Coptic alphabet
|
Coptic letters in a florid Bohairic script |
The
Coptic alphabet is an
alphabet used for writing the
Coptic language. It is based on the
Greek alphabet, but contains some extra letters for sounds used in Coptic but not in
Greek. Those letters are derived from the
Demotic script, a highly cursive writing system used to write the
Egyptian language.
History of the Coptic Alphabet
The Coptic alphabet came into general use in
Egypt during the
4th century AD. It is still used by the members of the
Coptic Church to write their
religious texts. All the
Gnostic codices found in
Nag Hammadi used the Coptic alphabet.
The Coptic alphabet did not appear overnight. There was a long history, going back to the
Hellenistic period, of using the Greek alphabet to
transcribe Demotic texts, with the aim of recording the correct pronunciation of the Demotic. During the first two centuries of the
Common Era, an entire series of magicial texts were written in what scholars term
Old Coptic, Egyptian language texts written in the Greek alphabet. A number of letters, however, were derived from Demotic, and many of these (though not all) are used in "true" Coptic writing. With the spread of
Christianity in Egypt, by the late
3rd century AD knowledge of
hieroglyphic writing was lost, as well as Demotic slightly later, making way for a writing system more closely associated with the Christian church. By the 4th century the Coptic alphabet was "standardised", particularly for the Sahidic dialect. (It should be noted that there are a number of differences between the alphabets as used in the various dialects in Coptic.)
The Old Nubian alphabet—used to write the
Old Nubian language [unrelated to the Coptic language]—is written mainly in an
uncial Greek alphabet, but it borrows Coptic and
Meroitic letters of Demotic origin into its inventory. It is often incorrectly thought that Old Nubian used the entire Coptic alphabet directly, but this is not the case.
Coptic in Unicode
In
Unicode, most Coptic letters formerly shared codepoints with similar
Greek letters, but a disunification has been accepted for version 4.1, which appeared in
2005. The new Coptic block is U+2C80 ... U+2CFF. See also:
Coptic block in Unicode (PDF),
Greek block in Unicode (PDF) (which includes 7 Coptic letters derived from Demotic, and needing to be included in any complete implementation of Coptic).
Alphabet table
| Letter | Name1 | Name2 | Transliteration | | Ⲁⲁ | alfa | alfa | a |
| Ⲃⲃ | vida | beta | b, v |
| Ⲅⲅ | gamma | gamma | g |
| Ⲇⲇ | dalda | delta | d |
| Ⲉⲉ | eie | eie | e |
| Ⲋⲋ | sou | sou | (so) |
| Ⲍⲍ | zata | zeta | z |
| Ⲏⲏ | hate | eeta | " |
| Ⲑⲑ | thete | theta | th |
| '" | iauda | iota | i, y |
| "ⲕ | kapa | kapa | k |
| Ⲗⲗ | laula | lavla | l |
| Ⲙⲙ | mi | mi | m |
| Ⲛⲛ | ni | ni | n |
| Ⲝⲝ | ksi | exsi | ks, x |
| Ⲟⲟ | o | o | o |
| Ⲡⲡ | pi | pi | p |
| Ⲣⲣ | ro | ro | r |
| Ⲥⲥ | sima | sima | s |
| Ⲧⲧ | tau | tav | t |
| Ⲩⲩ | ua | epsilon | v, u, y |
| Ⲫⲫ | fi | fi | ph, f |
| Ⲭⲭ | khi | ki | kh |
| Ⲯⲯ | psi | epsi | ps |
| Ⲱⲱ | oou | oou | ō |
| Ϣϣ | shei | shai | sh |
| Ϥϥ | fei | fai | f |
| Ϧϧ | khei | khai | h |
| Ϩϩ | hori | hori | h |
| Ϫϫ | gangia | janja | g, j |
| Ϭϭ | shima | chima | c, kj, ch |
| Ϯϯ | dei | ti | ti |
Note: the letter
sou was used only for its numerical value, 6.
"Old Bohairic" Alphabet table
* Alpha (a, a) as in far & at
* Wida or Bida (b,w) as in bad, was
* Gamma (g,n,gh) ...
* Dalda (d) as in duck
* Eia (a) as in at
* So (6)
* Zada Or Zida (z)
* Hada Or Hida (h) (a, ee) as in at, teen
* Tita Or Tida (t) as in town
* ioda (i) as in pin
* Kabba (K)
* Laula (L)
* Mei (M)
* Nei(N)
* Eksi (X)
* O (o,oa) as in off, oat
* Bei (b) as in boat
* Ro (R)
* Sima (S)
* Dau (D,T) as in do, wet
* ha ( i, w) as in pin, how
* Fi (F,B) as in fat, bat
* Kei (K,sh, kh)
* Ebsi (bs)
* Omega (oa) as in boat
* shaay (sh)
* faay (f)
* khaay (kh)
* hoary (h, h) as hat & occasionally, like haa (7a) in Arabic as in temsa7, 7arb
* jandja (j) as in job
* shima or gshima (sh)
* de (de) as in dig
See also
Coptic pronunciation reformReferences
*Loprieno, Antonio. 1995.
Ancient Egyptian: A Linguistic Introduction. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 24–26.
*Quaegebeur, Jan. 1982. "De la préhistoire de l'écriture copte."
Orientalia lovaniensia analecta 13:125–136.
*Ritner, Robert Kriech. 1996. "The Coptic Alphabet". In
The World's Writing Systems, edited by Peter T. Daniels and William Bright. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press. 287–290.
External links
*
Learn the Coptic language online (in English, Arabic including video tutorials): from Saint Takla Haymanout Coptic Orthodox Church - Alexandria, Egypt
*
The Coptic Alphabet* http://ra.dkuug.dk/JTC1/SC2/WG2/docs/n2636.pdf Rare charts showing derivation of the added letters from Demotic are on pp.7 and 8 of this document.
*[
1] Bohairic Coptic grammar book
*
Forum created for the Old-Bohairic Coptic language including Kami lessons*
Coptic Unicode Fonts Unicode 4.1.0 compliant fonts
*
Download Free Coptic Fonts*
Coptic Fonts Standard; a movement of Coptic Christians to standardize
ASCII-based Coptic computer
typefaces with a long term goal of designing Coptic Unicode fonts after disunification with the Greek block.
