Czech orthography

Czech Alpha bet Česká abeceda
Script type	Alphabet
Time period	SinceJan Hus'Orthographia bohemica(early 15th century – present)
Languages	Czech
Related scripts
Parent systems	Egyptian hieroglyphs Proto-Sinaitic Alpha bet Phoenician Alpha bet Greek Alpha bet Old Italic scripts Latin Alpha bet Czech Alpha bet
Child systems	Slovak Alpha bet Gaj's Latin Alpha bet Latvian Alpha bet Lithuanian Alpha bet
Unicode
Unicode range	Subset ofLatin

Czech orthographyis a system of rules for proper formal writing (orthography) inCzech.The earliest form of separate Latin script specifically designed to suit Czech was devised by Czechtheologianand church reformistJan Hus,the namesake of theHussite movement,in one of his seminal works,De orthographia bohemica(On Bohemian orthography).

The modern Czech orthographic system isdiacritic,having evolved from an earlier system which used manydigraphs(although one digraph has been kept -ch). Thecaronis added to standard Latin letters to express sounds which are foreign toLatin.Theacute accentis used for longvowels.

The Czech orthography is considered the model for many otherBalto-Slavic languagesusing theLatin Alpha bet;Slovakorthography being its direct revised descendant, while the Serbo-CroatianGaj's Latin Alpha betand itsSlovenedescendant system are largely based on it. TheBaltic languages,such asLatvianandLithuanian,are also largely based on it. All of them make use of similar diacritics and also have a similar, usually interchangeable, relationship between the letters and the sounds they are meant to represent.

Alphabet

The Czech Alpha bet consists of 42 letters.

Czech Alpha bet

Majuscule forms(uppercase/capital letters)
A	Á	B	C	Č	D	Ď	E	É	Ě	F	G	H	Ch	I	Í	J	K	L	M	N
Ň	O	Ó	P	Q	R	Ř	S	Š	T	Ť	U	Ú	Ů	V	W	X	Y	Ý	Z	Ž
Minuscule forms(lowercase/small letters)
a	á	b	c	č	d	ď	e	é	ě	f	g	h	ch	i	í	j	k	l	m	n
ň	o	ó	p	q	r	ř	s	š	t	ť	u	ú	ů	v	w	x	y	ý	z	ž

Czech Alpha bet (detail)

Letter		Name	Letter		Name
Uppercase	Lowercase		Uppercase	Lowercase
A	a	á	Ň	ň	eň
Á	á	dlouhé á; á s čárkou	O	o	ó
B	b	bé	Ó	ó	dlouhé ó; ó s čárkou
C	c	cé	P	p	pé
Č	č	čé	Q	q	kvé
D	d	dé	R	r	er
Ď	ď	ďé	Ř	ř	eř
E	e	é	S	s	es
É	é	dlouhé é; é s čárkou	Š	š	eš
Ě	ě	ije; é s háčkem	T	t	té
F	f	ef	Ť	ť	ťé
G	g	gé	U	u	ú
H	h	há	Ú	ú	dlouhé ú; ú s čárkou
Ch	ch	chá	Ů	ů	ů s kroužkem
I	i	í; měkké i	V	v	vé
Í	í	dlouhé í; dlouhé měkké í; í s čárkou; měkké í s čárkou	W	w	dvojité vé
J	j	jé	X	x	iks
K	k	ká	Y	y	ypsilon; krátké tvrdé ý
L	l	el	Ý	ý	dlouhé ypsilon; dlouhé tvrdé ý; ypsilon s čárkou; tvrdé ý s čárkou
M	m	em	Z	z	zet
N	n	en	Ž	ž	žet

The lettersQ,W,andXare used exclusively in foreign words, and the former two are respectively replaced withKVandVonce the word becomes "naturalized" (assimilated into Czech); the digraphsdzanddžare also used mostly for foreign words and are not considered to be distinct letters in the Czech Alpha bet.

Orthographic principles

Czech orthography is primarilyphonemic(rather than phonetic) because an individualgraphemeusually corresponds to an individualphoneme(rather than asound). However, some graphemes and letter groups are remnants of historical phonemes which were used in the past but have since merged with other phonemes. Some changes in thephonologyhave not been reflected in the orthography.

