Cyrillic alphabet of the Preslav school
Alfabeto cirílico de la escuela de Preslav
- Date
- c. 890-910 · confidence low
- Place
- Veliki Preslav, Shumen, Bulgaria
- Credited to
- Preslav Literary School (circle of Constantine of Preslav and Clement of Ohrid)
- People
- 👤 Clemente de Ohrid840–916👤 Constantino de Preslav900–1000👤 Naum de Preslav830–910
- Field
- Knowledge & symbols
⚠️ Disputed: the sources disagree.
What it is
An alphabet based on Greek uncial, with extra letters for Slavic sounds, developed in the First Bulgarian Empire around 900 and gradually replacing Glagolitic. It is the origin of today's Cyrillic scripts.
Authorship is debated: it is attributed to Clement of Ohrid, to Constantine of Preslav or to a circle of disciples, and not to Cyril, who created only Glagolitic. The date is approximate (the oldest inscriptions, from Preslav, are c. 893-921). It is kept separate from the Kraków entry, which concerns the first printing types.
What it led to
- the Cyrillic scripts of Russian, Serbian, Bulgarian and many other languages
- books printed in Cyrillic from 1491
- official alphabet of Church Slavonic in Bulgaria, Serbia and Rus'