Czech orthography

Czech orthography is a set of rules for writing the Czech language correctly. It started with a Latin script made by the theologian and church reformist Jan Hus.

Today, Czech uses special marks called diacritics on letters. These marks help show sounds that the regular Latin alphabet cannot express. One special mark is called the caron, known in Czech as háček, which is added to letters. The acute accent is used to show long vowels.

Czech orthography has helped other languages. It influenced the writing systems of Slovak, Croatian, Slovene, Latvian, and Lithuanian. These languages use similar special marks and related ways of connecting letters to sounds.

Alphabet

The Czech alphabet has 42 letters. Some letters like Q, W, and X are used only in words from other languages. When these words become Czech words, Q changes to KV and W changes to V. There are also special pairs of letters, dz and dž, mostly used in foreign words and not counted as separate letters.

Orthographic principles

Czech orthography is mostly about matching letters to sounds, but some letters and groups remind us of older sounds that changed over time.

All loud consonant sounds become soft before other loud consonants or at the end of words. For example, the sound d becomes t before a quiet p, like in the word odpadnout (to fall away). Some letters change based on their history, like k being used for the sound g in words such as kde (where).

Special letters help show soft sounds. For example, i or í after d, t, n makes these sounds soft, like in čeština (Czech language). The letter ě is an old marker that shows a soft sound even though it no longer makes its own special sound today.

The letters ú and ů both represent the long u sound but are used in different places. Ú is used at the start of words, like in úhel (angle), while ů is used inside words, like in dům (house) when it changes form, such as domu (homeward).

The rules also affect how verbs and nouns match in number and gender. For example, past tense verbs must match the gender of the subject. If the subject is a mix of genders, masculine is usually used, like in muži a ženy byli (men and women were).

Punctuation

The full stop (.), the colon (:), the semicolon (;), the question mark (?), and the exclamation mark (!) are used in Czech like in other European languages. The full stop is placed after numbers when they show order, like 1. den (= první den) – the 1st day.

The comma helps separate parts in complex-compound sentences, lists, and other parts of sentences. How it is used in Czech is different from English. Subordinate (dependent) clauses must always be separated from the main clauses. A comma is not used before a (and), i (as well as), ani (nor), and nebo (or) when they connect parts of sentences at the same level. But a comma is needed in non-copulative connections (like showing cause, emphasis, or exclusion). A comma can appear before a (and) if it is inside a parenthetical phrase: Jakub, můj mladší bratr, a jeho učitel Filip byli příliš zabráni do rozhovoru. Probírali látku, která bude u zkoušky, a též, kdo na ní bude.

Examples:

• otec a matka – father and mother, otec nebo matka – father or mother (coordinate relation – no commas)
• Je to pravda, nebo ne? – Is it true, or not? (exclusion)
• Pršelo, a proto nikdo nepřišel. – It was raining, and so no one came. (consequence)
• Já vím, kdo to je. – I know who it is.
• Myslím, že se mýlíš. – I think you are mistaken. (subordinate relation)
• Jak se máš, Anno? – How are you, Anna? (addressing a person)
• Karel IV., římský císař a český král, založil hrad Karlštejn. – Charles IV, Roman Emperor and Bohemian king, founded the Karlštejn Castle. (comma-delimited parenthesis)

Quotation marks. The first quotation mark is placed at the bottom line:

• Petr řekl: „Přijdu zítra.“ – Peter said: "I'll come tomorrow."

Other types of quotation marks: ‚‘ »«

Apostrophes are used rarely in Czech. They can show a missing sound in non-standard speech, but this is optional, e.g. řek' or řek (= řekl, he said).

Capital letters

The first word of every sentence and all proper names are capitalized. Special cases include:

• Respectful expressions – optional: Ty (you sg.), Tvůj (your sg.), Vy (you pl.), Váš (your pl.); Bůh (God), Mistr (Master), etc.
• Headings – The first word is capitalized.
• Cities, towns and villages – All words are capitalized, except for prepositions: Nové Město nad Metují (New-Town-upon-Metuje).
• Geographical or local names – The first word is capitalized, common names like ulice (street), náměstí (square) or moře (sea) are not capitalized: ulice Svornosti (Concordance Street), Václavské náměstí (Wenceslas Square), Severní moře (North Sea). Since 1993, the initial preposition and the first following word are capitalized: lékárna U Černého orla (Black Eagle Pharmacy).
• Official names of institutions – The first word is capitalized: Městský úřad v Kolíně (The Municipal Office in Kolín) vs. městský úřad (a municipal office). In some cases, an initial common name is not capitalized even if it is factually a part of the name: okres Semily (Semily District), náměstí Míru (Peace Square).
• Names of nations and nationality nouns are capitalized: Anglie (England), Angličan (Englishman), Německo (Germany), Němec (German). Adjectives derived from geographical names and names of nations, such as anglický (English – adjective) and pražský (Prague – adjective, e.g. pražské metro, Prague subway), are not. Names of languages are not capitalized: angličtina (English).
• Possessive adjectives derived from proper names are capitalized: Pavlův dům (Paul's house).
• Brands are capitalized as a trademark or company name, but usually not as product names: přijel trabant a několik škodovek but přijelo auto značky Trabant a několik aut značky Škoda, zákaz vjezdu segwayů but zákaz vjezdu vozítek Segway
• If a proper name contains other proper names, the inner proper names keep their orthography: Poslanecká sněmovna Parlamentu České republiky, Kostelec nad Černými lesy, Filozofická fakulta Jihočeské univerzity v Českých Budějovicích

History

In the 9th century, the Glagolitic script was used. By the 11th century, it was replaced by the Latin alphabet.

Over time, Czech developed its own way of writing using this alphabet. Early Czech writing used letters for foreign sounds, which could be confusing. Later, special pairs of letters called digraphs were used, but this was also unclear.

Finally, special marks called diacritics were introduced around 1406 by Jan Hus in his work "De orthographia Bohemica". These marks helped make writing clearer and are still used today. The Bible of Kralice in the late 1500s also helped shape Czech writing. In the 1800s, more rules were added, and today’s Czech writing is based on those ideas.

Computer encoding

In computing, there are different ways to write the Czech alphabet using special codes. Some of these include ISO 8859-2, Windows code page 1250, IBM PC code page 852, Kamenický brothers or KEYBCS2 for MS-DOS and Fidonet, and Unicode.