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Archive 1Archive 2

Greek gamma or Latin gamma?

Some articles in WP use Latin gamma, ɣ, in place of Greek gamma, γ, to transliterate Mongolian. (The Latin gamma is used in the orthography of some varieties of Berber.) This has the advantage of being visually more distinct from y (cf. ɣ γ y, ɣ γ y), as well as matching other letters esthetically, but we should be consistent. Any problem with me converting these back to Greek gamma, as used in this article? — kwami (talk) 19:40, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

Latin gamma ɣ is the correct character to use, and all instances of Greek gamma in Mongolian transliteration should be changed to Latin gamma. BabelStone (talk) 19:43, 28 September 2010 (UTC)
I won't get into this topic again, but there has been a lot of discourse about this question in the past. "transcription of the back G, yet again" on Wikipedia_talk:Naming_conventions_(Mongolian)/Archive_03 is one instance, and there must have been a number of similar discussions before. Maybe first try to look these up before eliciting new comments. G Purevdorj (talk) 19:56, 28 September 2010 (UTC)
Thanks. I wasn't aware of that, and forgot about the discussion above. The debate seems to have come down on using Greek gamma, so I'll sub that for Latin gamma as I come across it. — kwami (talk) 23:31, 28 September 2010 (UTC)
I personally perfer the Latin gamma, but I insist to follow Vladimirtsov, Poppe, Mostaert, or Cleaves, because we're using their transliteration. However, when mading a WP:Naming conventions (Classical Mongolian), I think Latin gamma is better. --虞海 (Yú Hǎi) (talk) 12:41, 29 September 2010 (UTC)
In all previous discussion on the topic, the result was to follow the general Wikipdia Naming conventions, which state that latin characters should be used in transcriptions. Mixing latin and greek characters in one word is an absurd idea to begin with. --Latebird (talk) 11:11, 30 September 2010 (UTC)
I think I've switched all gammas to Greek by now. (I had been the one to change many of those articles to Latin to begin with.)
If y'all ever achieve consensus, let me know, and I might be around to switch them again. — kwami (talk) 08:44, 4 October 2010 (UTC)
But till now there's no Wikipdia Naming conventions for classical Mongolian. So I insist following Vladimirtsov, Poppe, Mostaert, or Cleaves till WP:Naming conventions (Classical Mongolian) is created. The general Wikipdia Naming conventions does not necessarily affect certain languages. --虞海 (Yú Hǎi) (talk) 10:44, 4 October 2010 (UTC)
Create the convention, and if it's stable, I'll follow it. — kwami (talk) 11:54, 4 October 2010 (UTC)
It seems to be hard: unlike Chinese and Japanese text, Classical Mongolian script does not have an unified standard. And even the habitual transliteration - Vladimirtsov-Poppe-Mostaert-Cleaves transliteration, is not an unity transliterstion: different people and organizations may have different comprehension. In China, linguists often use the "Poppe variant", and Mongols use a modified version of Romanization of Cyrillic Mongolian (though they're not able to use Cyrillic Mongolian). For example, Alxa may be transliterated as either Alaša or Alaγša... I personally do not think it's practical to create such a convention. --虞海 (Yú Hǎi) (talk) 16:30, 4 October 2010 (UTC)
And we all know, recently a “new” transliteration appears. -虞海 (Yú Hǎi) (talk) 16:34, 4 October 2010 (UTC)
It would be good to have a convention in place, but it would have to be able to deal with all Mongolian letters available then and today. E.g. Poppe's conventions (though very widespread) exclude a letter like ᠽ. I myself am currently using 4 different conventions for four different purposes, but just establishing one convention on Wikipedia (that could certainly not be Mongolian pinyin) would constitute progress. G Purevdorj (talk) 18:24, 4 October 2010 (UTC)
The convention is very clear: Names not originally in a Latin alphabet, such as Greek, Chinese, or Russian names, must be transliterated. It goes without saying that the result of such a transliteration must only contain latin characters, or the requirement would not make any sense to begin with. There is nothing in names transliterated from traditional Mongolian script that would justify an exception. --Latebird (talk) 09:02, 6 October 2010 (UTC)
No, it doesn't go without saying at all. When Mongol is transliterated into the Latin alphabet, the gamma is nonetheless Greek. Unless the convention states that we need to diverge from RS's when common usage is not 100% Latin, then it doesn't address the issue here. (And in any case, ɣ isn't really Latin.) — kwami (talk) 09:47, 6 October 2010 (UTC)
As far as the naming conventions go, exclusive use of latin characters is mandatory whether you like to say it or not. Whether any scientific literature actually uses a mixture of latin and greek characters when transliterating a single word still remains to be shown. Don't get confused by superficial typographical similarites (or workarounds by typesetters who didn't have access to a latin gamma for some reason), but try to figure out whether a mixture of writing systems was actually the semantical intention of the author. I'd be quite surprised if you were to find a confirmed case. --Latebird (talk) 06:48, 7 October 2010 (UTC)
But since such a mixture is the fact on the ground, saying the academic field wants something else but can't manage it is completely OR. If you can get the guidelines to spell out that we should not mix Latin and Greek even if our sources do, fine, but otherwise this is just speculation. (And I'm saying this as s.o. who would prefer all-Latin.)
Consider The World's Writing Systems. They're capable of using the IPA, including it in many chapters, but often choose not too. They also use other Greek letters, such as δ, which they could have easily subbed with ð. Mongolian: γ, δ, β. Manchu: γ, χ. Uyghur: γ, δ, β. Turkic runes: γ. Syriac: γ, δ, β. Sogdian: γ, δ, β. Avestan: θ, ŋ, γ, δ, β, ə. Whether they use these letters or Latin only, as in some related scripts, is evidently a matter of convention for that script; Pahlavi and Mandaic, for example, have none of those letters in transliteration. — kwami (talk) 09:32, 7 October 2010 (UTC)

