This page documents an English Wikipedia naming convention. It is a generally accepted standard that editors should attempt to follow, though it is best treated with common sense and the occasional exception. Any substantive edit to this page should reflect consensus. When in doubt, discuss first on the talk page.

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Main article: Wikipedia:Naming conventions

[edit] Explanations and area of application

This table is a proposed romanization of the Armenian alphabet to be used throughout the English language Wikipedia. It aims to provide Wikipedia with a single system for all articles using proper names, words or sentences in Eastern Armenian language; while Western Armenian language uses the same letters, they can be pronounced differently, and another romanization system has to be used for them. However, for transcriptions of proper names, apart from other Armenian text, it is Wikipedia's general convention to follow English usage, where it exists; this may frequently mean using -ian instead of the systematic -yan as a name ending.

Different transliteration systems exist. They are detailed in Romanization of Armenian. For example, the name of the President of the Republic of Armenia, Ռոբերտ Քոչարյան, can be transliterated either Ṙobert K’očaryan using ISO 9985, or R¯obert K‘och‘aryan using Hübschmann-Meillet's system, or Rrobert K’och’aryan using BGN/PCGN romanization, and so on.

Those transliteration systems are not commonly used in publications, newspapers, encyclopedias; each source uses its own transcription method. There is no official system. The same example as above is transcribed Robert Kocharian in the website of the presidency, but often Robert Kocharyan in the website of the government.

The system presented here is close to the common English spelling. It's based on BGN/PCGN with one exception: ը is rendered by ë and not by y which renders the consonant յ only. This system can be used in every page involving a transcribed Armenian sentence or text. But a simplified version can be used for the transcription of common or proper names or article titles. For example, Մեր Հայրենիք will be transcribed Mer Hayrenik in the article's title and Mer Hayrenik’ in the text of the song itself.

[edit] Transliteration

For Modern Armenian, the preferred standard is ISO 9985:

In linguistic literature on Classical Armenian, the commonly used transliteration is that of Hübschmann-Meillet (1913):

(note the differing conventions marked in boldface)

[edit] Loose transcription

Note: all the given examples are first names.

[edit] Notes

1. ^ The letter Ո, ո is pronounced o at the beginning of two words: ով (ov) and ովքեր (ovk’er). Thus the transcription for those two words is o.
2. ^ ^{a b} The letter Ր, ր never occurs at the beginning of a word (but the letter Ռ, ռ does), except in rare foreign words or "foreign looking" chosen names, for example the pen name of poet Րաֆֆի (Raffi). In Eastern Armenian pronunciation, the distincrtion between ր and ռ is no more heard. Thus most usual transcription sytems of Armenian transcribe ռ and ր by a single r with no distinction.
3. ^ ^{a b} The letter Ւ, ւ, once the 34th letter of the Armenian alphabet, is no longer used in the modern Eastern Armenian alphabet; ու and և are considered independent letters . ՈՒ and ԵՎ are used in words written in block capitals, Ու and Եվ are used as the first letter of lower case words beginning with a capital, and ու and և are lower case.

[edit] See also

• Armenian Alphabet
• Romanization of Armenian