Arabic diacritics

Arabic alphabet
	ا ب ت ث ج ح
	خ د ذ ر ز س
	ش ص ض ط ظ ع
	غ ف ق ك ل
	م ن ه‍ و ي
	History · Transliteration; Diacritics · Hamza ء; Numerals · Numeration v • d • e

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The Arabic script has numerous diacritics, including iʿjam (إعجام), consonant pointing, and tashkīl (تشكيل), supplementary diacritics. The latter include the ḥarakāt (حركات, singular ḥaraka حركة), vowel marks.

The Arabic script is an impure abjad, where short consonants and long vowels are represented by letters but short vowels and consonant length are not generally indicated in writing. The tashkīl are optional symbols that can be used to represent the missing vowels and consonant length. Modern Arabic is nearly always written with consonant pointing, but occasionally unpointed texts are still seen. Early texts such as the Qur'an were written without pointing.

[edit] Iʿjām

Seventh-century kufic script without either harakat or iʿjam.

The iʿjām (Arabic: إعجام‎) are the pointing diacritics that distinguish various consonants that have the same form (rasm), such as ﺒ /b/, ﺘ /t/, ﺜ /θ/, ﻨ /n/, and ﻴ /j/.

Early manuscripts of the Qurʾan did not use diacritics either for vowels or to distinguish the different values of the rasm. Vowels pointing was introduced first, as a red dot placed above, below, or beside the rasm, and later consonant pointing was introduced, as thin, short black single or multiple dashes placed above or below the rasm. These iʿjam became black dots about the same time as the harakat became small black letters or strokes.

Typically, Egyptians do not use dots under final yāʾ (ي), both in handwriting and in print, resulting in substantial confusion with ʾalif maqṣūra (ى) to those not accustomed to the practice. This practice is also used in the Mus'hafs (copies of Koran) scribed by Uthman Taha. The same unification of yāʾ and ʾalif maqṣūra has happened in Persian, resulting in what The Unicode Standard calls "arabic letter farsi yeh", that looks exactly the same as yāʾ in initial and medial forms, but exactly the same as ʾalif maqṣūra in final and isolated forms.

[edit] Taškīl

The literal meaning of taškīl is "forming".

[edit] Ḥarakāt

The ḥarakāt, which literally means "motions", are the short vowel marks. There is some ambiguity as to which tashkīl are also ḥarakāt; the tanwīn, for example, are markers for both vowels and consonants.

[edit] Fatḥa

ـَ

The fatḥa (فتحة‎‎) is a small diagonal line placed above a letter, and represents a short /a/. The word fatḥa itself (فتحة) means opening, and refers to the opening of the mouth when producing an /a/. Example with dāl (henceforth, the base consonant in the following examples): <دَ> /da/.

A fatḥa followed by an <ا> (alif) indicate a long /aː/. Example: <دَا> [dā]. Not surprisingly, the fatḥa is not usually written in such cases.

[edit] Kasra

ـِ

A similar diagonal line below a letter is called a kasra (كسرة) and designates a short /i/. Example: <دِ> /di/.

A kasra plus a following letter <ﻱ>(yāʼ) indicate a long /iː/ (as in the English word "bead"). Example: <دِي> /diː/. As it is obvious, kasra is usually not written in such cases but if yāʼ is pronounced as a diphthong /ai/, fatḥa should be written on the preceding consonant to avoid mispronunciation. The word "kasra" means "breaking."

[edit] Ḍamma

ـُ

The ḍamma (ضمة) is a small curl-like diacritic placed above a letter to represent a short /u/. Example: <دُ> /du/.

And the ḍamma with a following letter <و> (wāw) designates a long /uː/ (as in the English word "soon"). Example: <دُو> /duː/. As it is obvious, ḍamma is usually not written in such cases but if wāw is pronounced as a diphthong /aw/, fatḥa should be written on the preceding consonant to avoid mispronunciation.

[edit] Tanwīn

ـٌ /-un/, ـٍ /-in/ and ـً /-an/

The three vowel diacritics may be doubled at the end of a word to indicate that the vowel is followed by the consonant /n/. These may or may not be considered ḥarakāt, and are known as tanwīn (تنوين), or nunation. The signs <ـً ـٍ ـٌ> indicate, from left to right, /un, in, an/. These endings are used as non-pausal grammatical indefinite case endings in MSA or Classical Arabic (triptotes only). In a vocalised text, they may be written even if they are not pronounced (see pausa). See iʿrab for more details. In spoken Arabic dialects, these endings are absent. Many Arabic textbooks introduce standard Arabic without these endings. The grammatical endings may not be written in some vocalised Arabic texts. As knowledge of ʼIʻrāb varies from country to country and there is a trend in simplifying the Arabic grammar. The sign ـً‎ is most commonly written in combination with ا‎ ʼalif ‎ (ـًا‎), ةً‎ (tāʼ marbūṭa) or stand-alone ءً‎ hamza. Alif should always be written (except for words ending in tāʼ marbūṭa, hamza or diptotes), even if "un" is not.

