Swedish alphabet

Template:Short description Template:Use mdy dates Template:Use American English Template:IPA notice The Swedish alphabet (Template:Langx) is a basic element of the Latin writing system used for the Swedish language. The 29 letters of this alphabet are the modern 26-letter basic Latin alphabet (Template:Vr to Template:Vr) plus Template:Vr, Template:Vr, and Template:Vr, in that order. It contains 20 consonants and 9 vowels (Template:Vr). The Latin alphabet was brought to Sweden along with the Christianization of the population, although runes continued in use throughout the first centuries of Christianity, even for ecclesiastic purposes, despite their traditional relation to the Old Norse religion. The runes underwent partial "latinization" in the Middle Ages, when the Latin alphabet was completely accepted as the Swedish script system, but runes still occurred, especially in the countryside, until the 18th century, and were used decoratively until mid 19th century.

Letters

The pronunciation of the names of the letters (that does not necessarily coincide with the sounds the letters represent) is as follows:

Letter		Name
A	a
B	b
C	c
D	d
E	e
F	f

Letter		Name
G	g
H	h
I	i
J	j
K	k
L	l

Letter		Name
M	m
N	n
O	o
P	p
Q	q
R	r

Letter		Name
S	s
T	t
U	u
V	v
W	w
X	x

Letter		Name
Y	y
Z	z
Å	å
Ä	ä
Ö	ö

Å, Ä and Ö

In addition to the 26 letters of the ISO basic Latin alphabet, A through Z, the Swedish alphabet includes Å, Ä, and Ö at the end. They are distinct letters in Swedish and are sorted after Template:Vr.

Uncommon letters

The letter Template:Vr is rare. Template:Vr was common in ordinary words before 1889, when its replacement by Template:Vr was allowed. Since 1900, only the forms with Template:Vr are listed in dictionaries. Some proper names kept their Template:Vr despite the change to common words: Qvist, Quist, Husqvarna, Quenby, Quinby, Quintus, Quirin and Quirinus. Other uses include some loanwords that retained Template:Vr, including queer, quisling, squash, and quilting; student terms such as gasque; and foreign geographic names like Qatar.

The letter Template:Vr is rare. Before the 19th century, Template:Vr was interchangeable with Template:Vr (Template:Vr was used in Fraktur, Template:Vr in Antiqua). Official orthographic standards since 1801 use only Template:Vr for common words. Many family names kept their Template:Vr despite the change to common words. Foreign words and names bring in uses of Template:Vr, particularly combinations with webb for (World Wide) Web. Swedish sorting traditionally and officially treated Template:Vr and Template:Vr as equivalent, so that users would not have to guess whether the word, or name, they were seeking was spelled with a Template:Vr or a Template:Vr. The two letters were often combined in the collating sequence as if they were all Template:Vr or all Template:Vr, until 2006 when the 13th edition of Svenska Akademiens ordlista (The Swedish Academy's Orthographic Dictionary) declared a change. Template:Vr was given its own section in the dictionary, and the Template:Vr = Template:Vr sorting rule was deprecated. This means Swedish books printed before 2006 would group Template:Vr with Template:Vr in the index, and most Swedish software published before 2006 would treat the two as variations of a single character when sorting text.

The letter Template:Vr is rare, used in names and a few loanwords such as "zone". Template:Vr historically represented . By 1700, this had merged with . As a result, Template:Vr was replaced by Template:Vr in 1700. Template:Vr was instead used in loanwords for historical . Template:Vr is the second least used letter in Swedish, before Template:Vr.

Foreign letters

The characters Template:Vr (which is used only in a few rare non-integrated loanwords such as , from French) and Template:Vr (used in some integrated loanwords like and , and in some surnames such as or ) are recognised but regarded as variants of Template:Vr and Template:Vr, respectively.

The umlauted Template:Vr is recognised but is only used in names of German origin, and in German loanwords such as . It is otherwise treated as a variant of Template:Vr and is called "German Template:Vr".

For foreign names, Template:Vr and many others might be used, but are usually converted to Template:Vr, etc.

The letters Template:Vr and Template:Vr, used in Danish and Norwegian, are considered variants of Template:Vr and Template:Vr, and are collated as such. Unlike letters with diacritics like Template:Vr, Template:Vr, Template:Vr, etc. Template:Vr and Template:Vr are not easily available on Swedish keyboards, and are thus often replaced with Template:Vr and Template:Vr. The news agency TT follows this usage because some newspapers have no technical support for Template:Vr and Template:Vr, although there is a recommendation to use Template:Vr and Template:Vr. The letter Template:Vr was used in earlier Swedish script systems, when there was in general more similarity between the Scandinavian languages.

The ligature Template:Vr, used in Latin as a variant of Template:Vr, is used in some Swedish surnames. It is then considered equivalent with Template:Vr and collated accordingly. However, sometimes it is collated as Template:Vr: in the 14th edition of the Svenska Akademiens ordlista, the words (from the surname Læstadius) are sorted between and .

