24 Facts About Cyrillic script

Cyrillic script, otherwise known as the Slavonic script or simply the Slavic script, is a writing system used for various languages across Eurasia.

Early Cyrillic alphabet was developed during the 9th century AD at the Preslav Literary School in the First Bulgarian Empire during the reign of tsar Simeon I the Great, probably by disciples of the two Byzantine brothers Saint Cyril and Saint Methodius, who had previously created the Glagolitic script.

Since the Cyrillic script was conceived and popularised by the followers of Cyril and Methodius, rather than by Cyril and Methodius themselves, its name denotes homage rather than authorship.

Some Bulgarian intellectuals, notably Stefan Tsanev, have expressed concern over this, and have suggested that the Cyrillic script be called the "Bulgarian alphabet" instead, for the sake of historical accuracy.

In Bulgarian, Macedonian, Russian, Serbian, Czech and Slovak, the Cyrillic script alphabet is known as azbuka, derived from the old names of the first two letters of most Cyrillic script alphabets.

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The Cyrillic script is derived from the Greek uncial script letters, augmented by ligatures and consonants from the older Glagolitic alphabet for sounds not found in Greek.

Glagolitic and Cyrillic script were formalized by the Byzantine Saints Cyril and Methodius and their disciples, such as Saints Naum, Clement, Angelar, and Sava.

Cyrillic script spread among other Slavic peoples, as well as among non-Slavic Vlachs.

The earliest datable Cyrillic inscriptions have been found in the area of Preslav, in the medieval city itself and at nearby Patleina Monastery, both in present-day Shumen Province, as well as in the Ravna Monastery and in the Varna Monastery.

The new Cyrillic script became the basis of alphabets used in various languages in Orthodox Church-dominated Eastern Europe, both Slavic and non-Slavic languages.

Bosnian Cyrillic script, widely known as Bosancica is an extinct variant of the Cyrillic script alphabet that originated in medieval Bosnia.

Paleographers consider the earliest features of Bosnian Cyrillic script had likely begun to appear between the 10th or 11th century, with the Humac tablet to be the first such document using this type of script and is believed to date from this period.

Bosnian Cyrillic script was used continuously until the 18th century, with sporadic usage even taking place in the 20th century.

The new letterforms, called the Civil Cyrillic script, became closer to those of the Latin alphabet; several archaic letters were abolished and several new letters were introduced designed by Peter himself.

However, over the course of the following millennium, Cyrillic script adapted to changes in spoken language, developed regional variations to suit the features of national languages, and was subjected to academic reform and political decrees.

Cyrillic script spread throughout the East Slavic and some South Slavic territories, being adopted for writing local languages, such as Old East Slavic.

Development of Cyrillic script typography passed directly from the medieval stage to the late Baroque, without a Renaissance phase as in Western Europe.

Late Medieval Cyrillic letters show a marked tendency to be very tall and narrow, with strokes often shared between adjacent letters.

Thus, unlike the majority of modern Greek fonts that retained their own set of design principles for lower-case letters, modern Cyrillic script fonts are much the same as modern Latin fonts of the same font family.

Similarly to Latin fonts, italic and cursive types of many Cyrillic script letters are very different from their upright roman types.

Cyrillic script has been used for languages of Alaska, Slavic Europe, the Caucasus, the languages of Idel-Ural, Siberia, and the Russian Far East.

The Russian government has mandated that Cyrillic script must be used for all public communications in all federal subjects of Russia, to promote closer ties across the federation.

The non-Latin letters, including Cyrillic script, were removed from the alphabet in 1982 and replaced with Latin letters that closely resembled the letters they replaced.

Punctuation for Cyrillic script text is similar to that used in European Latin-alphabet languages.