Vowels

Grapheme	IPAvalue	Notes
a	/a/
á	/aː/
e	/ɛ/
é	/ɛː/
ě	/ɛ/,/ʲɛ/	Marks palatalization of preceding consonant; see usage rulesbelow
i	/ɪ/	Palatalizes preceding⟨d⟩,⟨t⟩,or⟨n⟩;see usage rulesbelow
í	/iː/	Palatalizes preceding⟨d⟩,⟨t⟩,or⟨n⟩;see usage rulesbelow
o	/o/
ó	/oː/	Occurs mostly in words of foreign origin.
u	/u/
ú	/uː/	See usage rulesbelow
ů	/uː/	See usage rulesbelow
y	/ɪ/	See usage rulesbelow
ý	/iː/	See usage rulesbelow

Consonants

Grapheme	IPAvalue	Notes
b	/b/
c	/t͡s/
č	/t͡ʃ/
d	/d/	Represents/ɟ/before⟨i í ě⟩;seebelow
ď	/ɟ/
f	/f/	Occurs mostly in words of foreign origin.
g	/ɡ/	Occurs mostly in words of foreign origin.
h	/ɦ/
ch	/x/
j	/j/
k	/k/
l	/l/
m	/m/
n	/n/	Represents/ɲ/before⟨i í ě⟩;seebelow
ň	/ɲ/
p	/p/
r	/r/
ř	/r̝/
s	/s/
š	/ʃ/
t	/t/	Represents/c/before⟨i í ě⟩;seebelow
ť	/c/
v	/v/
x	/ks/,/ɡz/	Occurs only in words of foreign origin; pronounced/ɡz/in words with the prefix 'ex-' before vowels or voiced consonants.
z	/z/
ž	/ʒ/

Voicing assimilation

See also:Czech phonology

All the obstruent consonants are subject to voicing (before voiced obstruents except⟨v⟩) or devoicing (before voiceless consonants and at the end of words); spelling in these cases is morphophonemic (i.e. the morpheme has the same spelling as before a vowel). An exception is the cluster⟨sh⟩,in which the/s/is voiced to/z/only inMoravian dialects,while in Bohemia the/ɦ/is devoiced to/x/instead (e.g.shodit/sxoɟɪt/,in Moravia/zɦoɟɪt/). Devoicing/ɦ/changes its articulation place: it becomes[x].After unvoiced consonants⟨ř⟩is devoiced: for instance, intři'three', which is pronounced.Written voiced or voiceless counterparts are kept according to the etymology of the word, e.g.odpadnout[ˈotpadnoʊ̯t](to fall away) -od-is aprefix;written/d/is devoiced here because of the following voiceless/p/.

For historical reasons, the consonant[ɡ]is writtenkin Czech words likekde('where', < Proto-Slavic *kъdě) orkdo('who', < Proto-Slavic *kъto). This is because the lettergwas historically used for the consonant[j].The original Slavic phoneme/ɡ/changed into/h/in the Old-Czech period. Thus,/ɡ/is not a separate phoneme (with a corresponding grapheme) in words of domestic origin; it occurs only in foreign words (e.g.graf,gram,etc.).

Final devoicing

Unlike inEnglishbut likeGermanandRussian,voiced consonants are pronounced voicelessly in the final position in words. Indeclension,they are voiced incaseswhere the words take onendings.

Compare:

led[ˈlɛt]–ledy[ˈlɛdɪ](ice – ices)

let[ˈlɛt]–lety[ˈlɛtɪ](flight – flights)

"Soft" I and "hard" Y

The letters⟨i⟩and⟨y⟩are both pronounced[ɪ],while⟨í⟩and⟨ý⟩are both pronounced[iː].⟨y⟩was originally pronounced[ɨ]as in contemporaryPolish.However, in the 14th century, this difference in standard pronunciation disappeared, though it has been preserved in someMoravian dialects.In words of native origin "soft"⟨i⟩and⟨í⟩cannot follow "hard" consonants, while "hard"⟨y⟩and⟨ý⟩cannot follow "soft" consonants; "neutral" consonants can be followed by either vowel:

Hard and soft consonants

Soft	ž, š, č, ř, c, j, ď, ť, ň
Neutral	b, f, l, m, p, s, v, z
Hard	h, ch, k, r, d, t, n, g

When⟨i⟩or⟨í⟩is written after⟨d, t, n⟩in native words, these consonants are soft, as if they were written⟨ď, ť, ň⟩.That is, the sounds[ɟɪ,ɟiː,cɪ,ciː,ɲɪ,ɲiː]are written⟨di, dí, ti, tí, ni, ní⟩instead of⟨ďi, ďí, ťi, ťí, ňi, ňí⟩,e.g. inčeština[ˈt͡ʃɛʃcɪna].The sounds[dɪ,diː,tɪ,tiː,nɪ,niː]are denoted, respectively, by⟨dy, dý, ty, tý, ny, ný⟩.In words of foreign origin,⟨di, ti, ni⟩are pronounced[dɪ,tɪ,nɪ];that is, as if they were written⟨dy, ty, ny⟩,e.g. indiktát,dictation.

Historically the letter⟨c⟩was hard, but this changed in the 19th century. However, in some words it is still followed by the letter⟨y⟩:tác(plate) –tácy(plates).

