Ottoman Turkish Language - Orthography

Orthography

Ottoman Turkish was primarily written in the Ottoman Turkish alphabet (elifbâ الفبا), a variant of the Perso-Arabic script. It was not, however, unknown for Ottoman Turkish to also be written in Armenian script: for instance, the first novel to be written in the Ottoman Empire was 1851's Akabi, written in the Armenian script by Vartan Pasha. Similarly, when the Armenian Düzoğlu family managed the Ottoman mint during the reign of Sultan Abdülmecid, they kept records in Ottoman Turkish, but used the Armenian script. Other scripts, too—such as the Greek alphabet and the Rashi script of Hebrew—were used by non-Muslim groups to write the language, since the Arabic alphabet was identified with Islam. On the other hand, for example, Greek-speaking Muslims would write Greek using the Ottoman Turkish script.