Sorbian alphabet

The Sorbian alphabet is based on the ISO basic Latin alphabet but uses diacritics such as the acute accent and the caron, making it similar to the Czech and Polish alphabets. (This mixture is also found in the Belarusian Latin alphabet.) The standard character encoding for the Sorbian alphabet is ISO 8859-2 (Latin-2).

Not to be confused with Serbian alphabet.

The alphabet is used for the Sorbian languages, although some letters are used in only one of the two languages (Upper Sorbian and Lower Sorbian).

Alphabet table
Upper
case		 HTML
code		 Lower
case		 HTML
code		 Name Usual
phonetic value		 Other
phonetic values		 Comments
A   a   a [a]    
B   b   bej [b] [p]  
C   c   cej [ts]    
Č Č č č čej [tʃ]    
Ć Ć ć ć ćet [tɕ]    
D   d   dej [d] [t]  
E   e   ej [ɛ]    
Ě Ě ě ě jět/ět (Upper), ět (Lower) [iɪ]    
F   f   ef [f]    
G   g   gej [ɡ]    
H   h   ha Upper [ʔ͡h]
Lower [ʔ] or silent		    
I   i   i [i]    
J   j   jot/jót (Upper), jot (Lower) [j]    
K   k   ka [k]    
Ł Ł ł ł eł [w]    
L   l   el [l]    
M   m   em [m]    
N   n   en [n]    
Ń Ń ń ń eń (Upper), ejn (Lower) [ɲ]    
O   o   o [ɔ]    
Ó Ó ó ó ót Upper [uʊ]
Lower [ɛ] or [ɨ]		    
P   p   pej [p] [b]  
R   r   er [r]    
Ř Ř ř ř eř [ʃ]   Upper Sorbian only.
Represents older r after a voiceless consonant and before a front
vowel, e.g. přećel /ˈpʃɛt͡ɕɛl/ 'friend' from Proto-Slavic *prijateljь.
Ŕ Ŕ ŕ ŕ ejŕ [rʲ]   Lower Sorbian only
S   s   es [s] [z], [ɕ]  
Š Š š š eš [ʃ]    
Ś Ś ś ś śej [ɕ] [ʑ] Lower Sorbian only
T   t   tej [t] [d]  
U   u   u [u]    
W   w   wej Upper [v]
Lower [w] or silent		 Upper Sorbian [f]  
Y   y   y [ɨ]    
Z   z   zet [z] [s], [ʑ]  
Ž Ž ž ž žet [ʒ]    
Ź Ź ź ź źej [ʑ]   Lower Sorbian only
(except as part of digraph dź)

An earlier version of the Lower Sorbian alphabet included the use of the letters b́ (or b'), ṕ, ḿ, ẃ and rarely f́ (or f') to indicate palatalized labials. These have been replaced by bj, pj, mj, wj, and fj.[1][2]

Sorbian orthography also includes two digraphs:

Upper
case		 HTML
code		 Lower
case		 HTML
code		 Name Usual
phonetic value		 Other
phonetic values
Ch   ch   cha Upper [kʰ] word/root initially; [x] otherwise
Lower [x]		  
Dź Dź dź dź dźej/dźet [dʑ] [tɕ]

The digraph ch follows h in alphabetical order.

References
  1. Sebastian Kempgen. "Unicode 4.1 and Slavic Philology - Problems and Perspectives (I)" (PDF).
  2. Sebastian Kempgen. "Unicode 4.1 and Slavic Philology - Problems and Perspectives (II)" (PDF).
  • Jana Šołćina, Edward Wornar: Obersorbisch im Selbststudium, Hornjoserbšćina za samostudij, Bautzen 2000, ISBN 3-7420-1779-9, Seiten 12–15 (in German)
  • Starosta: Dolnoserbsko-nimski słownik, Niedersorbisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, Bautzen 1999, ISBN 3-7420-1096-4, Seiten 15–21 (in German)
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