Writing System
Kildin Sami is written in an extended version of Cyrillic since the 1980s. The alphabet has three variants with some minor differences in certain letters, mostly in Ҋ vs. Ј and ’ (apostrophe) vs. Һ. Whereas the dictionary of Sammallahti/Xvorostuxina (1991) uses Ҋ and ’ (apostrophe), Kuruč at al. 1985 uses Ј and Һ. The third orthographic variant, used, e.g., by Kert (1986), has neither of these letters.
Note that the letters Ӓ, Ҋ/Ј, Һ/’ (apostrophe), Ӆ, Ӎ, Ӊ, Ӈ, Ҏ, Ъ, Ь, Ҍ and Ӭ do not occur word initially, either because the letters mark features of preceding consonants or the sounds they represent do not occur word initially. So these letters don't normally occur in uppercase, except for all caps text.
The letter Щ occurs only in Russian loanwords.
| А а | Ӓ ӓ | Б б | В в | Г г | Д д | Е е | Ё ё | Ж ж | З з | Һ һ | ' |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| /a/ | /ʲa/ | /b/ | /v/ | /ɡ/ | /d/ | /je/ or /ʲe/ | /jo/ or /ʲo/ | /ʒ/ | /z/ | /ʰ/ | |
| И и | Й й | Ҋ ҋ | Ј ј | К к | Л л | Ӆ ӆ | М м | Ӎ ӎ | Н н | Ӊ ӊ | |
| /i/ or /ji/ or /ʲi/ | /j/ | /j̊/ | /k/ | /l/ | /l̥/ | /m/ | /m̥/ | /n/ | /n̥/ | ||
| Ӈ ӈ | О о | П п | Р р | Ҏ ҏ | С с | Т т | У у | Ф ф | Х х | Ц ц | |
| /ŋ/ | /о/ | /p/ | /r/ | /r̥/ | /s/ | /t/ | /u/ | /f/ | /x/ | /ts/ | |
| Ч ч | Ш ш | Щ щ | Ъ ъ | Ыы | Ь ь | Ҍ ҍ | Э э | Ӭ ӭ | Ю ю | Я я | |
| /tʃ/ | /ʃ/ | /ç/ | /ɨ/ | /ʲ/ | /ʲ/ | /e/ | /ʲe/ | /ju/ or /ʲu/ | /ja/ or /ʲa/ | ||
The orthographic principles are more or less similar to Russian, but note the following special features.
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