(dedent) In printed publications, it is generally impossible to tell whether someone used a latin or greek gamma (and whether the typesetter really used what the writer intended). And if the sources use inconsistent/contradictory/illogical spellings, then it makes even more sense to just follow the strict rules of the naming conventions, doesn't it? Or do you have sources that explicitly state "we use the greek gamma here because..."? --Latebird (talk) 08:45, 8 October 2010 (UTC)

It's quite clear in that volume. — kwami (talk) 10:14, 8 October 2010 (UTC)
I presume that this debate is for names that have no common English transliteration to multiple transliterations into English, because as a rule of thumb use is whatever is common in reliable English language sources. One guideline, which was created because of many names alternative translations and transliteration was Wikipedia:Naming conventions (Norse mythology) you might like to take a look at it and consider adapting the principles it adopted to address your issues here. -- PBS (talk) 04:29, 10 October 2010 (UTC)
PBS, since Old Norse has a standard latin spelling, that guideline can't really help us with our problem (the suggestion to mix greek and latin characters within the same word when transcribing traditional Mongolian).
Kwami, would it be possible to quote the relevant passage for those who don't have that book? Their specific arguments certainly would be relevant. Is there a way to show that their approach is "common" in the field? --Latebird (talk) 08:04, 11 October 2010 (UTC)
I think you are not seeing the wood for the trees. As far a most monoglot English speakers are concerned the Latin alphabet is learnt through the alphabet song anything else is not the Latin alphabet. As pedants on Wikipedia we know better! But to 99% of monoglot English speakers they will ignore funny foreign squiggles so if any of these "ɣ γ y, ɣ γ y" are used, they will be read as "Y" similarly "β" will be read as a "B" Which is why any name German name containing a ß is translated in newspapers for the plebs of the English speaking world as "ss" eg Franz Josef Strauss. So the point I was making above is don't get too hung up on whether the letter is a Greek β or a (German/Latin ß) as it is its all Greek to monoglot English language speakers (or if you prefer to avoid confusion double Dutch). What you need to do is use the name most commonly used in reliable English language sources, so if they use a mixture of Latin and Greek letters so should Wikipedia. But if like Old Norse there is not clear guidance from reliable English language sources then you may have to agree on further guidance, like for example choosing the "best" (most widely used) transliteration system, as a default if there is no common spelling for a Mongolian word in English. Like old Norse it may be necessary to develop a guideline if the general naming policy and guidelines do not address all the problems you face, but like the Old Norse guideline you should stick a closely as possible to the principles of using reliable English language sources as the basis for you decision making in the guideline and only give specific guidance where it is needed. -- PBS (talk) 22:46, 12 October 2010 (UTC)

Latebird, there is no argument, there's just the transcription. I'm sure someone covers it in some volume somewhere, but in what I've seen it's just taken for granted. For example, the "Mongolian script" section begins with the Mongols borrowing the Uyghur alphabet, which the author spell with a "gh": "... for several centuries no new letters were created for the few Mongol phonemes unknown in Uyghur. ... Thus in the orthography without diacritics, qačar 'cheek' and γaǰar 'place' have the same written form."

