Cyrillic alphabet: 33 letters, the unique letters ґ, є, і, ї, and the apostrophe
I can recognise and read the 33 letters of the Ukrainian alphabet, including the unique letters ґ, є, і, ї and the apostrophe.
Schau dir diese Beispiele an. Kannst du das grammatische Muster erkennen?
Моя країна — Україна, а моє місто — Одеса.
My country is Ukraine, and my city is Odesa.
Мене звати Іван, я з Чернігова.
My name is Ivan, I'm from Chernihiv.
Я люблю українську мову й вірші Лесі Українки.
I love the Ukrainian language and Lesia Ukrainka's poems.
Achte auf die hervorgehobenen Teile. Was haben sie gemeinsam?
Ukrainian is written in Cyrillic, with 33 letters plus an apostrophe. If you have already met Russian Cyrillic, most of it will look familiar, but Ukrainian has four letters Russian lacks, ґ, є, і, ї, and does without Russian ё, ъ, ы, э. Those four letters are the quickest way to tell a Ukrainian text from a Russian one on a menu or a station sign.
Several letters look like Latin ones and stand for something else. Read them wrong and ресторан becomes "pectopah".
| Letter | Looks like | Sounds like | Example |
|---|---|---|---|
| В в | B | v (w at the end of a syllable) | вода "water" |
| Н н | H | n | ніс "nose" |
| Р р | P | a rolled r | ріка "river" |
| С с | C | s | син "son" |
| У у | y | oo, as in "boot" | урок "lesson" |
| Х х | x | kh, as in Scottish "loch" | хліб "bread" |
| Letter | Sound | Example |
|---|---|---|
| І і | [i], as in "machine" | Іван, місто |
| И и | [ɪ], close to the vowel in "sit" | риба, син |
| Ї ї | [ji], "yee" | Україна, їжа |
| Є є | [je], "ye" as in "yes" | Європа, моє |
| Ґ ґ | [g], as in "go" | ґанок, ґудзик |
| Г г | [ɦ], a voiced, breathy h | голос, нога |
The trap for English speakers is the pair і / и. Ukrainian и is not the "ee" a Latin i suggests: син "son" sounds close to English "sin". The "ee" sound belongs to і.
The second trap is г. It is not "g". It is an h with voice in it, so гора "mountain" starts more like "hora" than "gora". The hard "g" of "go" has its own letter, ґ, and it appears in a fairly small set of words: ґанок "porch", ґудзик "button", ґрунт "soil".
The apostrophe is part of the spelling. It keeps a hard consonant apart from the "y" sound that follows, so п'ять "five" is "p-yat", not one blended sound. You will see it in ім'я "name", сім'я "family", м'ясо "meat", п'ятниця "Friday". On a phone keyboard it is often typed as a plain ' and that is accepted.
Ukrainian spelling is close to how words sound, so once the alphabet is in place you can read a sign such as Львів or Хрещатик aloud and be understood. What spelling does not show is stress, which is the next topic.
Wende diese Grammatik in den Übungen des Kurses A1 an
ÜbungsaufgabenМоя країна — Україна, а моє місто — Одеса.
My country is Ukraine, and my city is Odesa.
Note ї in Україна [ukrajina] ; unstressed о in моя stays [ɔ] and is never reduced.
Мене звати Іван, я з Чернігова.
My name is Ivan, I'm from Chernihiv.
Reading practice: і is [i], not [ɪ].
Я люблю українську мову й вірші Лесі Українки.
I love the Ukrainian language and Lesia Ukrainka's poems.
україн-ську: contains ї earlier in Україна; here plain, and the ї carries the stress: украї́нську.
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Im Kurs üben
Wende diese Grammatik in den Übungen des Kurses A1 an