ	j/ch	900
28	Rra (rolled)	ռ	Ռ	rr/ r (rolled)	1000
29	Seh	ս	Ս	s	2000
30	Vew/Vev	վ	Վ	v	3000
31	Tiun/Deoon	տ	Տ	t/d	4000
32	Reh	ր	Ր	r	5000
33	C`o/Tzoh	ց	Ց	č/tz	6000
34	Hiun/hyun	ւ	Ւ	w/v or combined with other letters	7000
35	P`iur/Pure	փ	Փ	p῾/p	8000
36	K`eh/Keh	ք	Ք	q/k	9000
37	Oh	օ	Օ	ō/o	10000
38	Feh	ֆ	Ֆ	f	20000

**Modifiers and punctuation:**
Name	Character
Small Ligature Ech` Wiwn (functions as an ampersand)	և
Modifier letters
Modifier Letter Left Half Ring	ՙ
Apostrophe = Armenian Modifier Letter Right Half Ring	՚
Modifier Emphasis Mark = Shesht	՛
Punctuation
Exclamation Mark = Bac`aganch`akan Nshan	՜
Comma = Bowt`	՝
Question Mark = Harc`akan Nshan	՞
Abbreviation Mark = Patiw	՟
Full Stop = Verjhaket	։
Hyphen = Ent`amnay	֊