They finish with a Mongolian text, with:

Transliteration: tʾrʾ pwβʾδhy sʾδwβʾmʾhʾʾ/sʾδwβʾ ʾynw pʾy ʾδwr mʾrkʾn kʾmʾn / ʾwqʾqδʾqwy :
Normalization: tere bôdhi-saduva ma-hā-saduva inu bey-e-dür mergen kemen / uqaγdaqui

It's in the Latin normalization that the Greek gamma shows up. Note that it's not supposed to be the IPA. The Avestan alphabet is listed with phonetic values/transliterations like β, δ, γ, x́, ń, ŋ́, etc. For ń they have a footnote in which they describe it as [ɲ], but they only give the IPA for a few values, probably because they can't be reconstructed all that well. Mandaic, by a different author, has an alphabet table with both this kind of transliteration and the IPA is full, like š [ʃ], but unfortunately Mandaic does not have a γ. I only see the letter in (most) extinct Persian/Central Asian languages with Aramaic-derived scripts, and derivatives like Uyghur and Mongolian. Nonetheless, it's clear that typography is not the problem in this volume, even if it might be the original motivation. As I've said, I'm in favor of using Latin gamma, I just don't think it's obvious that we "must". — kwami (talk) 23:41, 12 October 2010 (UTC)

I'm finding several snippets on Google books about using Greek gamma for Mongolian, such as teachers noting that US college students sometimes don't know what it is, but little that's accessible. In The gods of northern Buddhism they say, "For the Mongolian names, the Ramstedt method has been followed with the exception of the Greek gamma, which has been replaced by the letters gh." — kwami (talk) 23:51, 12 October 2010 (UTC)

Move back to Mongolian script

The following discussion is an archived discussion of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

No consensus to move. This discussion has been open for a while and I just don't see a consensus. Maybe a simple request with no distractions could result in a consensus. In the meantime, the pages are move protected. Vegaswikian (talk) 05:47, 26 September 2011 (UTC)

– Kwami moved Mongolian script to Classical Mongolian alphabet, yet leave the talk page (Talk:Mongolian script) here. And this is a move without consensus. ––虞海 (Yú Hǎi) ✍ 12:51, 23 August 2011 (UTC)

Per our naming conventions, an alphabet should be at 'alphabet' and a script should be at 'script'. Since they're conflated in this case, the question is whether this article deals more with the script or with the alphabet. — kwami (talk) 13:24, 23 August 2011 (UTC)
I was not too happy about the move either. The article does not limit itself to the Classical Mongolian script, but also includes the Middle Mongolian and modern Inner Mongolian ductus and conventions. Accordingly, we should drop the "Classical" from the article title and accordingly the article is about a "script", not an "alphabet". Following the somewhat contra-intuitive definitions given at NCWS, the Mongolian script contains at least three alphabets, one pertaining to pre-classical Middle Mongolian, one to modern Inner Mongolian and one to Evenki (plus one for Dagur, I guess). G Purevdorj (talk) 16:41, 23 August 2011 (UTC)
Maybe. But we never really cover the the various alphabets.
虞海 just moved us to "Mongolian alphabet". I'm reverting: that name is just as appropriate for the Cyrillic alphabet. — kwami (talk) 16:48, 23 August 2011 (UTC)
I was reverting your second move. ––虞海 (Yú Hǎi) ✍ 17:09, 23 August 2011 (UTC)
And please stop move pages before the discussion is finished. Also, as an administrator, you should use your previlige on pages you've edited. (e.g. You've edited “Mongolian alphabet”, so you should not “00:53, 24 August 2011 Kwamikagami (talk | contribs) deleted "Talk:Mongolian alphabet"”) ––虞海 (Yú Hǎi) ✍ 17:14, 23 August 2011 (UTC)
What are you talking about? You're the one moving the article while the discussion is going on. And to a ridiculous name to boot. — kwami (talk) 17:17, 23 August 2011 (UTC)
(Moved below) Reply: This move was to revert this move, and it was done before the discussion. And it was just because I don't want to start an edit war that I didn't revert your move again. ––虞海 (Yú Hǎi) ✍ 17:23, 23 August 2011 (UTC)
Well, let's preserve the current situation without any further moves unless they are agreed upon by discussion. As for kwami's [one-but-]last comment: they are not treated here, even though there is a tiny bit about two of them. Uyghurjin is grouped as another script, which is probably not that common, but possible. A good rewrite would probably suffice to clarify "Mongolian script" as the topic of this article, but I don't have the right literature at hand. So I am not strongly opposed for leaving the current status for the time being. G Purevdorj (talk) 17:20, 23 August 2011 (UTC)
Yes, if the article were to cover the various Mongolian-script alphabets, I'd agree that it should be moved. It might be a good idea anyway, as a dab. Currently in the MOS the guideline is that if the article's primarily about the alphabet rather than the script, it's kept at 'alphabet'. But as I said, it might be a good idea to move it anyway. Not an obvious case, though. — kwami (talk) 17:25, 23 August 2011 (UTC)
  • (edit conflict)
I was reverting your second move, and surprisingly you did it again. ––虞海 (Yú Hǎi) ✍ 17:09, 23 August 2011 (UTC)
And please stop move pages before the discussion is finished. Also, as an administrator, you should use your previlige on pages you've edited. (e.g. You've edited “Mongolian alphabet”, so you should not “00:53, 24 August 2011 Kwamikagami (talk | contribs) deleted "Talk:Mongolian alphabet"”) ––虞海 (Yú Hǎi) ✍ 17:14, 23 August 2011 (UTC)
Repeating nonsense doesn't make it sensible. — kwami (talk) 17:25, 23 August 2011 (UTC)
  1. This move was to revert this move, and it was done before the discussion. And it was just because I don't want to start an edit war that I didn't revert your move again. ––虞海 (Yú Hǎi) ✍ 17:23, 23 August 2011 (UTC)
  2. Wikipedia:Administrators#Involved_admins: “In general, editors should not act as administrators in cases in which they have been involved.” ––虞海 (Yú Hǎi) ✍ 17:33, 23 August 2011 (UTC)

