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The Old Hungarian script, also known as rovásírás (Hungarian: rovásírás, székely rovásírás (listen ) or simply rovás), is a type of writing system used by the Magyars (mainly by Székely Magyars) prior to AD 1000. The name rovás is the Hungarian word for "carving"[1] since the letters were usually carved on wood or sticks. Technically the alphabet isn't a true runic alphabet because it is unrelated to the Futhark. However, the similarity of the letter shapes to runes have led to them popularly being called "Hungarian runes", the "Hungarian runic script", etc. The script is thought to be derived from the Old Turkic script, and probably first appeared between 600 to 700 AD. The Hungarians settled the region that is now Hungary in 895. In December 1000 the country became a kingdom, where the Latin alphabet was adopted. However, the pagan runic script remained in use in remote regions of Transylvania until the late 1850s. Some claim that this writing system is more suitable for writing the Hungarian language than the Latin alphabet, because it includes letters for all the phonemes of Hungarian, such as cs, gy, ly, ny, ö, sz, ty, ü, zs.. The modern Hungarian alphabet represents these sounds with digraphs (letter sequences used to write a single sound) and diacritics. Note that the rovásírás alphabet does not contain the letters for the phonemes dz, dzs of modern Hungarian since these are relative recent developments in the language's history. The Latin letters q, w, x and y also do not have an equivalent as these do not stand for separate phonemes in Hungarian but are only used to spell foreign words.
[edit] History[edit] Early period, 600 – 896Around 600 AD, the Hungarian tribes moved southwest from their earlier territories to the coastal region of the Eastern Black Sea. The Hungarian Runes are almost certainly related to the Old Turkic script, itself deriving from Aramaic script[citation needed]. This is supported by the Hungarian tribes' early geographical proximity to the Göktürks. Moreover, thirteen of the Hungarian rovás glyphs closely resemble characters of the Orkhon script. 
The additional characters were Hungarian developments rather than borrowings, but some signs seem to derive from Greek ones, such as Around 830, after living for 230 years in Khazaria, the Hungarians moved westwards, to Etelköz (the land of present-day Moldavia). Off here, they descried the Pannonian Basin. In 896, because of external pressures, they left behind Etelköz and conquered the territory of present-day Hungary. [edit] Later Middle Ages, 896 – 1526
The century after 896 saw the emergence of the Hungarian State. The seven Hungarian tribes settled the Pannonian Basin, where the Principality of Hungary was formed.[3] There are archaeological findings from the 10th century, for example, from Homokmégy[4] The latter inscription was found on a fragment of a quiver made of bone. Although there have been several attempts to interpret it, the meaning of it is still unclear. In 1000, with the coronation of Stephen I of Hungary, Hungary became a Kingdom. The Latin alphabet was adopted as official, however rovasiras remained in use for a long time. The runic script was first mentioned in the 13th century Chronicle of Simon of Kéza,[5] where he stated that the Székelys borrowed the Bulaq turks' script: "... non tamen in plano Panonie, sed cum Blackis in montibus confinii sortem habuernut, unde Blakis commixti litteris ipsorum uti perhibentur".[6] The earliest surviving copy of the actual alphabet was found is an incunabulum from 1483, found at the library of the castle of Nikolsburg, now Mikulov in Moravia, hand-written onto the endpaper of the printed book. This alphabet lists 35 letters and 15 ligatures with Latin transcriptions. [edit] The period between 1526 – 1850In 1526, Hungary lost the Battle of Mohács against the Ottomans. This led to the partition of the Kingdom: the western and northern parts remained Royal Hungary, the southern parts were occupied by the Ottoman Empire, and the eastern portion became independent. The latter, notably the Principality of Transylvania, favoured Hungarian culture. 
