The current official Turkmen

Turkmen language

Turkmen is the national language of Turkmenistan...

 alphabet as used in Turkmenistan

Turkmenistan

Turkmenistan , formerly also known as Turkmenia is one of the Turkic states in Central Asia. Until 1991, it was a constituent republic of the Soviet Union, the Turkmen Soviet Socialist Republic . Turkmenistan is one of the six independent Turkic states...

 is a Latin alphabet based on the Turkish alphabet

Turkish alphabet

The Turkish alphabet is a Latin alphabet used for writing the Turkish language, consisting of 29 letters, seven of which have been modified from their Latin originals for the phonetic requirements of the language. This alphabet represents modern Turkish pronunciation with a high degree of accuracy...

, but with notable differences: J is used instead of the Turkish C; Ž is used instead of the Turkish J; Y is used instead of the dotless i

Turkish dotted and dotless I

The Turkish alphabet, which is a variant of the Latin alphabet, includes two distinct versions of the letter I, one dotted and the other dotless. The difference between the two versions is modelled after the letters Ö and Ü, which were taken from German. These two letters represent front-vowel...

 (I/ı); Ý is used instead of the Turkish consonantal Y; and the letters Ä and Ň have been added to represent the phonetic values [æ] and [ŋ], respectively. At the start of the 20th century, when Turkmen first started to be written, it used the Arabic script, but in 1928 the Latin script was adopted. In 1940, the Russian

Russian language

Russian is a Slavic language used primarily in Russia, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. It is an unofficial but widely spoken language in Ukraine, Moldova, Latvia, Turkmenistan and Estonia and, to a lesser extent, the other countries that were once constituent republics...

 influence in Soviet

Soviet Union

The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....

 Turkmenistan prompted a switch to a Cyrillic alphabet, and a Turkmen Cyrillic alphabet (shown below in the table alongside the Latin) was created. When Turkmenistan became independent in 1991, president Saparmurat Niyazov

Saparmurat Niyazov

Saparmurat Atayevich Niyazov; , was a Turkmen politician who served as President of Turkmenistan from 2 November 1990 until his death in 2006...

 immediately instigated a return to the Latin script. When it was first reintroduced it was supposed to contain some rather unusual letters, such as the pound (£), dollar ($), yen (¥

¥

¥ is a currency sign used by the Japanese yen and the Chinese yuan currencies. The symbol resembles a Latin letter Y with a double stroke. The base unit of both currencies shared the same Chinese character pronounced yuán in Mandarin Chinese and en in Standard Japanese...

), and cent signs (¢), but these were later replaced by more orthodox letter symbols. The political and social forces that have combined to bring about these changes of script, then modifications of the Latin script, have been documented by Clement (2008).

Turkmen is still often written with an Arabic alphabet in other countries where the language is spoken and where the Arabic script is dominant (such as Afghanistan

Afghanistan

Afghanistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located in the centre of Asia, forming South Asia, Central Asia and the Middle East. With a population of about 29 million, it has an area of , making it the 42nd most populous and 41st largest nation in the world...

).

Alphabetic order

Cyrillic alphabet
Аа, Бб, Вв, Гг, Дд, Ее, Ёё, Жж, Җҗ, Зз, Ии, Йй, Кк, Лл, Мм, Нн, Ңң, Оо, Өө, Пп, Рр, Сс, Тт, Уу, Үү, Фф, Хх, (Цц), Чч, Шш, (Щщ), (Ъъ), Ыы, (Ьь), Ээ, Әә, Юю, Яя

Latin alphabet
Aa, Bb, Çç, Dd, Ee, Ää, Ff, Gg, Hh, Ii, Jj, Žž, Kk, Ll, Mm, Nn, Ňň, Oo, Öö, Pp, Rr, Ss, Şş, Tt, Uu, Üü, Ww, Yy, Ýý, Zz