Move:

  1. Unlike Latin alphabet, Mongolian script is half alphabet half syllabary (e.g. ᠪᠣ) and half abjad (ᠨᠠ/ᠨᠡ may be either na or ne), and with some abugida characteristic.
  2. Even if it is an alphabet, (new added) Mongolian script may be used to write Evenk language.

––虞海 (Yú Hǎi) ✍ 17:21, 23 August 2011 (UTC)

That's not an argument for moving. Per the MOS, such things belong under "alphabet". The reason we'd move it to 'script' is if it covers more than just the Mongolian alphabet. — kwami (talk) 17:28, 23 August 2011 (UTC)
Reply: Script#4: “A non-segmental writing system, especially one which is logographic, mixed, or of unknown character” - obviously ᠪᠣ is non-segmental. ––虞海 (Yú Hǎi) ✍ 17:36, 23 August 2011 (UTC)
(point in red) Yes, if this article covered the script as used for Mongolian and as used for Evenki, then you're right, that would be two different alphabets and the article would be about the script. But it doesn't do that. It only covers the Mongolian alphabet. Since it only covers the Mongolian alphabet, it should be at 'alphabet'.
No system is pure. "&", "u", and "x" aren't segmental either, but we still speak of the English "alphabet". But what's ᠪᠣ? I'm not sure it's showing up right for me. It's not even in the article. What's it's value? — kwami (talk) 17:55, 23 August 2011 (UTC)
bo/bu. It's segmental, just somewhat contracted. G Purevdorj (talk) 20:20, 23 August 2011 (UTC)
@kwami You cannot render ᠪᠣ because you don't have Mongolian Unicode font.
@kwami I may add info about Mongolian script used in Evenk language but it's impractial to put these 2 in a same weight. ––虞海 (Yú Hǎi) ✍ 11:33, 26 August 2011 (UTC)
Ah, but that's precisely my point: this article is not really about the script, but about the Mongol alphabet specifically. — kwami (talk) 11:51, 26 August 2011 (UTC)
Nope, in Cyrillic, Russian Cyrillic and Mongolian Cyrillic are clearly not in a same weight. ––虞海 (Yú Hǎi) ✍ 12:18, 26 August 2011 (UTC)
Yes, but Cyrillic isn't about the Russian alphabet. It's merely mentioned as one among many, even if the most important. If this article were similar, then of course it should be at 'script'. — kwami (talk) 13:08, 26 August 2011 (UTC)

(Split)

Look at the article, sir! How many words are introducing the script itself and how many words are introducing its orthography on Mongolian... I'll split the article. ––虞海 (Yú Hǎi) ✍ 09:08, 29 August 2011 (UTC)

I cannot bare the nonsense discussion. The introduction on applying Mongolian script to Evenk language has long been there but that man just says this article is about the alphabet, a.k.a. the orthography... I revert his unilateral move. ––虞海 (Yú Hǎi) ✍ 09:43, 29 August 2011 (UTC)

