The MACEDONIAN Language



Macedonian is a South Slavic language divided into two large groups, the western and the eastern Macedonian dialects. The Macedonian literary language was based on the central dialects of Veles, Prilep, and Bitola. The Cyrilic alphabet that the Macedonian language uses, was developed by the Macedonian brothers from Solun (Salonica), St.Cyril and St.Methodius (Sveti Kiril i Metodij), in the IX-th century. It was thought by their disciples (St.Kliment and St.Naum) at a monastery in Ohrid, Macedonia, whence it spread across the Eastern Slavic world.
Although both the Cyrilic and the Roman alphabet are widely known in Macedonia, Cyrilic is predominantly used. Main signs and street names are printed either in Cyrilic script only, or in both alphabets.

Pronounciation: The spelling of Macedonian is phonetically based: almost every word is written exactly as it is pronounced, and every letter of a word is pronounced. The stress accent varies in different situations and only one certain rule can be given - the last syllable of a word is never stressed.

There are 31 letters in the Macedonian alphabet:


Cyrilic
Roman
Pronounciation

A
'a' as in 'rather'

B
'b' as in 'brother'

V
'v' as in 'vodka'

G
'g' as in 'got'

D
'd' as in 'do'

Gj
as the dj sound in 'verdure'

E
the e sound in 'bear'

Zh
'zh' as in 'treasure'

Z
'z' as in 'zero'

Dz
'z' plus 'y'

I
'i' as in 'machine'

J
'y' as in 'young'

K
'k' as in 'keg'

L
'l' as in 'lad'

Lj
the 'ly' sound in 'colliery'

M
'm' as in 'map'

N
'n' as in 'no'

Nj
'ny' as in 'canyon'

O
'o' as in 'shawl'

P
'p' as in 'pop'

R
'r' as in 'rock'

S
's' as in 'loss'

T
't' as in 'too'

Kj
'k' plus 'y'

U
'oo' as in 'book'

F
'f' as in 'fat'

H
'h' as in 'hot'

C
'ts' as in 'cats'

Ch
'ch' as in 'chop'

Dzh
'j' as in 'just'

Sh
'sh' as in 'hush'

Greetings:
Hello (Hi)
Good Morning
Good Day
Good Night
See You Later (Goodbye)
Welcome
How are you?

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