# Georgian: names of the alphabet letters



## winenous

How do Georgians recite the aphabet, or spell out a word?

As a learner I have seen two different ways of pronouncing the letters: _a, be, ge, de_ etc (where the _e_ is the English shwa) and _an, ban, gan, don_, etc. And one place they seemed to put the letters in the nominative case: _ani, bani, gani, doni_, etc.

Many thanks for any help


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## AndrasBP

winenous said:


> or spell out a word?


I'm not sure about reciting the alphabet, but when spelling out a word, I've only heard the "schwa version".
I've seen a video where a Georgian guy teaches to count in Georgian and he spells out the numbers. He always said "e - kə - və - sə - i" (ekvsi), "shə - və - i - də - i" (shvidi), etc.


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## winenous

Thanks, AndrasBP. But that Georgian guy was presumably teaching foreigners? I too have usually heard the schwa version, but I am wondering if it is used mainly for teaching, so people also get to hear how the word in constructed in speech from its component letters? The _an, ban gan don_ comes from Beginner's Georgian, by Donna Kizira, BTW.

It also occurs to me that maybe Georgians don't recite the alphabet at all, and as the language is so phonetic maybe there is no need to explain to other Georgians how to spell other than by speaking clearly. I understand the latter happens in Spain when, rather than spelling one letter at a time, the Spanish word is sometimes just broken down into clear syllables.


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## Ruzanna

Georgians recite the alphabet, for example, it is taught how to recite it from the beginning till the end at school. They say in most cases a be ge de e v(schwa) z(schwa)..
An ban gan is also taught, but when asked it's more common to recite the first version.


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## AndrasBP

winenous said:


> But that Georgian guy was presumably teaching foreigners?


Yes, that's right.



winenous said:


> The _an, ban gan don_ comes from Beginner's Georgian, by Donna Kizira, BTW.


Just a minor correction: the author of the book is *Dodona Kiziria* (დოდონა კიზირია).


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## winenous

Thanks very much both, for the information, clarification, and correction. I shall stick with learning the "schwa version" from now. It also has the advantage of being simpler!


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