Because neutral consonants can be followed by either⟨i⟩or⟨y⟩,in some cases they distinguishhomophones,e.g.být(to be) vs.bít(to beat),mýt(to wash) vs.mít(to have). At school pupils must memorize wordrootsandprefixeswhere⟨y⟩is written;⟨i⟩is written in other cases. Writing⟨i⟩or⟨y⟩inendingsis dependent on thedeclension patterns.

Letter Ě

The letter⟨ě⟩is a vestige ofOld Czechpalatalization.The originally palatalizingphoneme/ě/[ʲɛ]became extinct, changing to[ɛ]or[jɛ],but it is preserved as agraphemewhich can never appear in the initial position.

• [ɟɛ,cɛ,ɲɛ]are written⟨dě, tě, ně⟩instead of⟨ďe, ťe, ňe⟩,analogously to⟨di, ti, ni⟩
• [bjɛ,pjɛ,vjɛ,fjɛ]are usually written⟨bě, pě, vě, fě⟩instead of⟨bje,pje,vje,fje⟩
  • In words likevjezd(entry, drive-in)objem(volume),⟨bje,vje⟩are written because in such cases–je-is etymologically preceded by the prefixesv-orob-
• [mɲɛ]is usually written⟨mě⟩instead of⟨mně⟩,except for morphological reasons in some words (jemný,soft ->jemně,softly)
  • The first-person singular pronounsmě(for the genitive and accusative cases) andmně(for the dative and locative) are homophones[mɲɛ]—seeCzech declension

Letter Ů

There are two ways in Czech to write long[uː]:⟨ú⟩and⟨ů⟩.⟨ů⟩cannot occur in an initial position, while⟨ú⟩occurs almost exclusively in the initial position or at the beginning of a wordrootin a compound.

Historically, long⟨ú⟩changed intothediphthong⟨ou⟩[ou̯](as also happened in the EnglishGreat Vowel Shiftwith words such as "house" ), though not in word-initial position in theprestigeform. In 1848⟨ou⟩at the beginning ofword-rootswas changed into⟨ú⟩in words likeouřadto reflect this. Thus, the letter⟨ú⟩is written at the beginning of word-roots only:úhel(angle),trojúhelník(triangle), except in loanwords:skútr(scooter).

Meanwhile, historical long⟨ó⟩[oː]changed into the diphthong⟨uo⟩[ʊo].As was common withscribal abbreviations,the letter⟨o⟩in the diphthong was sometimes written as aringabove the letter⟨u⟩,producing⟨ů⟩,e.g.kóň > kuoň > kůň(horse), like the origin of the Germanumlaut.Later, the pronunciation changed into[uː],but the grapheme⟨ů⟩has remained. It never occurs at the beginning of words:dům(house),domů(home, homeward).

The letter⟨ů⟩now has the same pronunciation as the letter⟨ú⟩(long[uː]), butalternateswith a short⟨o⟩when a word is inflected (e.g. nom.kůň→ gen.koně,nom.dům→ gen.domu), thus showing the historical evolution of the language.

Agreement between the subject and the predicate

Thepredicatemust be always in accordance with thesubjectin the sentence - innumberandperson(personalpronouns), and with past and passiveparticiplesalso ingender.Thisgrammaticalprinciple affects the orthography (see also"Soft" I and "Hard" Y) – it is especially important for the correct choice and writing of plural endings of theparticiples.

Examples:

Gender	Sg.	Pl.	English
masculine animate	pes byl koupen	psibylikoupeni	a dog was bought/dogs were bought
masculine inanimate	hrad byl koupen	hradybylykoupeny	a castle was bought/castles were bought
feminine	kočkabylakoupena	kočkybylykoupeny	a cat was bought/cats were bought
neuter	městobylokoupeno	městabylakoupena	a town was bought/towns were bought

The mentioned example shows both past (byl, byla...) and passive (koupen, koupena...) participles. The accordance in gender takes effect in the pasttenseand the passivevoice,not in the present and future tenses in active voice.

If the complex subject is a combination of nouns of different genders, masculine animate gender is prior to others and the masculine inanimate and feminine genders are prior to the neuter gender.

Examples:

mužia ženy byli- men and women were

kočkya koťata byly- cats and kittens were

my jsme byli(my = we all/men) vs.my jsme byly(my = we women) - we were

Priority of genders:

masculine animate > masculine inanimate & feminine > neuter

Punctuation

The use of thefull stop(.), thecolon(:), thesemicolon(;), thequestion mark(?) and theexclamation mark(!) is similar to their use in other European languages. The full stop is placed after a number if it stands for ordinal numerals (as in German), e.g.1. den(=první den) – the 1st day.