That's the spirit! Always better to fix problems rather than insisting on them not being problems. — kwami (talk) 12:45, 29 August 2011 (UTC)
Actually, I take that back. That was such a pathetic excuse for an article that it almost seems like you're sabotaging WP to get your way (WP:POINT). This article was still about the alphabet rather than the script. I moved the alphabet stuff over to the alphabet article, but now this article is incomplete, and the alphabet article is still hardly a proper article even with my additions. You might want to expand the alphabet article to encyclopedic standards so that it doesn't just get merged back into this one, especially considering that you're too impatient to even wait for your own move request to close. — kwami (talk) 13:01, 29 August 2011 (UTC)
I was of impatience because you just point an article with both Mongolian language and Evenk language good arranged an “alphabet” for single language, with no reason provided... I didn't think such a discussion would make any sense, so I separate it myself. Anyway, I didn't make thousands of disputable move with no discussion - among articles you moved recently, many are wrong (e.g. Modi script is not for any particular language, but you moved it to Modi alphabet without any discussion). ––虞海 (Yú Hǎi) ✍ 13:10, 30 August 2011 (UTC)
The rearrange of the article you made is extremely problematic:
  1. What you arranged is a script family, not a script; Mongolian script is a script to write at least 3 languages with no modification:
    1. Manchu alphabet and Xibe alphabet are never considered Mongolian script, though Mongolian script may be used to write Manchu language (as Old Manchu alphabet, used after 1599 and became obsolete before 1644)
    2. Todo, Xibe, Vaghintara are not orthodox Mongolian script.
    3. Hudum is not the “original form” of Mongolian script, but the orthography of Mongolian script, Evenki becoming another orthography.
  2. The table in Traditional Mongolian alphabet#Overview have 2 parts. The first part, "Characters", belongs to Mongolian script, while the second parts, "Transliteration & Notes" a.k.a. Usage, belongs to Hudum. But you moved it to Hudum altogether.
  3. Your recent edits on Asian scripts bring some inconvience. I think you'd better ask G Purevdorj before edit any Mongolian-related article, to prevent potential damaging consequence.
––虞海 (Yú Hǎi) ✍ 13:10, 30 August 2011 (UTC)
I think you're confusing "alphabet" with "orthography". — kwami (talk) 22:34, 10 September 2011 (UTC)
No, an orthography concerns how to use a script to write a specific language, and an alphabet is a (kind of) script for a specific language. So articles of alphabet-topic often include basic information of orthography, but a script-topic one does not. Recall the following statement:

The table contains basic information of orthography in "Notes" part and language specific part ("Transliteration"), so it cannot be included in Mongolian script article solely (without corresponding Evenki and Manchu one). However, the "Characters" relate nothing to specific languages, so it should be preserved in the Mongolian script article. ––虞海 (Yú Hǎi) ✍ 15:25, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

New discussion

What a fucking mess. Can you two ladies and/or gentlemen (see I'm charitable) first please stop moving the articles for the duration of the discussion. (I count 12 moves and a content fork since this about the time discussion began). Next, could someone please restate the move request based on the article titles at the cessation of hyperactive moving. I would love to contribute but I can't even figure out who wants what done to what. Thanks. —  AjaxSmack  17:34, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

Why don't you say what you would like done? — kwami (talk) 22:34, 10 September 2011 (UTC)
I don't know if it'll make sense without being able to refer to real articles but it would be nice to have 2 articles (rather than the current 3) on:
  1. All of the various historical and current Mongolian alphabets/scripts with links to the individual pages. The title could be Mongolian alphabets or Mongolian writing systems — either is largely accurate but the latter separates the topic from other Mongolian alphabet articles better.
  2. Mongolian "writing" — the vertical one — with links to derivations like Manchu and clear script. Merge the current Traditional Mongolian alphabet into the current Mongolian script article (there's no reason to fork the content) — the title could be Classical Mongolian script or Traditional Mongolian script
Then it would be nice to get some other input. —  AjaxSmack  00:41, 11 September 2011 (UTC)
Much of the argument about has been over whether we call the narrower of your two articles an "alphabet" or a "script". That of course would depend on whether it primarily covers the alphabet or the script. It had primarily covered the alphabet, but 虞海 wanted to call it a "script" anyway, as he seems to object to the term "alphabet". The reason I object to calling alphabets "scripts" is that this only happens with funny Asiatic squiggles, as if they weren't proper writing. WP should not be so ethnocentric. — kwami (talk) 01:52, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

Hudum

One should avoid referring to the traditional Mongolian alphabet as hudum (ᡍᡇᡑᡇᡏ худам). This is an Oirat term not used by most speakers of Mongolian proper. 乔伦夫 even finds it derogatory (《为两种蒙古文正名》, 《语言与翻译》1999年第4期, p. 66). Also the word does not mean "inexact". According to 色音额尔敦 (《关于新疆卫拉特方言中“胡都木”一词的含义》, 《民族语文》1983年2期, p. 70), the Oirat word hudum might be a cognate of the Mongolian proper word udum (ᠤᠳᠤᠮ удам), which means "tradition". Daltac (talk) 23:44, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

You are right in some sense, but
  1. The origin of the term "hudum" is disputed among scholars;
  2. Regardless of the origin, the term "hudum" has been adopted into Mongolian language proper (Chakhar-Khalkha) to refer the script when mentioned with Todo script.
––虞海 (Yú Hǎi) ✍ 15:25, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the proposal. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

