Armenian alphabet

Lore & Background

The Armenian alphabet was introduced by Mesrop Mashtots and Isaac of Armenia (Sahak Partev) in CE 405. Medieval Armenian sources also claim that Mashtots invented the Georgian and Caucasian Albanian alphabets around the same time, though most scholars link the Georgian script to the Christianization of Iberia. The first sentence written in Armenian by Mashtots is not definitively known, despite traditional claims linking it to a phrase from Solomon's Book of Proverbs.

Reader's Guide

The Armenian alphabet is significant as the writing system that enabled the development of Armenian literature and Christian scripture in the Armenian language. Its creation around 405 AD by Mesrop Mashtots is a foundational event in Armenian cultural history. The script originally had 36 letters, later expanded to 38 in the Middle Ages with the addition of letters for foreign sounds, and to 39 in the reformed orthography of the 1920s when the ligature և was treated as a letter. The alphabet is written horizontally from left to right. Its order and many letter shapes show similarities to Greek, and it is generally considered modeled after the Greek alphabet, supplemented with sources for Armenian sounds not found in Greek. The earliest known example of the script's usage is a dedicatory inscription from the 480s, and the earliest surviving manuscripts date from the 9th–10th century. The script has four principal calligraphic hands: erkatagir, bolorgir, notrgir, and sheghagir. The reformed orthography, adopted in Soviet Armenia from 1922 to 1924, changed the digraph ու and the ligature և into separate letters, but is rejected by Western Armenians and Eastern Armenians in Iran, who continue to use traditional orthography.

Did You Know?

• The Armenian word for 'alphabet' is այբուբեն (aybuben), named after the first two letters ⟨Ա⟩ (ayb) and ⟨Բ⟩ (ben).
• The earliest securely dated Armenian inscriptions are from later centuries, such as the Mren inscription (7th century) or the Jerusalem mosaic (5th–6th century).
• A papyrus discovered in 1892 at Fayyum contains Armenian words written in Greek script and is dated between the 5th and 7th centuries.
• The script originally had 36 letters; two more were adopted in the 13th century, and the ligature և was treated as a letter in the reformed orthography of the 1920s.