Thecommais used to separate individual parts incomplex-compound sentences,lists, isolated parts ofsentences,etc. Its use in Czech is different from English. Subordinate (dependent)clausesmust be always separated from their principal (independent) clauses, for instance. A comma is not placed beforea(and),i(as well as),ani(nor) andnebo(or) when they connect parts of sentences or clauses in copulative conjunctions (on a same level). It must be placed in non-copulative conjunctions (consequence, emphasis, exclusion, etc.). A comma can, however, occur in front of the worda(and) if the former is part of comma-delimited parenthesis: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.A comma also separates subordinate conjunctions introduced by composite conjunctionsa proto(and therefore) anda tak(and so).

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 this is why nobody came. (consequence)
• Já vím, kdo to je.– I know who it is.Myslím, že se mýlíš.– I think (that) you are wrong. (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,Holy Roman Emperor and Bohemian king, founded theKarlštejn Castle.(comma-delimited parenthesis)

Quotation marks.The first one preceding the quoted text is placed to the bottom line:

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

Other types of quotation marks: ‚‘ »«

Apostrophesare used rarely in Czech. They can denote a missing sound in non-standard speech, but it is optional, e.g.řek'orřek(=řekl,he said).

Capital letters

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

• Respect expression – 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).
• Geographicalor local names – The first word is capitalized, common names asulice(street),náměstí(square) ormoře(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 vKolíně(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 asanglický(English – adjective) andpražský(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 škodovekbutpřijelo auto značky Trabant a několik aut značky Škoda,zákaz vjezdu segwayůbutzákaz 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, theGlagolitic scriptwas used, during the 11th century it was replaced by Latin script. There are five periods in the development of the Czech Latin-based orthographic system:

Primitive orthography

For writing sounds which are foreign to theLatinAlpha bet,letters with similar sounds were used. The oldest known written notes in Czech originate from the 11th century. The literature was written predominantly in Latin in this period. Unfortunately, it was very ambiguous at times, withc,for example, being used forc,č,andk.

Digraphic orthography

Variousdigraphswere used for non-Latin sounds. The system was not consistent and it also did not distinguish long and short vowels. It had some features thatPolish orthographyhas kept, such ascz,rzinstead ofč,ř,but was still crippled by ambiguities, such as spelling bothsandšass/ss,zandžasz,and sometimes evencandčboth ascz,only distinguishing by context. Long vowels such asáwere sometimes (but not always) written double asaa.Other features of the day included spellingjasgandvasw,as the early modern Latin Alpha bet had not by then distinguishedjfromiorvfromu.

Diacritic orthography

Introduced probably byJan Hus.Usingdiacriticsfor long vowels ( "virgula", anacute,"čárka" in Czech) and "soft" consonants ( "punctus rotundus", a dot above a letter, which has survived inPolishż) was suggested for the first time in"De orthographia Bohemica"around 1406. Diacritics replaced digraphs almost completely. It was also suggested that the Prague dialect should become the standard for Czech. Jan Hus is considered to be the author of that work but there is some uncertainty about this.

Brethren orthography

TheBible of Kralice(1579–1593), the first complete Czech translation of theBiblefrom the original languages by theCzech Brethren,became the model for the literary form of the language. The punctus rotundus was replaced by thecaron( "háček" ). There were some differences from the current orthography, e.g. the digraphſſwas used instead ofš;ay, ey, auinstead ofaj, ej, ou;vinstead ofu(at the beginning of words);winstead ofv;ginstead ofj;andjinstead ofí(gegj=její,hers).Ywas written always afterc, sandz(e.g.cizí,foreign, was writtencyzý) and theconjunctioni(as well as, and) was writteny.

Modern orthography

During the period of the Czech National Renaissance (end of the 18th century and the first half of the 19th century), Czech linguists (Josef Dobrovskýet al.) codified some reforms in the orthography. These principles have been effective up to the present day. The later reforms in the 20th century mostly referred to introducing loanwords into Czech and their adaptation to the Czech orthography.

Computer encoding

Incomputing,several different coding standards have existed for this Alpha bet, among them:

• ISO 8859-2
• Microsoft Windows code page 1250
• IBM PC code page 852
• Kamenický brothers or KEYBCS2on earlyDOSPCs and onFidonet.
• Unicode

See also

• Czech language
• Czech phonology
• Orthographia bohemica
• Czech declension
• Czech verb
• Czech word order
• International Phonetic Alphabet
• Phonemic orthography
• Háček
• Kroužek
• Non-English usage of quotation marks

External links

• Czech Language
• Czech Encodings FAQandlist of known encodings(in Czech)
• Typo.czArchived2004-03-27 at theWayback MachineInformation on Central European typography and typesetting