Symbols
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Wolaytta alphabet (Latin)
The 26 letters in Wolaytta school order, which is A–Z. Q, X and C are ejective k, t and ch; the double letters CH, SH, PH, DH and TS are typed as two letters; V is found only in loanwords and names. Long vowels and long consonants are written double: Wolaytta, Xoossaa.
Glottal stop
Wolaytta writes the glottal stop with an apostrophe. The straight ' is what keyboards type, phones often curl it to ’, and ʼ U+02BC is the letter apostrophe Unicode intends for it.
Punctuation
Latin-script Wolaytta uses ordinary punctuation; these are the marks besides . and , that people look for.
Wolaytta in fidel: ሀ to ኘ
The older Ethiopic (Ge'ez) spelling, still read by everyone who learned Amharic. Each row is one consonant in its seven vowel forms; the label gives the Latin spelling of the sound.
Wolaytta in fidel: አ to ፐ
ጠ ጨ ጰ ጸ and ቀ (above) are the ejectives that Latin Wolaytta writes x, c, ph, ts and q.
Ethiopic punctuation
። ends a sentence in fidel text, ፣ is the comma, ፤ the semicolon, ፡ the old word divider and ፧ the question mark.
Where it's spoken
Wolaytta is spoken in southern Ethiopia, above all in the Wolaita Zone around Wolaita Sodo.
On the map
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The Wolaytta alphabet: A–Z and an apostrophe
Wolaytta, also spelled Wolaita, Wolayta or Welayta in English, is written today in the Latin alphabet. Schoolbooks, local newspapers, Bible editions and social media use the ordinary 26 letters A to Z, in the ordinary order, each with a capital and a small form, so the Latin letters can be typed on a plain English keyboard. There are no accents and no special letters.
What Wolaytta adds are double letters such as ch, sh, ph, dh and ts, each one sound written with two ordinary letters; they have no Unicode characters of their own and need none. The apostrophe ' is a letter in all but name: it marks a glottal stop, the short catch in the throat heard in the middle of English uh-oh.
Before the Latin alphabet came into the schools in the 1990s, Wolaytta was written, when it was written at all, in the Ethiopic script, fidel, the letters of Amharic. Many people who went to school in Ethiopia read both, and the name of the people is still spelled ወላይታ on Amharic signs and papers. That is why the grid also holds the fidel letters for Wolaytta's sounds.
What Q, X, C, PH and DH mean in Wolaytta
Wolaytta has ejective consonants, said with a short pop of air pushed up from the closed throat, and its spelling, like Oromo's Qubee and Sidama's, gives them Latin letters English uses differently. Q is an ejective k, X an ejective t, C an ejective ch, PH an ejective p and TS the glottalized s. The word for God, Xoossaa, begins with that ejective t, so x is never the ks of English box, q never the q of queen, and c never k or s.
DH is a glottalized d, though some descriptions call it implosive. CH, SH and J sound as in English church, shop and jam, Y is the y of yes and G is always hard. The five vowels a e i o u are read as in Italian, not by their English names.
In fidel the same ejectives have letters of their own: ጠ for x, ጨ for c, ጰ for ph, ጸ for the glottalized s written ts and ቀ for q, each again in seven vowel forms, ጠ ጡ ጢ ጣ ጤ ጥ ጦ.
Long vowels, double consonants and the glottal stop
Length matters in Wolaytta and the Latin spelling always shows it. A long vowel is written twice, aa ee ii oo uu, and a long consonant is written twice too: the language's own name, Wolaytta, has a doubled tt, Xoossaa a long oo, a doubled ss and a long aa, and the New Year festival Gifaataa two long aa. A double letter is never a typo, and dropping one can change the word. Fidel cannot show doubled consonants at all, one of the reasons the Latin alphabet won out in schools.