Expert opinion on the name

Choijinzhab, a major contributor to the encoding of the Mongolian script in Unicode, recorded a naming scheme in his 蒙古文编码. According to the scheme, which was proposed by experts in the field, the term "Mongolian script" (Monggoljin bicig; 蒙古文) covers the following:

  • Traditional Mongolian script (Monggol bicig; 传统蒙古文)
  • Todo script
  • Sibe script
  • Manchu script

Per WP:NCWS these four should be called alphabets. Daltac (talk) 08:36, 9 October 2011 (UTC)

The claim that Xibe has language status (as opposed to Manchu) is Chinese politics, but does not connect to linguistic reality. It would be nice if anybody presented evidence relating the orthographies of Xibe and Manchu (which might be based on one script or more scripts).
The Clear script employs a few new letters and one diacritic, and the Manchu script has introduced a number of diacritics. It might well be worthwhile to retain these as scripts (even if they have an inventory of common letters that is larger than their inventory of distinctive letters) to differentiate between those and mere alphabets where the Mongolian script is merely adapted to write another language, yielding a new alphabet. Cases in point are Old Manchu, Evenki and Dagur.
The idea of Choijongjav probably is that these scripts can be modelled with a set of basic characters to which particular characters are added. The idea is not to state that they have the same inventory of characters.
G Purevdorj (talk) 08:59, 9 October 2011 (UTC)

Indeed the Monggol bicig (not the Monggoljin bicig) itself include at least 3 different alphabets - Hudum Mongolian, Old Manchu alphabet, and Evenki alphabet. I think this article is about Monggol bicig, a script consists of 3 alphabets; for Monggoljin bicig, it would be Mongolian script family (not the Mongolian writing systems). ––虞海 (Yú Hǎi) ✍ 11:45, 9 October 2011 (UTC)

The Unicode concept of a "script" is different from the Wikipedia usage of the term. Unicode unifies the Mongolian, Todo, Manchu and Sibe scripts or alphabets, and includes them all in a single "Mongolian script" for encoding purposes. This should have no bearing on the terms used on Wikipedia. BabelStone (talk) 12:50, 9 October 2011 (UTC)
Agree. ––虞海 (Yú Hǎi) ✍ 13:18, 9 October 2011 (UTC)
Hm, that picture is interesting. I entered the Daur writing system as a Mongolian "alphabet", but actually I don't know that. I own a book that would provide this information, but I can probably not access it before Christmas (if I think of it then, that is). So if anybody could provide a source that Daur derives from Manchu, I would like to change this in the article above... G Purevdorj (talk) 06:26, 10 October 2011 (UTC)
I'm sure that Daur, albeit Mongolic, use Manchu alphabet. It's called 达呼尔文 (Dahur script or Dagur script) in Chinese. You may easily find a sample of that script. It's generally Manchu but with a sibe f (ᡫ). ––虞海 (Yú Hǎi) ✍ 12:24, 15 October 2011 (UTC)
See Nikan Dahūr buleku bithe (OCLC 52421560). ––虞海 (Yú Hǎi) ✍ 12:38, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

Tools?

There seem to be some tools for processing Mongol bichig available now, including auto-conversion from cyrillic to bichig and/or vice versa. Anyone know details? www.saiyin.net seems to be a good start, unfortunately it is all in Chinese and I just can't be bothered right know to work through it (notice that cute yet disquieting Internet Police mascot on the subpages, though). Yaan (talk) 12:06, 21 October 2008 (UTC)

www.ulaq.com has an "ad" for a Windows IME on the cyrillic pages that was recommended to me, although I haven't tried it yet. I don't think that auto-conversion is even possible (unless the tool uses a dictionary), as the spelling of most words is much too different. --Latebird (talk) 23:54, 21 October 2008 (UTC)
I guess the best way would be to try, and then add here if it works. But that must take some time. My impression is also that autoconversion does require a dictionary. But then, I think Traditional/Simplified Chinese character conversion also nis not really possible without one. Yaan (talk) 11:30, 22 October 2008 (UTC)
Why? Aren't traditional and Simplified Chinese characters in a one-to-one relation, so that there shouldn't be major problems in autoconversing them without a dictionary?! G Purevdorj (talk) 12:12, 22 October 2008 (UTC)
Even if it is a one-to-one relation (which I am not entirely sure of - generally: yes, but without exceptions?) I would think you still need a lookup table that tells you which traditional character corresponds to which simplified one - just simplifying the radicals (or components) does not seem sufficient, if I am not mistaken. So, what I meant was some kind of character dictionary. But I guess it is an interesting question for the Chinese Character article.
Is Mongolian so ambigous that such a lookup table (for words, not characters) is not enough? And if yes, how bad is it, re. autoconversion of texts? Yaan (talk) 12:43, 22 October 2008 (UTC)
Chinese character letters don’t have radicals that a computer could recognize, so you have to replace the whole character anyway.

