Old Hungarian script
Old Hungarian script | ||
---|---|---|
Font | alphabet | |
languages | Hungarian | |
Used in | Hungary , Romania | |
particularities | from right to left | |
Unicode block | U + 10C80-U + 10CFF | |
ISO 15924 | Hung |
The old Hungarian script ( Hungarian rovásírás , rovás = notch, rune, irás = script), sometimes also referred to as Hungarian runes because of their appearance , was used in the early Middle Ages before the introduction of the Latin alphabet to write the Hungarian . It runs from right to left.
The old Hungarian script is possibly related to the Orkhon runes (old Turkish script), which, like most European and West Asian alphabets, has its roots in the Phoenician script . There is no relationship to the Germanic runes .
In the last few years the script has been used more often. There are several cities and towns in Hungary that have not only the place name sign in Latin script but also the place name in old Hungarian script. In modern usage is in contrast to the historical use between large - and small letters distinction (with similar rules apply as in the Latin script of the Hungarian language), but differ only in size, not in form.
example
Example from Csíkszentmárton (1501), where ligatures in the original text are underlined here. In Latin characters of the text reads (each capital letter corresponds to a letter of the original text):
"ÚRNaK SZÜLeTéSéTÜL FOGVÁN ÍRNaK eZeRÖTSZÁZeGY eSZTeNDŐBE Matyas JÁNOS eSTYTáN KOVÁCS CSINÁLTáK MÁTYáSMeSTeR GeRGeLYMeSTeRCSINÁLTÁK G IJ A aS I LY LY LT A "
Translated into modern Hungarian:
“(Ezt) az Úr születése utáni 1501. évben írták. Mátyás, János, István kovácsok csinálták. Mátyás mester (és) Gergely mester csinálták ... "
German translation:
“(This) was written in the 1501st year of our Lord. The blacksmiths Matthias, Johannes (and) Stefan did (this). Master Matthias (and) Master Gergely did ... “The meaning of the last letters is unclear.
Unicode
The font has been included in Unicode since version 8.0 (June 2015) in the Old Hungarian block . The name Old Hungarian used in Unicode was controversial; one of the reasons for this was that this term is also used for a specific historical level of the Hungarian language, while the script can be used for all language levels. The dispute over this had delayed its inclusion in Unicode by a few years.
Web links
- Portal through the script with news on the subject (Hungarian)
- Map on Google Maps (contains places with place-name signs in the old Hungarian script, Hungarian, rovas.info)
- "Old Hungarian" Szekler script - Rovásírás. In: timediver.de. December 3, 2006.
- The Székely-Hungarian Rovás Script (A székely-magyar rovásírás). In: tpg.com.au. 1997, archived from the original on September 27, 2007 .