Type the glottal stop with the apostrophe key '. Phones and word processors often turn it into the curly ’, and some writers use the modifier letter apostrophe ʼ , the character Unicode intends for an apostrophe that belongs to a word, so that search and line breaks treat the word as one. All three are on this page; pick one and stay with it. For ’ press OptionShift] on a Mac or Alt0146 on the Windows number pad; in HTML ’ is ’ and ʼ is ʼ.
To write the fidel letters, use an Amharic keyboard: Windows has a built-in Amharic input method, Gboard offers Amharic on Android, and Keyman works on most systems. They are phonetic, so w a gives ወ and l a gives ለ. In fidel text a sentence ends with ። and ፣ is the comma. The Ethiopian birr's Latin symbol is Br; in fidel it is written ብር.
Where the Wolaytta language is spoken
Wolaytta is the language of the Wolaita people of southern Ethiopia , on the green, densely farmed highlands around the town of Wolaita Sodo and Mount Damota, where enset (the false banana), maize and coffee grow around round thatched houses. CLDR, Unicode's locale database, estimates about 2.1 million speakers in Ethiopia (1.8% of the population); other estimates differ, and there are Wolaytta speakers abroad too. Its locale code is wal.
Until the 1890s Wolaita was a kingdom of its own, ruled by kings with the title kawo, before it was taken into the Ethiopian empire under Menelik II. Today the Wolaita Zone is one of the most populous parts of southern Ethiopia, and Wolaytta is heard well beyond it, in Addis Ababa and on music and gospel song (mezmur) videos shared online.
Wolaytta belongs to the Omotic family, usually counted as a branch of Afroasiatic, and to its Ometo group, together with its close relatives Gamo, Gofa and Dawro. Its neighbours Sidama and Oromo are Cushitic languages with Latin alphabets of their own, and Amharic, Ethiopia's working language, is the source of the fidel; each has its own collection, and the Ethiopia collection has the country's flag, emoji and symbols.
How to use them
5 situationsClick to copyWolaytta Alphabet & Letters combos
8Worth knowing
- Wolaytta needs no accented letters at all: its ejective t and k are written with x and q, two letters English barely uses.
- The double tt in Wolaytta is not decoration: Latin Wolaytta writes every long consonant twice, something the fidel spelling ወላይታ cannot show.
- Wolaita was an independent kingdom until the 1890s, when it was taken into Menelik II's Ethiopian empire.
- Unicode's CLDR still lists Wolaytta under the Ethiopic script, although its schools have used the Latin alphabet since the 1990s.
Questions people ask
7What is the Wolaytta alphabet?
The Latin alphabet A–Z as Wolaytta uses it, with double letters such as ch, sh, ph, dh and ts, and the apostrophe ' for the glottal stop. It has no accented letters. Wolaytta was earlier written in the Ethiopic fidel, which is also in the grid.
How many letters are in the Wolaytta alphabet?
Twenty-six, the letters A to Z, plus the apostrophe for the glottal stop. The extra sounds are written with two-letter combinations rather than new letters.
Is Wolaita the same as Wolaytta?
Yes. Wolaytta, Wolaita, Wolayta, Wolaitta and Welayta are spellings of the same name; Wolaytta is the language's own Latin spelling, and ወላይታ is the Amharic one.
How do you pronounce x and q in Wolaytta?
They are ejectives, said with a sharp pop of air from the closed throat: x is an ejective t and q an ejective k, as in Xoossaa (God). c is an ejective ch.
Where is the Wolaita language spoken?
In southern Ethiopia, above all in the Wolaita Zone around Wolaita Sodo. CLDR estimates about 2.1 million speakers.
What language family is Wolaita?
Omotic, in its Ometo group, together with Gamo, Gofa and Dawro. Omotic is usually counted as a branch of Afroasiatic, the family of Amharic, Oromo and Arabic.
Is there a Wolaita flag emoji?
No. Emoji flags exist only for countries and a few regions, so people use with the name Wolaytta.
