The Bello orthography or Chilean orthography was a Spanish-language orthography

Orthography

The orthography of a language specifies a standardized way of using a specific writing system to write the language. Where more than one writing system is used for a language, for example Kurdish, Uyghur, Serbian or Inuktitut, there can be more than one orthography...

 created by the Venezuelan

Venezuelan people

Venezuelan people are from a multiethnic nation in South America called Venezuela. Venezuelans are predominantly Roman Catholic and speak Spanish, and a majority of them are the result of a mixture of Europeans, Africans, and Amerindians.-Demography:...

 linguist Andrés Bello

Andrés Bello

Andrés de Jesús María y José Bello López was a Venezuelan humanist, poet, lawmaker, philosopher, educator and philologist, whose political and literary works constitute an important part of Spanish American culture...

 and Juan García del Río, published in 1823. Part of the orthography was used officially for a time in Chile

Chile

Chile ,officially the Republic of Chile , is a country in South America occupying a long, narrow coastal strip between the Andes mountains to the east and the Pacific Ocean to the west. It borders Peru to the north, Bolivia to the northeast, Argentina to the east, and the Drake Passage in the far...

, and it influenced other Spanish-speaking countries. The aim of the orthography was a perfect correspondence

Phonemic orthography

A phonemic orthography is a writing system where the written graphemes correspond to phonemes, the spoken sounds of the language. In terms of orthographic depth, these are termed shallow orthographies, contrasting with deep orthographies...

 between graphemes and phonemes. The reform did not succeed. Standard Spanish orthography as used for Latin American Spanish contains several homophones (⟨c⟩, ⟨k⟩, ⟨qu⟩; ⟨c⟩, ⟨s⟩, ⟨z⟩; ⟨g⟩, ⟨j⟩, ⟨x⟩; ⟨b⟩, ⟨v⟩; ⟨y⟩, ⟨ll⟩; ⟨i⟩, ⟨y⟩) or letters that represent more than one sound (⟨c⟩, ⟨g⟩, ⟨r⟩, ⟨x⟩, ⟨y⟩), and other variances (⟨h⟩; ⟨u⟩ after ⟨g⟩ and ⟨q⟩). Bello proposed several modifications that he believed should be undertaken in two stages:

• First stage:

1. Substitute ⟨j⟩ for "strong" ⟨g⟩ sounds
   Hard and soft G
   In the Latin-based orthographies of many European languages , a distinction between hard and soft ⟨g⟩ occurs in which ⟨g⟩ represents two distinct phonemes...
   
    (jeneral, jinebra);
2. Substitute ⟨z⟩ for "weak" ⟨c⟩ sounds
   Hard and soft C
   In the Latin-based orthographies of many European languages , a distinction between hard and soft ⟨c⟩ occurs in which ⟨c⟩ represents two distinct phonemes...
   
    (zerdo, zisma);
3. Remove silent ⟨h⟩s (ombre) and the silent ⟨u⟩ of ⟨qu⟩- (qeso);
4. Substitute ⟨i⟩ for ⟨y⟩s used as vowels (rei, i);
5. Always write ⟨rr⟩ where a rolled ⟨r⟩ is pronounced (rrazón, alrrededor).

• Second stage:

1. Substitute ⟨q⟩ for "strong" c sounds (qasa);
2. Remove the silent ⟨u⟩ in ⟨gu⟩- (gerra, ginda).

On October 17, 1843, Domingo Faustino Sarmiento (the Bello rector of the University of Chile) presented a project to the Faculty of Humanities and Philosophy: Report on American Orthography.http://www.proyectosarmiento.com.ar/trabajos.pdf/memoriaortografia.pdf

On February 19, 1844, the Faculty judged the reform to be radical, but recommended some of Bello's ideas. The government of Chile followed this recommendation and that year introduced the following reforms:

1. Substituting ⟨j⟩ for "strong" ⟨g⟩ sounds (jeneral, jinebra)
2. Removing silent ⟨h⟩ (ombre);
3. Substituting ⟨i⟩ for ⟨y⟩ used as vowels (rei, i);
4. Writing ⟨s⟩ instead of ⟨x⟩ before consonants (testo).

The changes influenced Argentina

Argentina

Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...

, Ecuador

Ecuador

Ecuador , officially the Republic of Ecuador is a representative democratic republic in South America, bordered by Colombia on the north, Peru on the east and south, and by the Pacific Ocean to the west. It is one of only two countries in South America, along with Chile, that do not have a border...

, Colombia

Colombia

Colombia, officially the Republic of Colombia , is a unitary constitutional republic comprising thirty-two departments. The country is located in northwestern South America, bordered to the east by Venezuela and Brazil; to the south by Ecuador and Peru; to the north by the Caribbean Sea; to the...

, Nicaragua

Nicaragua

Nicaragua is the largest country in the Central American American isthmus, bordered by Honduras to the north and Costa Rica to the south. The country is situated between 11 and 14 degrees north of the Equator in the Northern Hemisphere, which places it entirely within the tropics. The Pacific Ocean...

, and Venezuela

Venezuela

Venezuela , officially called the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela , is a tropical country on the northern coast of South America. It borders Colombia to the west, Guyana to the east, and Brazil to the south...

. With time, however, Spanish orthography returned to how it had been previously. The last country to return to standard orthography was Chile, where President Carlos Ibáñez del Campo

Carlos Ibáñez del Campo

General Carlos Ibáñez del Campo was a Chilean Army officer and political figure. He served as dictator between 1927 and 1931 and as constitutional President from 1952 to 1958.- The coups of 1924 and 1925 :...

 established the use of RAE

Real Academia Española

The Royal Spanish Academy is the official royal institution responsible for regulating the Spanish language. It is based in Madrid, Spain, but is affiliated with national language academies in twenty-one other hispanophone nations through the Association of Spanish Language Academies...

 orthography in teaching and official documents in Decree No. 3,876 of July 20, 1927, going into effect on October 12, 1927.

The poet and Nobel Prize winner Juan Ramón Jiménez

Juan Ramón Jiménez

Juan Ramón Jiménez Mantecón was a Spanish poet, a prolific writer who received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1956. One of Jiménez's most important contributions to modern poetry was his advocacy of the French concept of "pure poetry."-Biography:Jiménez was born in Moguer, near Huelva, in...

 used an orthography similar to that of Bello in his work.

See also

• Latin American Spanish
• Phonemic orthography
  Phonemic orthography
  A phonemic orthography is a writing system where the written graphemes correspond to phonemes, the spoken sounds of the language. In terms of orthographic depth, these are termed shallow orthographies, contrasting with deep orthographies...
  
  
• Real Academia Española
  Real Academia Española
  The Royal Spanish Academy is the official royal institution responsible for regulating the Spanish language. It is based in Madrid, Spain, but is affiliated with national language academies in twenty-one other hispanophone nations through the Association of Spanish Language Academies...
  
  
• Spanish orthography
• Spelling reform
  Spelling reform
  Many languages have undergone spelling reform, where a deliberate, often officially sanctioned or mandated, change to spelling takes place. Proposals for such reform are also common....