Originally the yer denoted an ultra-short orreducedmidrounded vowel.[citation needed] It is one of two reduced vowels that are collectively known as theyers in Slavic philology.
InBulgarian, theer goljam ("ер голям") is the 27th letter of the alphabet. It is used for the phoneme representing themid back unrounded vowel/ɤ̞/, sometimes also notated as aschwa/ə/. It sounds somewhat like the vowel sound in some pronunciations of English "but"[bʌ̘t] orMandarin "de" (的)[tɤ]. It sounds similar to theRomanian letter "ă" (for example, in "băiat"[bəˈjat̪]) andEstonian letterõ. In unstressed positions (in the same manner as ⟨а⟩), ⟨ъ⟩ is normally pronounced/ɐ/, which sounds like Sanskrit "a" (अ), Portuguese "terra"[ˈtɛxɐ], or the German-er in the word "Kinder"[ˈkʰɪndɐ]. Unlike the schwa sound in English, the Bulgarian/ɤ̞/ can appear in stressed as well as in unstressed syllables, for example in "въ́здух" ['vɤ̞zdux] 'air' or even at the beginning of words (only in the word "ъ́гъл" ['ɤ̞gɐɫ] ‘angle’).
Before the reform of 1945, this sound was written with two letters, "ъ" and "ѫ" ("big yus", denoting a formernasal vowel). Additionally "ъ" was used silently after a final consonant, as in Russian. In 1945 final "ъ" was dropped; and the letter "ѫ" was abolished, being replaced by "ъ" in most cases. However, to prevent confusion with the former silent final "ъ", final "ѫ" was replaced instead with "а" (which has the same sound when notstressed).
It is variously transliterated as ⟨ǎ⟩, ⟨ă⟩, ⟨ą⟩, ⟨ë⟩, ⟨ę⟩, ⟨ų⟩, ⟨ŭ⟩, or simply ⟨a⟩, ⟨u⟩ and even ⟨y⟩.[citation needed]
The letter ъ is not used in the alphabets ofBelarusian orUkrainian, its functions being performed by theapostrophe instead. In the Latin Belarusian alphabet (Łacinka), as inPolish, the hard sign's functions are performed by a followingj rather than thei that would be present after a palatalized consonant.
In theCarpatho-Rusyn alphabets of Slovakia and Poland, ъ (also known as ір in Cyrillic or yr in Latin alphabets) is the last letter of the alphabet, unlike the majority ofCyrillic alphabets, which place ъ afterщ. InPannonian Rusyn, ъ is not present.
AlthoughMacedonian is most closely related to Bulgarian, its writing system does not use theyer. During the creation of the modern Macedonian orthography in the late 1944 and the first half of 1945, theyer was one of the subjects of arguments. The problem was that the corresponding vowel exists in many dialects of Macedonian, but it is not systematically present in the west-central dialect, the base on which the Macedonian language standard was being developed.
Among the leaders of the Macedonian alphabet and orthography design team,Venko Markovski argued for using the letteryer, much like the Bulgarian orthography does, butBlaže Koneski was against it. An early version of the alphabet promulgated on December 28, 1944, contained theyer, but in the final version of the alphabet, approved in May 1945, Koneski's point of view prevailed, and noyer was used.[2]
The absence ofyer leads to an apostrophe often being used in Macedonian to print texts composed in the language varieties that use the corresponding vowel, such as the Bulgarian writerKonstantin Miladinov's poemТ'га за југ (Bulgarian:Тъга за юг).[2]
In Modern Russian, the letter "ъ" is called thehard sign (твёрдый знак /tvjordyj znak). It has no phonetic value of its own and is purely an orthographic device or it doesn't make a sound. Its function is to separate a number of prefixes ending in consonants from subsequentmorphemes that begin withiotated vowels. In native words, it is therefore only seen in front of the letters "я", "е", "ё", and "ю" (ja,je,jo, andju transliterated). The hard sign marks the fact that the sound[j] continues to be heard separately in the composition. For example:
сесть[ˈsʲesʲtʲ]sjestʹ 'sit down'
съесть[ˈsjesʲtʲ]sʺjestʹ perfective form of 'eat'
It therefore functions as a kind of "separation sign" and has been used only sparingly in the aforementioned cases since thespelling reform of 1918. The consonant before the hard sign often becomes somewhat softened (palatalized) due to the following iotation. As a result, in the twentieth century there were occasional proposals to eliminate the hard sign altogether, and replace it with the soft sign ь, which always marks the softening of a consonant. However, in part because the degree of softening before ъ is not uniform, the proposals were never implemented. The hard sign ъ is written after both native and borrowed prefixes. It is sometimes used before "и" (i), non-iotated vowels or even consonants in Russian transcriptions of foreign names to mark an unexpected syllable break, much like an apostrophe in Latin script (e.g.Чанъань —Chang'an), theArabic ʽayn (e.g.Даръа —Darʽa[ˈdarʕa]), or combined with a consonant to form aKhoisanclick (e.g.Чъхоан —ǂHoan). However, such usage is not uniform and, except for transliteration of Chinese proper names, has not yet been formally codified (see alsoRussian phonology andRussian orthography).