Handwritten cursive alphabet

File:Svssfb.jpg

Swedish handwritten alphabet

The Swedish traditional handwritten alphabet is the same as the ordinary Latin cursive alphabet, but the letters Template:Vr and Template:Vr are written by connecting the dots with a curved line, identical to a tilde Template:Vr, hence looking like Template:Vr and Template:Vr. In text the dots should be clearly separated, but in handwriting writers frequently replace them with a macron Template:Vr: Template:Vr, Template:Vr.

Sound–spelling correspondences

Vowels

Letter	Pronunciation (IPA)		Notes
	Long	Short
a
e			Some speakers distinguish two short sounds: and . The former sound is usually spelled Template:Vr, but some words exceptionally have Template:Vr, among them words with Template:Vr, numerals, proper names and their derivations, and loanwords. Before 1889, Template:Vr for and was also used for many other words, in particular words with Template:Vr now spelled Template:Vr. The sound at the end of loanwords and in the last syllable of Swedish surnames is represented by Template:Vr.
i
o	,	,	The phoneme is relatively infrequent; short Template:Vr more often represents . Long Template:Vr usually represents in native words.
u
y
å			Most words with and some words with are spelled with Template:Vr.
ä			Some words with are spelled with Template:Vr.
ö			The short Template:Vr is, in some dialects, pronounced as .

Short vowels are followed by two or more consonants; long vowels are followed by a single consonant, by a vowel or are word-final.

Consonants

Grapheme	Sound (IPA)	Notes
b
c	,	before front vowels Template:Vr (not used before Template:Vr), otherwise (not used before Template:Vr). The letter Template:Vr alone is used only in loanwords (usually in the value) and proper names, but Template:Vr is a normal representation for after a short vowel (as in English and German).
ch	,	In loanwords. The conjunction (and) is pronounced or .
d
dj
f
g	,	before front vowels Template:Vr, otherwise
gj
gn	,	word-initially; elsewhere
h
hj
j
k	,	before front vowels Template:Vr except for a , otherwise
kj
l
lj
m
n
ng
p
r		Is pronounced as in some words. Considerable dialectal variation, often pronounced as an approximant or fricative . Southern dialects are noted for their uvular realization of ; that is, a uvular trill , a fricative or , or an approximant .
rd
rl
rn
rs
rt
s
sj
sk	,	before front vowels Template:Vr and in the words and , otherwise
skj
stj
t
tj
v		Before 1906, Template:Vr and final Template:Vr were also used for . Now these spellings are used in some proper names.
w		Rarely used (loanwords, proper names). In loanwords from English, may represent .
x
z		Only used in loanwords and proper names.

Spellings for the Template:Vr-phoneme

Due to several phonetic combinations coalescing over recent centuries, the spelling of the Swedish sje-sound is very eclectic. Some estimates claim that there are over 50 possible different spellings of the sound, though this figure is disputed. Garlén (1988) gives a list of 22 spellings (Template:Vr, Template:Vr, Template:Vr, Template:Vr, Template:Vr, Template:Vr, Template:Vr, Template:Vr, Template:Vr, Template:Vr, Template:Vr, Template:Vr, Template:Vr, Template:Vr, Template:Vr, Template:Vr, Template:Vr, Template:Vr, Template:Vr, Template:Vr, Template:Vr, Template:Vr), but many of them are confined to only a few words, often loanwords, and all of them can correspond to other sounds or sound sequences as well. Some spellings of the sje-sound are as follows:

• Template:Vr in most French loanwords, but in final position often respelled Template:Vr. English loanwords with this spelling usually use the tje-sound
• Template:Vr in words mainly from French, for example (generous) and (generous, posh, stylish)
• Template:Vr mostly in the end of the word in many French loanwords, like garage, prestige
• Template:Vr in for example (religious)
• Template:Vr in French loanwords, e.g. (jalousie window)
• Template:Vr in (fascinate)
• Template:Vr in all positions in many German loanwords, like ("chess")
• Template:Vr in all positions in many English loanwords
• Template:Vr in many native Swedish words
• Template:Vr in native Swedish words before the front vowels Template:Vr
• Template:Vr in five words only, four of which are enumerated in the phrase (In just his shirt he pushes the vehicle into the shed). The fifth word is (shear). It is also used in an old word (Eurasian magpie) and dialectic derivations of the same
• Template:Vr in four words only: , , ,
• Template:Vr in three words only: , , . These are not common and are often pronounced as . All of them are compound words: väst+göte (person from Västergötland) öst+göte (person from Östergötland) and gäst+giveri (inn)
• Template:Vr occurs only in the words , , , , the place-name Kristianstad, and in the pronunciation of the name Christian when used about Danish kings
• Template:Vr in five words only, all enumerated in the phrase (It is easier to steal a stalk than to overturn a star with your behind)
• Template:Vr, Template:Vr, Template:Vr () in many words of Latin origin, e. g. , (in a few of these words, the sje-sound is preceded by a , e. g. , ); also Template:Vr for is used before vowels in some adjective derivations (e. g. , )
• Template:Vr for the sequence occurs only in the place-name Växjö

See also

• Swedish orthography
• Swedish phonology
• Swedish Dialect Alphabet
• Danish orthography
• Finnish orthography
• German orthography
• Icelandic orthography
• Norwegian orthography
• Runes (fuþark, or futhark)
• Swedish Braille