Abjad

An abjad is a special kind of writing system where only the consonants are written with special signs, and the vowels are left for the reader to guess. This is different from alphabets, which have signs for both consonants and vowels. The idea of calling this type of writing an "abjad" was first suggested in 1990 by Peter T. Daniels.

Some writing systems, like the ones used for Arabic and Hebrew scripts, are called "impure abjads." In these systems, vowels can sometimes be shown using special marks or a small number of special signs, but often they are still left for the reader to figure out. This makes reading these languages a bit like solving a puzzle, where you use the consonants as clues to find the missing vowels.

Etymology

The name abjad comes from the first four letters of the Arabic alphabet. These letters are ʾa, b, j, and d. This order matches the first letters in other ancient writing systems, like the Phoenician and Hebrew alphabets, used for languages in the West Semitic family.

Terminology

An abjad is a special kind of writing system where only the letters for consonants are shown. The letters for vowels are usually left out, and the reader has to figure out what vowels go in between the consonants. Sometimes, there are special marks added to show vowels, like in Hebrew or Arabic, but these marks are not always used.

Some people think the word "abjad" is confusing because it can also mean the Arabic numeral system. But many experts in language studies still use this term to talk about writing systems that only show consonants.

Origins and history

See also: History of the alphabet § Descendants of the Aramaic abjad

The Proto-Sinaitic script is the oldest known example of a writing system that uses letters. It was created around the Sinai Peninsula during the Middle Bronze Age by people who spoke an ancient West Semitic language. They used pictures from Egyptian hieroglyphs to make a new way to write the sounds of their language, focusing only on the letters for consonants.

The Phoenician abjad was a simpler way to write that used just a few dozen symbols. This made it easy to learn and share. As Phoenician traders traveled around the ancient Mediterranean world, they shared their writing with others. From this, new writing systems grew, like the Aramaic abjad and the Greek alphabet. The Greek alphabet later inspired others, such as the Latin alphabet, while Aramaic helped create many writing systems across Asia.

Impure abjads

Impure abjads have characters for some vowels, optional vowel marks, or both. The term pure abjad refers to scripts without any vowel indicators. However, most abjads, such as Arabic, Hebrew, Aramaic, and Pahlavi, are "impure" abjads — they contain symbols for some vowel sounds. These vowel symbols are also used for certain consonants, especially sounds similar to long vowels.

Addition of vowels

Main article: Greek alphabet

In the 9th century BC, the Greeks used the Phoenician script for their language. Because the Greek language needed vowels to avoid confusion, they changed the script. They did not need letters for certain sounds, so they used those symbols for vowels. The letters waw and yod were also changed into vowel signs. The big new idea was to use these symbols only for vowels, which could be mixed freely with consonants.

Abugidas developed in a different way. The basic letter had an "a" vowel sound. Small marks added to the letter changed the vowel. This is how the South Arabian abjad turned into the Geʽez script of Ethiopia between the 5th century BC and the 5th century AD. In a similar way, the Brāhmī abugida of the Indian subcontinent developed around the 3rd century BC (from the Aramaic abjad, it has been hypothesized).

Abjads and the structure of Semitic languages

The abjad way of writing works well with Semitic languages because these languages build words from a root of three consonants. Vowels help show meaning changes in words. For example, in Arabic, the root ك‌ت‌ب K-T-B (to write) can create words like كَتَبَ kataba (he wrote), كَتَبْتَ katabta (you wrote), يَكْتُبُ⁩ yaktubu (he writes), and مَكْتَبَة⁩ maktabah (library). Not showing all vowels in writing helps readers recognize word roots and guess new words more easily, especially with help from the context.

Adaptation for use as true alphabets

The Arabic abjad can be changed to work like a regular alphabet when writing languages such as Kurdish, Swahili, Malay, and Uyghur. It was also used in the past for Bosnian, Mozarabic, Aragonese, Portuguese, Spanish, and Afrikaans. To do this, some letters or groups of letters are used to show vowels. Similarly, the Hebrew abjad has been changed to write Jewish languages like Ladino and Yiddish.

Comparative chart of abjads, extinct and extant