Balochi alphabets

Balochi alphabets (Balochi: بلۏچی سیاھگ; Balòci Siyàhag) consist of the Balòrabi script, based on the Perso-Arabic script, and the Balòtin script, based on the Latin script. Both scripts are used for the Balochi language spoken in the Balochistan region of Pakistan, Afghanistan and Iran.

Alphabet

The Balochi alphabet, standardized by Balochi Academy Sarbaz, consists of 32 letters.

The Romanized version is called Balòtin, and the Arabic version is called Balòrabi.

Script Correspondence Table

Some digraphs in Balochi writing

Balochi also has 3 digraphs set by Balochi Academy Sarbaz in Standard Alphabets:

Arabic diacritics in Balochi writing

Arabic diacritics are used in Balochi, as with other scripts derived from Arabic:

Use of Hamza

One of the aspects that distinguishes Balochi orthography from other orthographies derived from Perso-Arabic Script is the use of stand-alone Hamza (), which, depending on its function within a sentence, is always written with one of three vowel diacritics. Stand-alone Hamza without diacritic is also used similar to other Perso-Arabic Scripts, to indicated glottal stop at end of words

The use of Hamza in such a way was first used in Balochi by poet Husayn Anqa, and officially adopted into Balochi as a result of decisions made in a convention in Karachi, Pakistan on 22 July 1959, attended by prominent Balochi poets and literaturists.

Below are the forms that stand-alone Hamza is used:

Balochi Numbers

Notes

Some dialects of Balochi very infrequently use the voiced retroflex flap, meaning ڑ. Due to its immense rarity in Balochi, most orthographies of the language leave out glyphs for the phoneme. When written however, it is usually represented with ر.

This alphabet uses two completely separate and new glyphs to represent the long close front unrounded vowel (/iː/). For the initial and medial forms, ݔ is used. This glyph is based on the initial/medial form of the Perso-Arabic "Ye": <br/> (یـ/ـیـ), the difference being the dot above it. Meanwhile, for the final form, ے is used, which is also based on ی and is called "Bari ye"; it is from Urdu. Sometimes there is خ, meaning /x/.

Vowels

in standard alphabets have 11 vowels,

The difference in writing between old Balochi and standard Balochi

In standardized Balochi, letters from old Balochi have been removed and some new letters have been added, The added letters are:

• ݔ‍ Cappi Yà or Arabic yā letter with a dot on it, which is the same at the beginning and middle of the word, and at the end of the word, the letter ے is used only, which existed in old Balochi.
• ۏ Cappi Wà or Wāw letter with a dot added on it

And also in standard Balochi, the letter ڑ is merged with the letter ڈ

In the table below, you can see the difference between old and standard writing:

"ݔ‍" Letter using

Cappi Yà (ݔ‍ ے ࢩ) is one of the standard letters of the Balochi language, which was added to the standard Balochi alphabets by the Balochi Academy Sarbaz. In the old Balochi alphabet, this letter is given as ی‍ْ, but in some others, it is also given as ڃ and یٚ.

References