Serbian Cyrillic Alphabet

Serbian Cyrillic, ћирилица (ćirilica), is the alphabet Vuk Stefanović Karadžić set out in his Serbian dictionary of 1818 and that Serbia made official in 1868. Its rule is the one Serbian schoolchildren still learn: пиши као што говориш, читај како је написано, write as you speak, read as it is written. Every letter stands for exactly one sound and every sound has exactly one letter, so there are no silent letters and no spelling bees.

The 30 letters in order, the азбука, are: А Б В Г Д Ђ Е Ж З И Ј К Л Љ М Н Њ О П Р С Т Ћ У Ф Х Ц Ч Џ Ш. To make it work Karadžić dropped the letters that wrote no separate sound in the vernacular, such as the hard and soft signs Ъ Ь and the iotated vowels Ю Я, and filled the gaps with new ones.

Those six special letters are the hallmark of Serbian Cyrillic; several are also used in Macedonian. Ђ ђ is a soft "j" sound, close to the j in "jeep" said with the tongue flat, as in ђак (pupil). Ћ ћ is a soft "ch", as in ћерка (daughter) and Новак Ђоковић. Ј ј is the y of "yes", as in јабука (apple). Љ љ is the lli of "million", as in љубав (love). Њ њ is the ny of "canyon", as in њива (field). Џ џ is the hard j of "jam", as in џеп (pocket). Next to them, Ч ч is the hard "ch" of "church", Ш ш is "sh", Ж ж is the s of "measure", Ц ц is the ts of "cats" and Х х is the ch of Scottish "loch".

Serbian Cyrillic vs Russian Cyrillic

Serbian and Russian share 24 letters. Serbian has Ђ Ј Љ Њ Ћ Џ, which Russian does not use, and Russian has Ё Й Щ Ъ Ы Ь Э Ю Я, which Serbian does not: 30 letters against 33. Where Russian writes the y sound with Й or inside Я and Ю, Serbian always uses Ј, so the Russian name Юрий becomes Јуриј. Љ and Њ were made by joining Л and Н to the soft sign Ь, which is why their right halves look the same.

The difference you notice in print is in italics and handwriting. Serbian (and Macedonian) cursive has its own forms for five small letters, which differ from the Russian ones: italic б has a different, rounded top, г looks like an i with a bar over it, д like a Latin g, п like a u with a bar over it and т like an m with a bar over it. Fonts switch to these shapes only when the text is marked as Serbian, for example with lang="sr" on a web page, and the font has the Serbian forms built in.

Watch the look-alikes. Cyrillic А В Е Ј К М Н О Р С Т У Х look like Latin letters but are different characters, and some sound different: Cyrillic В is V, Н is N, Р is R, С is S, У is U and Х is H, so РЕСТОРАН reads RESTORAN. Cyrillic Ј and Latin J look the same and even sound the same, but a search or a spell checker treats them as different letters, so copy the one that matches the rest of the word.

Serbian Cyrillic to Latin: letter by letter

Serbian is written in two alphabets that match letter for letter, and Serbs read both. The Latin one, латиница (latinica), uses the same letters as Croatian: А = A, Б = B, В = V, Г = G, Д = D, Ђ = Đ, Е = E, Ж = Ž, З = Z, И = I, Ј = J, К = K, Л = L, Љ = Lj, М = M, Н = N, Њ = Nj, О = O, П = P, Р = R, С = S, Т = T, Ћ = Ć, У = U, Ф = F, Х = H, Ц = C, Ч = Č, Џ = Dž, Ш = Š. So Београд is Beograd, ћевапи is ćevapi and Живели! is Živeli!

Going from Cyrillic to Latin is mechanical. Going back needs one check: three Cyrillic letters, Љ Њ Џ, become two Latin ones, lj nj dž, and now and then those pairs are really two letters. Injekcija is инјекција with Н and Ј, not Њ, and nadživeti (to outlive) is надживети with Д and Ж, not Џ. Good converters keep a list of such words. The Latin alphabet also sorts in a different order, A B C Č Ć D Dž Đ E … and has its own collection here, Serbian (Latin).

How to type Serbian Cyrillic letters

On Windows, add the Serbian (Cyrillic) keyboard under Settings, Time & language, Language & region, and switch with Win+Space. It is a QWERTZ layout that puts each Cyrillic letter on the key of its Latin twin: Љ and Њ are where Q and W are, Ш, Ђ and Ж sit to the right of П, and Ч and Ћ to the right of Л. On a Mac, add the Serbian input source in System Settings, Keyboard, Input Sources. On a phone, add Serbian (Cyrillic) to the keyboard languages; Gboard and the iPhone keyboard both have it.

The special letters are in the basic Cyrillic block of Unicode. In HTML, write Ђ Ђ, ђ ђ, Ј Ј, ј ј, Љ Љ, љ љ, Њ Њ, њ њ, Ћ Ћ, ћ ћ, Џ Џ and џ џ; the named entities Ђ Ј Љ Њ Ћ Џ work too, and their lowercase spelling (ђ …) gives the small letters.

Serbian quotation marks, punctuation and accents

Serbian quotes open low and close high, „like this“, with the closing mark shaped like a small 66. Angle quotes » « pointing inward are the accepted alternative, and a quote inside a quote takes single marks, ‚like this‘. Dialogue and pauses use the dash, – or —, and an apostrophe ’ stands for a dropped sound in speech, as in ’ајде (come on).

Ordinary writing uses no accent marks. Dictionaries and textbooks mark Serbian's pitch accent with four signs over the vowels, and a combining circumflex ◌̂, the genitive sign, may be put over a vowel to tell a genitive plural from a look-alike form when the context could mislead. These marks are combining characters added to the plain letters, not separate letters of the alphabet.

Where Serbian Cyrillic is written

Serbia's 2006 Constitution puts the Serbian language and the Cyrillic script in official use, while Latin is everywhere in everyday life, on screens, in ads and in much of the press. CLDR estimates about 7.2 million Serbian speakers across its listed territories, including about 6.6 million in Serbia, about 380,000 in Bosnia and Herzegovina, about 100,000 in Kosovo and about 30,000 in Montenegro. Large communities abroad, in Canada and across Europe, keep writing it too.

Serbia pays in dinars, which have no Unicode sign: prices read 500 дин. in Cyrillic. Bosnia and Herzegovina writes its convertible mark as КМ, and Montenegro and Kosovo use the euro, €. Bosnian (Cyrillic) is written in nearly the same letters; Macedonian shares Ј Љ Њ Џ and has its own Ѓ Ќ Ѕ, but not Ђ Ћ; Russian and Bulgarian are the larger Cyrillic neighbours, and Croatian and Serbian (Latin) share the Latin side. The countries have their own pages: Serbia, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Montenegro and Kosovo.