Grammar cases and tanwīn endings in indefinite triptote forms:

ـٌ (/-un/) - nominative case

ـً (/-an/) - accusative case, also serves as an adverbial marker.

ـٍ (/-in/) - genitive case

[edit] Sukūn

ـْـ

The sukūn (سكون) is a circle-shaped diacritic placed above a letter. It indicates that the consonant to which it is attached is not followed by a vowel; this is a necessary symbol for writing CVC syllables, which are very common in Arabic. Example: <دَدْ> /dad/.

The sukūn may also be used to help represent a diphthong. A fatḥa followed by the letter <ﻱ> (yāʼ) with a sukūn over it indicates the diphthong /ay/ (IPA /aj/). A fatḥa followed by the letter <ﻭ> (wāw) with a sukūn indicates /aw/.

[edit] Dawabit

[edit] Šadda

ـّـ

The shadda (شدة) or tashdīd (تشديد tašdīd) is a diacritic shaped like a small written Latin "w". It is used to indicate gemination (consonant doubling or extra length), which is phonemic in Arabic. It is written above the consonant which is to be doubled. It is the only ḥaraka that is sometimes used in ordinary spelling to avoid ambiguity. Example: <دّ> /dd/; مدرسة /madrasa/ school vs. مدرّسة /mudarrisa/ teacher (f.)

[edit] Madda

آ

The madda (مدة) is a tilde-like diacritic which can appear only on top of an alif and indicates a glottal stop followed by long /aː/. The sequence /ʔaː/ should logically be spelled with a hamza on an alif (representing the /ʔ/) followed by another alif (representing the /aː/) but two consecutive alifs, including the combination *<أَا, is never written. The sequence /ʔaː/ must always be written with an alif madda. Example: <ﺁ>.

[edit] ʼAlif waṣla

ٱ

The waṣla وصلة, ʼalif waṣla ألف وصلة or hamzatu 'l-waṣl همزة الوصل looks like a small letter ṣad on top of an alif (also indicated by an alif without a hamza), it means that the alif is not pronounced, e.g. <بٱسم>. Occurs only in the beginning of words (can occur after prepositions and the definite article). Found commonly in imperative verbs, the perfective aspect of verb stems VII to X and their verbal nouns (maṣdar). The alif of the definite article is considered a waṣla.

[edit] Dagger ʼalif

ــٰ

The superscript (dagger) ʼalif (ألف خنجرية‎‎ alif ḫanǧariyya), is written as short vertical stroke on top of a consonant. It indicates a long /aː/ sound where alif is normally not written, e.g. <هٰذَا> or <رَحْمٰن‎>. The "dagger alif" occurs in few words, but these words include some common ones; it is seldom written, however, even in fully vocalised texts. Most keyboards do not have "dagger alif". The word for "Allāh(u)" (الله) in Arabic is usually produced automatically by entering alif - lām - lām - hā'. The word consists of alif + ligature of doubled lām with a shadda and a "dagger alif" above lām.

[edit] Hamza

Main article: hamza

ئ ؤ إ أ

Although often a diacritic and not considered a letter of the alphabet, the hamza (‎‎همزة), or glottal stop, often does stand as a separate letter in writing, is written in unpointed texts, and is not considered a tashkīl. It may appear as a letter by itself or as a diacritic over or under an alif, wāw, or yā’.

Which letter is to be used to support the hamza depends on the quality of the adjacent vowels. If the syllable occurs at the beginning of the word, the glottal stop is always indicated by hamza on an alif. But if the syllable occurs in the middle of the word, alif is used only if it is not preceded or followed by /i/ or /u/. If /i(ː)/ is before or after the glottal stop, a yāʼ with a hamza is used (the two dots which are usually beneath the yāʼ disappear in this case - <ئ>). If [u(ː)] is there, a wāw sukūn with a hamza is used. Consider the following words: <أَخ> (/ʔax/, brother), <ِإِسْرَائِيل> (/ʔisraːʔiːl/, Israel), <أُمْ> (/ʔumm/, mother). All three of above words "begin" with a vowel opening the syllable, and in each case, alif is used to designate the initial glottal stop (the actual beginning). But if we consider middle syllables "beginning" with a vowel: <نَشْأة (/našʔa/, 'origin'), <ِإِسْرَائِيل (/ʔisraːʔiːl/, 'Israel' - notice the /ʔiːl/ syllable), <ِرَؤُوف> (/raʔuːf/ 'lenient'), the situation is different, as noted above. See the comprehensive article on hamza for more details.

