Urdu/Alphabet

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The Urdu alphabet is derived from the Persian (Farsi) and the Arabic alphabet, where majority of the letters are borrowed from Arabic while only four alphabets are primarily borrowed from Persian. Very seldom, letters may be borrowed from Sanskrit. Even though the letters actually are inherited from these languages, the names used for these letters differ in some cases, for instance, letters ‘bay’ and ‘tay’ in Urdu are called only ‘baa’ and ‘taa’ in Arabic.

In Urdu, composition of alphabets based on three formations, former or pre (ترکیبِ سابق) , after (ترکیبِ لاحق) and parallel (ترکیبِ طرفین). For example, in با, the formation of Aliph (ا) with Bay (ب) is pre formation (ترکیبِ سابق) [1].

Below is a table of all the Urdu letters along with their names and the phonetic pronunciation of their names. It is also specified as to which language the letter is borrowed from and the respective keys to press on a keyboard. For the purposes of following the text in this book, Latin alternatives are provided with the alphabet.

Alphabet	Name	Phonetic pronunciation	Origin	Keyboard	Voice
ا	Aliph	pronounced [əlɪf]	Arabic	J	Vowel
ب	Bay	pronounced [beː]	Arabic	I	Labial
پ	Pay	pronounced [peː]	Persian	Y	Labial
ت	Tay; with soft ‘t’	pronounced [t̪eː]	Arabic	U	Dental
ٹ	Tay; with hard ‘T’	pronounced [ʈeː]	Sanskrit	Shift + U	Retroflex
ث	Thay; colloquially ‘say’	pronounced [s·eː]	Arabic	Shift + T	Dental
ج	Jeem	pronounced [dʒ·iːm]	Arabic	O	Palatal
چ	Chay	pronounced [tʃ·eː]	Persian	Shift + O	Palatal
ح	Hay	pronounced [heː]	Arabic	P	Aspirated
خ	Khay	pronounced [xeː]	Arabic	Shift + P	Velar
د	Daal; with soft ‘d’	pronounced [d̪aːl]	Arabic	R	Dental
ڈ	Daal; with hard ‘D’	pronounced [ɖaːl]	Sanskrit	Shift + R	Retroflex
ذ	Dhaal; colloquially ‘zaal’	pronounced [zaːl]	Arabic	Shift + E	Aspirated
ر	Ray	pronounced [reː]	Arabic	D	Semi-vowel
ڑ	Ray; with very guttural ‘r’	pronounced [ɽeː]	Sanskrit	Shift + D	Hard retroflex
ز	Zay	pronounced [zeː]	Arabic	Shift + S	Aspirated
ژ	Zhay; much like ‘si’ in ‘vision’	pronounced [ʒeː]	Persian	Shift + A	Aspirated
س	Seen	pronounced [siːn]	Arabic	V	Dental aspirated
‎‎ش	Sheen	pronounced [ʃ·iːn]	Arabic	B	Dental aspirated
ص	Suaad	pronounced [sʊ̈·aːd̪]	Arabic	W	Velar aspirated
ض	Dhuaad; colloquially ‘zuaad’	pronounced [zʊ̈·aːd̪]	Arabic	Shift + W	Velar aspirated
ط	Toay'n	pronounced [t̪oːẽː]	Arabic	Q	Dental velar
ظ	Zoay'n	pronounced [zoːẽː]	Arabic	Shift + Q	Velar aspirated
ع	Ain; guttural ‘a’	pronounced [aːiːn]	Arabic	M	Velar vowel
غ	Ghain; hoarse guttural ‘g’ followed by a hollow ‘h’	pronounced [ɣaːiːn]	Arabic	N	Strong velar aspirated
ف	Fay	pronounced [feː]	Arabic	X	Aspirated
ق	Quaaf; ‘Qu’ is pronounced only as ‘k’	pronounced [kaːf]	Arabic	Z	Velar
ک	Kaaf	pronounced [kaːf]	Arabic	K	Velar
گ	Gaaf	pronounced [gaːf]	Persian	Shift + K	Velar
ل	Laam	pronounced [laːm]	Arabic	G	Dental
م	Meem	pronounced [miːm]	Arabic	A	Labial
ن	Noon	pronounced [nuːn]	Arabic	F	Palatal
ں	Noon ghuna; nasal equivalent of ‘noon’ used to specify that the previous vowel is a nasal one	pronounced [nuːn ɣʊ̈naː]	Arabic	Shift + F	Palatal nasal
و	Vao; as you'd say “wow”	pronounced [vaːoː]	Arabic	S	Vowel/semi-vowel
ہ	Hay	pronounced [heː]	Arabic	H	Aspirated
‍‌ء	Hamza	pronounced [həmzaː]	Arabic	Shift + H	Palatal nasal
ی	Chhoti yeh; literally meaning ‘small yeh’	pronounced [yeː]	Arabic	L	Vowel
ے	Bari yeh; literally meaning ‘big yeh’	pronounced [yeː]	Arabic	C	Vowel

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