Correspondence chart

Latin letter	Cyrillic equivalent	Phonetic value	English Approximation
A a	А а	[a, aː]	Father
B b	Б б	[b]	Ball
Ç ç	Ч ч	[t͡ʃ]	Cheek
D d	Д д	[d]	Dean
E e	Е е	[je], [e]	Yes, Egg
Ä ä	Ә ә	[æ, æː]	Hat, Had
F f	Ф ф	[ɸ]
G g	Г г	[ɡ~ʁ]	Get
H h	Х х	[h~x]	Hat, Loch
I i	И и	[i, iː]	Mini
J j	Җ җ	[d͡ʒ]	Joke
Ž ž	Ж ж	[ʒ]	Treasure
K k	К к	[k~q]	Look
L l	Л л	[l]	Lake
M m	М м	[m]	Mole
N n	Н н	[n]	Nest
Ň ň	Ң ң	[ŋ]	Sing
O o	О о	[o, oː]	Horse
Ö ö	Ө ө	[ø, øː]	Measure
P p	П п	[p]	Loop
R r	Р р	[r]	Rim
S s	С с	[θ, s]	Thick
Ş ş	Ш ш	[ʃ]	Shimmer
T t	Т т	[t]	Austin
U u	У у	[u, uː]	Fluent
Ü ü	Ү ү	[y, yː]
W w	В в	[β]
Y y	Ы ы	[ɯ, ɯː]
Ý ý	Й й	[j]	Yacht
Z z	З з	[ð, z]	There, Zoo