Cyrillic (Cy) to Written Mongolian (WM) and transcription (tr) of WM to Cy could easily be done via a dictionary. trWM to Cy could also be done by a complex set of character replacement rules, but you’d have to use a supplementary dictionary. Eg it is адгуус (< *atuhus), not the expected адуус (cp. *atuhu > адуу), and you have no rule to predict what science has not yet managed to explain as regular sound change. Of course it doesn’t work the other way round: if *uhu and *ahu both become modern u, there’s no way of knowing from Cy which form was present in WM. WM to Cy can not even be based on a dictionary alone, as a few words (probably less than one in a hundred, but still a considerable number) will need contextual disambiguation. You could enter compounds that are written separately into your dictionary, that might help to some extent, but a few remaining ambiguous words that are not part of compounds will have do be resolved by a human. G Purevdorj (talk) 14:47, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

On ushuaia.pl website I implemented a simple tool that includes online conversion from traditional mongolian script to latin and cyrillic, as well as romanization of Mongolian cyrillic. Bafab (talk) 10:45, 23 March 2012 (UTC)

direction in the Infobox

"Direction Left-to-right" is incorrect. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jonah.ru (talk • contribs) 12:11, 16 April 2012 (UTC)

Indeed, the disinformation box has it wrong again. I took a look, but it wasn't apparent to me where to change it. Can anybody help? Best, G Purevdorj (talk) 17:41, 16 April 2012 (UTC)
Fixed. Yaan (talk) 23:27, 16 April 2012 (UTC)
I've adjusted the basic template, it now includes "top-to-bottom" (ttb). Unicode describes this issue in chapter 13.2: [1]. The original L-to-R was based on the Unicode bidi-class for Mong (so now overruled in the template). What "wrong again" points to I don't understand. -DePiep (talk) 11:47, 17 April 2012 (UTC)

Merge with Traditional Mongolian alphabet

I propose a merger with the Traditional Mongolian alphabet article. Both seem to have the same rough information, so I don't see a need for separate articles. Even the interwikis link to same articles in different languages. --chinneeb-talk 13:27, 26 August 2012 (UTC)

LaTeX typesetting

LaTeX typesetting for monglian and related scripts (old uyghur, manchu) and cyrillic.

http://books.google.com/books?id=LLYYisjrFdEC&pg=PA361#v=onepage&q&f=false

http://books.google.com/books?id=LLYYisjrFdEC&pg=PA362#v=onepage&q&f=false

Rajmaan (talk) 15:23, 7 January 2013 (UTC)

Mongolian script was traditionally treated as a syllabary by both Mongolians and some Mongolists

Mongols learned their script by syllables and not in an alphabetic manner.

Page 15 of

Chinggeltei. A Grammar of the Mongol Language (New York, Frederick Ungar Publishing Co.) 1963.

Page 52

http://books.google.com/books?id=YXlXAAAAYAAJ&q=Some+Mongolists+consider+the+script+a+syllabary,+and+this+is+reflected+in+the+practice+of+abbreviating+names:+Ri+bagsh&dq=Some+Mongolists+consider+the+script+a+syllabary,+and+this+is+reflected+in+the+practice+of+abbreviating+names:+Ri+bagsh&hl=en&sa=X&ei=8WXHU5-bPLC-sQS53IDABg&ved=0CB0Q6AEwAA

Page xxvi

http://books.google.com/books?id=v6k-AAAAcAAJ&pg=PR26#v=onepage&q&f=false

Rajmaan (talk) 06:07, 17 July 2014 (UTC)

I cannot successfully follow your link, but I indeed remember teachers from Inner and Outer Mongolia who took just such an approach. But "syllabic" refers (at least partly, I'm not entirely sure on that) to open syllables, else the number of possible syllables would become too large. G Purevdorj (talk) 08:13, 17 July 2014 (UTC)
The same was said for the Mongolian derived Manchu script in various sources, both modern works on Manchu and works by 19th century Europeans observing how Manchu script was taught. They said Manchu script as taught as a syllabary during the Qing dynasty and still is taught that way in China today. [2] [3] [4] [5] [6]
Chinggeltei's Grammar confirms that that the Mongolian way was open syllable and ended in vowels. From page 15: Up until the present, Mongols studying the Mongol language have not really separated the vowels asn the consonants but have persistently learned syllables. Therefore it is easy for Mongols to know the syllables and to consider the old twelve syllabaries as properly made up of syllables. How the vowels and consonants are joined and what kind of syllables they make: 1. Syllables which are made up of vowels only. 2. Syllables which are made up of consonants followed by vowels.Rajmaan (talk) 18:04, 17 July 2014 (UTC)
Old texts also say that Mongolian and Manchu classified their syllables into 12 categories, based on the final ending of the syllables. [7] [8]. This should be written into the article (using Chinggeltei's Grammar as the source).Rajmaan (talk) 20:27, 18 July 2014 (UTC)

