Unified Northern Alphabet (Kola Sámi)

The Unified Northern Alphabet is the result of a systematic study by the Institute of the Peoples of the North, starting in 1926. The alphabet was used ca. 1932–1937, before being replaced by a Cyrillic spelling. A subset of the Unified Northern Alphabet forms a common orthography for the three Sámi languages spoken on the Kola Peninsula.

Scripts
Latin, Cyrillic
ISO 639-2
smi
Status
Official
Debut
1933
Cutoff
1935

This orthography was used by Zakhary Efimovich Chernyakov in the 1933 Kola Sámi ABC Book, Saam̦ Bukvaŗ.Chernyakov, 1933. A dedicated Kildin Sámi primer followed in 1934, written by Petr Nikolaevich Ƶuļov.Ƶuļov, 1934. The same year, Natalia Popova’s arithmetic textbook was published in Kildin Sámi,Popova, 1934. as well as a translation of L. Saveļjev’s Koht jemne miļt vьjet ("How People Travel the Land").Saveļjev, 1934. A translation of Evgeny Charushin’s Jeljes poak jemnen (“Animals of Hot Countries”)Charushin, 1935. came out in 1935.Kert, 1975, p. 210.

Literature

Charushin, E. (1935). Jeljes poak jemnen [Animals of Hot Countries]. Ogiz-Detgiz. Retrieved 20 September 2026 from fennougrica.kansalliskirjasto.fi

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Chernyakov, Z.E. (1933). Saam̦ Bukvaŗ [Sami ABC Book]. Uꞓpedgiz.

Davidov, I.D., Alkor, P.Y. (Eds.). (1932). Материалы 1 Всесоюзной Конференции по развитию языков и письменности народов Севера [Proceedings of the 1st All-Union Conference on the Development of Languages and Writing of the Peoples of the North]. Institute of the Peoples of the North. Retrieved 20 September 2026 from archive.org

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Kert, G. M. (1975). Saamskij jazyk [Sámi language]. In V. ‎Lytkin (Ed.), Osnovy finno-ugorskogo jazykoznanija. Pribaltijsko-finskie, saamskij i mordovskie jazyki, pp. 203–247. Akademija Nauk SSSR, Institut Jazukoznanija.

Partanen, N., Rießler, M. (2019). An OCR system for the Unified Northern Alphabet. ACL Anthology. Retrieved 20 September 2026 from aclanthology.org

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Popova, N. S. (1934). Olhьs̷ s̷kola varas arifmetika: opnuvәm kniga: vәsmus pieļ: vәsmus egk opnuvmus [Arithmetic textbook: for primary school: part one: first year of study]. Uꞓpedgiz. Retrieved 20 September 2026 from fennougrica.kansalliskirjasto.fi

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Saveļjev, L. (1934). Koht jemne miļt vьjet [How people travel on earth]. Ogiz-Antmuꞩ Paŗn Literatura. Retrieved 20 September 2026 from fennougrica.kansalliskirjasto.fi

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Ƶuļov, P.N. (1934). Kniga logkɘm guejka: vɘsmus pieļ vɘsmus egest opnuvmus [Reading book: Part 1: 1st Grade]. Rațkmus Uꞓpedgizɘst. Retrieved 20 September 2026 from fennougrica.kansalliskirjasto.fi

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