The indigenous script was not widely used, as previously, but became part of folk art in several areas. Thus, the corpus of Hungarian runes became more voluminous at the time. In 1598, János Telegdi wrote his primer, "Rudimenta Priscae Hunnorum Linguae", where he presents his understanding of the rovás. It also contains Hungarian texts written with runes, for example, the Lord's Prayer. In Royal Hungary, rovás was used less, although there are relics from this territory, too. There is another copy – similar to the Nikolsburg Alphabet – of the rovás alphabet, dated 1609. The inscription from Inlăceni, dated 1668, is a good example of the "folk art use". In 1686, the Kingdom of Hungary regained the territories lost in 1526. After that time several other runic inscriptions were created, for example the inscriptions of Kibéd, Csejd, Makfalva, Szokolma, Marosvásárhely, Csíkrákos, Mezőkeresztes, Nagybánya, Torda, Felsőszemeréd [1], Kecskemét and Kiskunhalas, all ranging from the 17th to the early 19th century. After 1850, with the spread of modern education, Hungarian runic writing was all but extinguished. [edit] 20th century: the era of researchBecause their use had died out, researchers in the twentieth century had to reconstruct the alphabet from historic sources, with very limited reference to a living tradition. Gyula Sebestyén, Hungarian folklorist, did the lion's share of this work. His publications, Rovás és rovásírás (Runes and Runic Writing, Budapest, 1909) and A magyar rovásírás hiteles emlékei (Official Relics of Hungarian Runic Writing, Budapest, 1915) contain valuable information on the topic. In the latter part of the twentieth century, several new rovás and rovás-like inscriptions were found all over Hungary. This includes the 10th century relic from Homokmégy, which is surely Hungarian, and the 8th century inscribed Avar needle-box from Szarvas. Also, runic inscriptions appear on the Nagyszentmiklós Treasure, which is a precious golden hoard of unknown origin. These created much confusion. However, nowadays, experts agree that the alphabets used on the Nagyszentmiklós Treasure and on the Szarvas needle-box are the same, while the Hungarian one is of another ancestry. [edit] TodayThough the rovás script is no longer in practical use, Hungarians treasure it — especially the Hungarians of Transylvania. The worldwide Hungarian Scout organisations are still teaching it today.[citation needed] The script does not have its own code page, and it is not coded in Unicode either.[7]However, there are some fonts which contain Hungarian Runic characters. After installing one of them and applying their formatting to the document – because of the lack of capital letters – rovás characters could be entered in the following way: those letters which are unique letters in today's Hungarian orthography are virtually lowercase ones, and can be written by simply pressing the specific key; and since the modern digraphs equal to separate rovás letters, they were encoded as 'uppercase' letters, i.e. in the space originally restricted for capitals. Thus, typing a lowercase g will produce the rovas character for the sound marked with Latin script g, but entering an uppercase G will amount to a rovás sign equivalent to a digraph gy in Latin-based Hungarian orthography. Just like the German runes, the Hungarian rovás writing appeared in Hungarian neopaganism as well. The runes sometimes also have a political undertone, as they are used by far-right groups in their propaganda or graffiti across Hungary.[citation needed] [edit] CharactersThe runic alphabet includes 42 letters.[8] Some consonants have two forms, for example, aS and eS. The 'a' form should be written after vowels a, á, o, ó, u, ú, while the 'e' form after e, ë, é, i, í, ö, ő, ü, ű.
The Hungarian runes also include some non-alphabetical runes which are not ligatures but separate signs. These are called capita dictionum. Further research is needed to define their origin and traditional usage. Some examples:
[edit] FeaturesOld Hungarian letters were usually written from right to left on sticks. Later, in Transylvania, they appeared on several media. Writings on walls also were right to left and not boustrophedon style (alternating direction right to left and then left to right). 
The numbers are almost the same as the Roman, Etruscan, and Chuvash numerals. Numbers of livestock were carved on tally sticks and the sticks were then cut in two lengthwise to avoid later disputes.
[edit] Text example
Interpretation in old Hungarian: "ÚRNaK SZÜLeTéSéTÜL FOGVÁN ÍRNaK eZeRÖTSZÁZeGY eSZTeNDŐBE MÁTYáS JÁNOS eSTYTáN KOVÁCS CSINÁLTáK MÁTYáSMeSTeR GeRGeLYMeSTeRCSINÁLTÁK G IJ A aS I LY LY LT A" (The letters actually written in the runic text are written with uppercase in the transcription.) Interpretation in modern Hungarian: "(Ezt) az Úr születése utáni 1501. évben írták. Mátyás, János, István kovácsok csinálták. Mátyás mester (és) Gergely mester csinálták [uninterpretable]" English translation: "(This) was written in the 1501st year of our Lord. The smiths Matthias, John (and) Stephen did (this). Master Matthias (and) Master Gergely did [uninterpretable]" [edit] Archeological findingsRune relics exist all over the territory of the Kingdom of Hungary, from Transdanubia to Transylvania. Only some of these:
[edit] Gallery
[edit] Notes
[edit] References
[edit] External links Wikimedia Commons has media related to:
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