The Vithkuqi alphabet, also called Büthakukye or Beitha Kukju after the appellation applied to it by German Albanologist Johann Georg von Hahn, was an alphabetic script invented for writing the Albanian language between 1825 and 1845 by Albanian scholar Naum Veqilharxhi.

History

Though the alphabet is sometimes erroneously claimed to be named after its inventor, as in Carl Faulmann's Das Buch der Schrift, the script's name is derived from Vithkuq, a village in the Korçë region where Veqilharxhi was born.

The alphabet never took hold because of its inventor's premature death and because of the prohibitive costs of cutting new type for the invented characters; nevertheless, a number of documents using the alphabet were published in the late 19th century. The alphabet was eventually overwhelmed by the Greek, Arabic and Latin scripts it had been designed to supplant, the last becoming the official one in 1909. Other original alphabets used for Albanian were the Elbasan alphabet and the Todhri alphabet of the 18th century. These similarly failed to see prolonged widespread usage.

Description

The Vithkuqi alphabet was specifically designed to be as religiously neutral as possible, avoiding the duplication of Greek, Latin, or Arabic characters. It had a near-perfect correspondence between letters and phonemes, but lacked characters for modern Albanian "gj", "rr", "xh", and "zh". Additionally, modern "b" and "h" were each represented by two characters- the lesser-used characters in each pair are transliterated as "bb" and "hh" below.

Capital letterSmall letterModern AlbanianIPA
ImageTextImageText
𐕰𐖗a/a/
𐕱𐖘bb/b/
𐕲𐖙b/b/
𐕳𐖚c/t͡s/
𐕴𐖛ç/t͡ʃ/
𐕵𐖜d/d/
𐕶𐖝dh/ð/
𐕷𐖞e/ɛ/
𐕸𐖟ë/ə/
𐕹𐖠f/f/
𐕺𐖡g/ɡ/
𐕼𐖣h/h/
𐕽𐖤hh/h/
𐕾𐖥i/i/
𐕿𐖦ie/iɛ̯/
𐖀𐖧j/j/
𐖁𐖨k/k/
𐖂𐖩l/l/
𐖃𐖪ll/ɫ/
𐖄𐖫m/m/
𐖅𐖬n/n/
𐖆𐖭nj/ɲ/
𐖇𐖮o/ɔ/
𐖈𐖯p/p/
𐖉𐖰q/c͡ç/
𐖊𐖱r/ɹ/
𐖌𐖳s/s/
𐖍𐖴sh/ʃ/
𐖎𐖵t/t/
𐖏𐖶th/θ/
𐖐𐖷u/u/
𐖑𐖸v/v/
𐖒𐖹x/d͡z/
𐖔𐖻y/y/
𐖕𐖼z/z/
The letters of the Vithkuqi alphabet matched to their Latin equivalents
The letters of the Vithkuqi alphabet matched to their Latin equivalents

Typeface

The books by Veqilharxhi were lithographed in Bucharest by George Venrich, as was recently discovered. Though the alphabet was lithographed, in 1847 it was also cut for typographic use in Vienna, by the Austrian philologists and punchcutter Alois Auer. It was first used for a type specimen called Das Vaterunser in 206 Sprachen by the Imperial Printing Press (k.k. Hof- und Staatsdruckerei) in Vienna, under the direction of Auer. The same type was also used by Carl Faulmann in a different book a few years later. It is the first typeface to be cut for an original Albanian alphabet.

Unicode

Vithkuqi was added to the Unicode Standard in September 2021 with the release of version 14.0.

The Unicode block for Vithkuqi is U+10570–U+105BF:

Vithkuqi[1][2] (PDF)
0123456789ABCDEF
U+1057x𐕰𐕱𐕲𐕳𐕴𐕵𐕶𐕷𐕸𐕹𐕺𐕼𐕽𐕾𐕿
U+1058x𐖀𐖁𐖂𐖃𐖄𐖅𐖆𐖇𐖈𐖉𐖊𐖌𐖍𐖎𐖏
U+1059x𐖐𐖑𐖒𐖔𐖕𐖗𐖘𐖙𐖚𐖛𐖜𐖝𐖞𐖟
U+105Ax𐖠𐖡𐖣𐖤𐖥𐖦𐖧𐖨𐖩𐖪𐖫𐖬𐖭𐖮𐖯
U+105Bx𐖰𐖱𐖳𐖴𐖵𐖶𐖷𐖸𐖹𐖻𐖼
Notes 1.^ As of Unicode version 17.0 2.^ Grey areas indicate non-assigned code points

See also

Sources

  • Diringer, David. (1949). The Alphabet.
  • Десницкая, Агния Васильевна. (1968). Албанский язык и его диалекты. Leningrad: Nauka.
  • Десницкая, Агния Васильевна. (1987). Албанская литература и албанский язык. Leningrad: Nauka.
  • Elsie, Robert. (1995). The Elbasan Gospel Manuscript (Anonimi i Elbasanit), 1761, and the struggle for an original Albanian alphabet.
  • Faulmann, Karl. (1880). Das Buch der Schrift.
  • Skendi, Stavro. 1960. The history of the Albanian alphabet: a case of complex cultural and political development. Südost-Forschungen: Internationale Zeitschrift für Geschichte, Kultur und Landeskunde Südosteuropas 19:263-284.
  • Trix, Frances. 1997. Alphabet conflict in the Balkans: Albanian and the congress of Monastir. International Journal of the Sociology of Language 128:1-23.
  • Veqilharxhi, Naum. (1845). Ëvetar Shqip Fort i Shkurtër.