Teaching section is redundant

Read through the teaching section, someone REALLY wants us to know that Mongolian and Manchu were often taught as a syllabary--they repeat it about 4 times in four paragraphs. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.105.179.191 (talk) 16:28, 10 August 2015 (UTC)

Cleanup

The "Examples" section needs to be condensed. It's breaking into other sections. BMACS1002 (talk) 13:50, 22 April 2016 (UTC)

Example text

What is the translation of the "Example text" used in the infobox? It would be nice to provide that to readers instead of just identifying it as "Example text". Pretty sure it ends in the phrase "Mongolian script", but I can't figure out the rest of it. - dcljr (talk) 19:09, 1 December 2015 (UTC)

Is it maybe "ᠴᠣᠷᠢ ᠶᠢᠨ ᠭᠠᠭᠴᠠ ᠪᠣᠰᠤᠭ᠎ᠠ ᠪᠢᠴᠢᠭ᠄ ᠮᠣᠩᠭᠣᠯ ᠪᠢᠴᠢᠭ / Čori yin γaγča bosuγ-a bičig: mongγol bičig / Цорын гагц босоо бичиг: монгол бичиг"? I matched the appearance of the words and compared with ones in the online Bolor Toli dictionary, then converted the sentence into cyrillic (using the converter linked in the external links section). Translated with google translate it becomes "Vertical Vertical Letter: Mongolian script", so there has to be a better translation out there. NiluXC (talk) 10:21, 20 March 2018 (UTC)

Commons files used on this page have been nominated for deletion

The following Wikimedia Commons files used on this page have been nominated for deletion:

Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. —Community Tech bot (talk) 06:37, 2 September 2018 (UTC)

Requested move 12 August 2019

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: not moved (non-admin closure) ~SS49~ {talk} 23:29, 19 August 2019 (UTC)

Mongolian script → Traditional Mongolian script – Most Mongolians use Mongolian Cyrillic alphabet now. 67.149.246.163 (talk) 22:51, 12 August 2019 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

There are 3 rows of gallery pictures, of which many examples are not very good examples at all. I suggest picking the clearest/most interesting examples and removing the rest. Thoughts? Glennznl (talk) 18:25, 30 August 2020 (UTC)

I agree. How about reducing the number of images and instead including see also links to sub-categories on commons? for example:

NiluXC (talk) 17:57, 27 September 2020 (UTC)

Too much information

There is too much information in the Letters section, particularly the Vowels and Consonants subsections. I am already familiar with Semitic and Brahmic scripts, but even with a large screen I can only see two letter tables at a time, so I can't get a sense of the script as a whole. Can someone condense the information into a single table for easy comparison? Danielklein (talk) 03:15, 11 May 2019 (UTC)

Agreed. I made the tables inline tables to more effectively use whitespace on desktop.NiluXC (talk) 12:12, 12 June 2019 (UTC)
Disagree. This is one of the best Wikipedia articles I have ever seen. I am very content with the amount of information on vowels and consonants. Although not being familiar with this writing system, I know many other writing systems, and finding information on them is often very hard cf. Georgian_scripts#Asomtavruli, which is why I personally find it a great service to anyone interested in learning the Mongolian script to give this much information. I thank everyone who made this great article and everyone who supports the survival of its current state. Daniel A. Schachinger 21:16, 08 May 2020 (UTC)
Strong agree. The information in the letters table is certainly very thorough, and I agree that info should be preserved, but it absolutely breaks the flow of this page. I believe it would be better to have a more general table in this article, and move the detailed information to its own dedicated article. Perhaps call it "Mongolian Orthography", or something to that effect. Settinger0603 (talk) 00:54, 7 May 2021 (UTC)

Letter tables

Is nobody going to say anything about the message at the very top of this section? I won’t touch it, but I think someone should do something about it. It is, and I quote: “ THIS SECTION CONTAINS INFORMATION THAT SHOULD BE CORRECT, BUT MAY NOT BE COMPLETE.

THE FORMATTING OF THESE TABLES IS TERRIBLE. IF SOMEONE COULD PLEASE FIX THIS, THAT WOULD BE GREAT.

ALL OF THE INFORMATION HERE HAS BEEN TAKEN FROM THIS ARTICLE.” Thank you for your time and consideration. SuperNova422 (talk) 21:15, 3 November 2021 (UTC)

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