Before 1918, a hard sign was normally written at the end of a word when following a non-palatal consonant, even though it had no effect on pronunciation. For example, the word for "male cat" was written "котъ" (kotʺ) before the reform, and "кот" (kot) after it. This old usage of ъ was eliminated by the spelling reform of 1918, implemented by theBolsheviks after the 1917October Revolution. Because of the way this reform was implemented, the issue became politicized, leading to a number of printing houses inPetrograd refusing to follow the new rules. To force the printing houses to comply,red sailors of theBaltic Fleet confiscated type carrying the "parasite letters".[3][4] Printers were forced to use a non-standardapostrophe for the separating hard sign, for example:
pre-reform: съѣздъ (s'jezd')
transitional: с’езд (s’jezd)
post-reform: съезд (s'jezd)
In the beginning of the 1920s, the hard sign was gradually restored as the separator. The apostrophe was still used afterward on sometypewriters that did not include the hard sign, which became the rarest letter in Russian. InBelarusian andUkrainian, the hard sign was never brought back, and the apostrophe is still in use today.
According to the rough estimation presented inLev Uspensky'spopular linguistics bookA Word On Words (Слово о словах /Slovo o slovakh), which expresses strong support for the reform, the final hard sign made up about 3.5% of printed text and thus wasted paper and ink, which provided the economic grounds for the reform.
Printing houses set up by Russianémigrés abroad kept using the pre-reform orthography for some time, but gradually they adopted the new spelling. Meanwhile, in theUSSR,Dahl’s Explanatory Dictionary was repeatedly (1935, 1955) reprinted in compliance with theold rules of spelling and the pre-reform alphabet.
Today the finalyer is sometimes used in Russianbrand names: the newspaperKommersant (Коммерсантъ) uses the letter to emphasize its continuity with the pre-Soviet newspaper of the same name. Such usage is often inconsistent, as thecopywriters may apply the simple rule of putting the hard sign after a consonant at the end of a word but ignore the other former spelling rules, such as the use ofѣ andі.[5] It is also sometimes encountered in humorous personal writing adding to the text an "old-fashioned flavour" or separately denotingtrue.
The hard sign is the rarest grapheme of the Russian language. Out of all 200,000 documented words in Russian, only 400 (0.02%) contain the letter Ъ. Despite its rare usage in Russian, it is considered one of the most common letters in Bulgarian.
In Cyrillic orthographies for variouslanguages of the Caucasus, along with thesoft sign and thepalochka, the hard sign is a modifier letter, used extensively in forming digraphs and trigraphs designating sounds alien in Slavic, such as /q/ andejectives. For example, inOssetian, the hard sign is part of the digraphs гъ /ʁ/, къ /kʼ/, пъ /pʼ/, тъ /tʼ/, хъ /q/, цъ /tsʼ/, чъ /tʃʼ/, as well as the trigraphs къу /kʷʼ/ and хъу /qʷ/. The hard sign is used in theCrimean Tatar language for the same purpose. InChechen andIngush, the hard sign can represent a glottal stop in addition to its use to represent the ejective consonants used in these languages. It sees limited use in Latin-script transliterations of Caucasian languages to transliterate thepalochka, e.g. хӀорджӀаьлаkhъordjъäla, ГӀалгӀайGъalgъai.