[edit] Usage

As the normal Arabic text does not provide enough information about the correct pronunciation, the main purpose of tashkīl (ḥarakāt) is to provide a phonetic guide or a phonetic aid; i.e. show the correct pronunciation. It serves the same purpose as furigana (also called "ruby") in Japanese or pinyin or zhuyin in Chinese (Mandarin) for children who are learning to read or foreign learners.

The bulk of Arabic script is written without ḥarakāt (or short vowels). However, they are commonly used in some religious texts that demand strict adherence to pronunciation rules such as Qur'an (القرآن ‎ al-qur’ān). It is not uncommon to add ḥarakāt to Hadith (الحديث al-ḥadīth, pl. aḥadīth) as well. Another use is in children's literature. Harakat are also used in ordinary texts when an ambiguity of pronunciation might arise. Vowelled Arabic dictionaries provide information about the correct pronunciation to both native and foreign Arabic speakers.

An example of a fully vocalised (vowelised or vowelled) Arabic from Qur'ān (Al-Fatiha 1:1):

بِسْمِ ٱللهِ ٱلرَّحْمٰنِ الرَّحِيمِ

/ bismi 'llāhi 'r-raḥmāni 'r-raḥīmi /

In the Name of Allāh, the Most Beneficent, the Most Merciful

Some Arabic textbooks for foreigners now use ḥarakāt as a phonetic guide to make learning reading Arabic easier. The other method used in textbooks being phonetic romanisation of unvocalised texts. Fully vocalised Arabic texts (i.e. Arabic texts with ḥarakāt/diacritics) are sought after by learners of Arabic. Some online bilingual dictionaries also provide ḥarakāt as a phonetic guide similarly to English dictionaries providing transcription.

[edit] History

Evolution of early Arabic calligraphy (9th - 11th century). The Basmala was taken as an example, from kufic Qur’an manuscripts. (1) Early 9th century. script with no dots or diacritic marks [1]; (2) and (3)9th - 10th century under Abbasid dynasty, the Abu al-Aswad's system establish red dots with each arrangement or position indicating a different short vowel. Later, a second black dots system was used to differentiate between letters like "fāʼ" and "qāf" [2] [3]; (4) 11th century, In Al Farāhídi's system (system we know today) dots were changed into shapes resembling the letters to transcribe the corresponding long vowels [4].

According to tradition, the first to commission a system of harakat was Muawiyah I of the Umayyad dynasty, when he ordered Ziad Ibn Abih, his wāli in Basra (governed 664-673), to find someone to who would devise a method to transcribe correct reading. Ziad Ibn Abih, in turn, appointed Abu al-Aswad al-Du'ali for the task. Abu al-Aswad devised a system of dots to signal the three short vowels (along with their respective allophones) of Arabic. This system of dots predates the i'jam, dots used to distinguish between different consonants.

[edit] Abu al-Aswad's system

Abu al-Aswad's system of Harakat was different from the system we know today. The system used red dots with each arrangement or position indicating a different short vowel. A dot above a letter indicated the vowel "a", a dot below indicated the vowel "i", a dot on the side of a letter stood for the vowel "u", and two dots stood for the tanwin. However, the early manuscripts of the Qur'an did not use the vowel signs for every letter requiring them, but only for letters where they were necessary for a correct reading.

[edit] Al Farāhídi's system

This is the precursor to the system we know today. Al Farāhídi found that the task of writing using two different colours was tedious and impractical. Another complication was that the i'jam had been introduced by then, which, while they were short strokes rather than the round dots seen today, meant that without a color distinction the two could become confused. Accordingly he changed the harakat into shapes resembling the letters used to transcribe the corresponding long vowels. His system evolved to the system we know today.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] References

[edit] See also

Arabic alphabet
iʿrāb
Rasm
Tajwid
Niqqud, the Hebrew equivalent of ḥarakāt
Dagesh, the Hebrew equivalent of iʿjām
Furigana, a phonetic guide for Japanese
Pinyin and Bopomofo, phonetic guides for Chinese

[edit] External links