Pronunciation of the Latin alphabet

Türkmen elipbiýi

Letter	Name	IPA	Letter	Name	IPA
A A A is the first letter and a vowel in the basic modern Latin alphabet. It is similar to the Ancient Greek letter Alpha, from which it derives.- Origins :... , a	a	/a, aː/	N N N is the fourteenth letter in the basic modern Latin alphabet.- History of the forms :One of the most common hieroglyphs, snake, was used in Egyptian writing to stand for a sound like English ⟨J⟩, because the Egyptian word for "snake" was djet... , n	en	/n/
B B B is the second letter in the basic modern Latin alphabet. It is used to represent a variety of bilabial sounds , most commonly a voiced bilabial plosive.-History:... , b	be	/b/	Ň N N is the fourteenth letter in the basic modern Latin alphabet.- History of the forms :One of the most common hieroglyphs, snake, was used in Egyptian writing to stand for a sound like English ⟨J⟩, because the Egyptian word for "snake" was djet... , ň	eň	/ŋ/
Ç Ç is a Latin script letter, used in the Albanian, Azerbaijani, Ligurian, Tatar, Turkish, Turkmen, Kurdish and Zazaki alphabets. This letter also appears in Catalan, French, Friulian, Occitan and Portuguese as a variant of the letter “c”... , ç	çe	/tʃ/	O O O is the fifteenth letter and a vowel in the basic modern Latin alphabet.The letter was derived from the Semitic `Ayin , which represented a consonant, probably , the sound represented by the Arabic letter ع called `Ayn. This Semitic letter in its original form seems to have been inspired by a... , o	o	/o, oː/
D D D is the fourth letter in the basic modern Latin alphabet.- History :The Semitic letter Dâlet may have developed from the logogram for a fish or a door. There are various Egyptian hieroglyphs that might have inspired this. In Semitic, Ancient Greek, and Latin, the letter represented ; in the... , d	de	/d/	Ö Ö "Ö", or "ö", is a character used in several extended Latin alphabets, or the letter O with umlaut to denote the front vowels or . In languages without umlaut, the character is also used as a "O with diaeresis" to denote a syllable break, wherein its pronunciation remains an unmodified .- O-Umlaut... , ö	ö	/ø, øː/
E E E is the fifth letter and a vowel in the basic modern Latin alphabet. It is the most commonly used letter in the Czech, Danish, Dutch, English, French, German, Hungarian, Latin, Norwegian, Spanish, and Swedish languages.-History:... , e	e	/e/	P P P is the sixteenth letter of the basic modern Latin alphabet.-Usage:In English and most other European languages, P is a voiceless bilabial plosive. Both initial and final Ps can be combined with many other discrete consonants in English words... , p	pe	/p/
Ä Ä "Ä" and "ä" are both characters that represent either a letter from several extended Latin alphabets, or the letter A with an umlaut mark or diaeresis.- Independent letter :... , ä	ä	/æ, æː/	R R R is the eighteenth letter of the basic modern Latin alphabet.-History:The original Semitic letter may have been inspired by an Egyptian hieroglyph for tp, "head". It was used for by Semites because in their language, the word for "head" was rêš . It developed into Greek Ρ and Latin R... , r	er	/r/
F F F is the sixth letter in the basic modern Latin alphabet.-History:The origin of ⟨f⟩ is the Semitic letter vâv that represented a sound like or . Graphically, it originally probably depicted either a hook or a club... , f	fe	/ɸ/	S S S is the nineteenth letter in the ISO basic Latin alphabet.-History: Semitic Šîn represented a voiceless postalveolar fricative . Greek did not have this sound, so the Greek sigma came to represent... , s	es	/θ, s/
G G G is the seventh letter in the basic modern Latin alphabet.-History:The letter 'G' was introduced in the Old Latin period as a variant of ⟨c⟩ to distinguish voiced, from voiceless, . The recorded originator of ⟨g⟩ is freedman Spurius Carvilius Ruga, the first Roman to open a fee-paying school,... , g	ge	/ɡ~ʁ/	Ş S S is the nineteenth letter in the ISO basic Latin alphabet.-History: Semitic Šîn represented a voiceless postalveolar fricative . Greek did not have this sound, so the Greek sigma came to represent... , ş	şe	/ʃ/
H H H .) is the eighth letter in the basic modern Latin alphabet.-History:The Semitic letter ⟨ח⟩ most likely represented the voiceless pharyngeal fricative . The form of the letter probably stood for a fence or posts.... , H	he	/h~x/	T T T is the 20th letter in the basic modern Latin alphabet. It is the most commonly used consonant and the second most common letter in the English language.- History :Taw was the last letter of the Western Semitic and Hebrew alphabets... , t	te	/t/
I I I is the ninth letter and a vowel in the basic modern Latin alphabet.-History:In Semitic, the letter may have originated in a hieroglyph for an arm that represented a voiced pharyngeal fricative in Egyptian, but was reassigned to by Semites, because their word for "arm" began with that sound... , i	i	/i, iː/	U U U is the twenty-first letter and a vowel in the basic modern Latin alphabet.-History:The letter U ultimately comes from the Semitic letter Waw by way of the letter Y. See the letter Y for details.... , u	u	/u, uː/
J J Ĵ or ĵ is a letter in Esperanto orthography representing the sound .While Esperanto orthography uses a diacritic for its four postalveolar consonants, as do the Latin-based Slavic alphabets, the base letters are Romano-Germanic... , j	je	/dʒ/	Ü Ü Ü, or ü, is a character which can be either a letter from several extended Latin alphabets, or the letter U with an umlaut or a diaeresis... , ü	ü	/y, yː/
Ž Ž The grapheme Ž is formed from Latin Z with the addition of caron . It is used in various contexts, usually denoting the voiced postalveolar fricative, a sound similar to English g in mirage, or Portuguese and French j... , ž	že	/ʒ/	W W W is the 23rd letter in the basic modern Latin alphabet.In other Germanic languages, including German, its pronunciation is similar or identical to that of English V... , w	we	/w/
K K K is the eleventh letter of the English and basic modern Latin alphabet.-History and usage:In English, the letter K usually represents the voiceless velar plosive; this sound is also transcribed by in the International Phonetic Alphabet and X-SAMPA.... , k	ka	/k~q/	Y Y Y is the twenty-fifth letter in the basic modern Latin alphabet and represents either a vowel or a consonant in English.-Name:In Latin, Y was named Y Graeca "Greek Y". This was pronounced as I Graeca "Greek I", since Latin speakers had trouble pronouncing , which was not a native sound... , y	y	/ɯ, ɯː/
L L Ł or ł, described in English as L with stroke, is a letter of the Polish, Kashubian, Sorbian, Łacinka , Łatynka , Wilamowicean, Navajo, Dene Suline, Inupiaq, Zuni, Hupa, and Dogrib alphabets, several proposed alphabets for the Venetian language, and the ISO 11940 romanization of the Thai alphabet... , l	el	/l/	Ý Y Y is the twenty-fifth letter in the basic modern Latin alphabet and represents either a vowel or a consonant in English.-Name:In Latin, Y was named Y Graeca "Greek Y". This was pronounced as I Graeca "Greek I", since Latin speakers had trouble pronouncing , which was not a native sound... , ý	ýe	/j/
M M M is the thirteenth letter of the basic modern Latin alphabet.-History:The letter M is derived from the Phoenician Mem, via the Greek Mu . Semitic Mem probably originally pictured water... , m	em	/m/	Z Z Z is the twenty-sixth and final letter of the basic modern Latin alphabet.-Name and pronunciation:In most dialects of English, the letter's name is zed , reflecting its derivation from the Greek zeta but in American English, its name is zee , deriving from a late 17th century English dialectal... , z	ze	/ð, z/

External links

• Omniglot
• Turkmen Cyrillic – Latin converter