Bello orthography

The Bello orthography or Chilean orthography was a Spanish-language orthography created by the Venezuelan linguist Andrés Bello and Juan García del Río, published in 1823. Part of the orthography was used officially for a time in Chile, and it influenced other Spanish-speaking countries. The aim of the orthography was a perfect correspondence between graphemes and phonemes. The reform did not succeed. Standard Spanish orthography as used for Latin American Spanish contains several homophones (⟨c⟩, ⟨k⟩, ⟨qu⟩; ⟨c⟩, ⟨s⟩, ⟨z⟩; ⟨g⟩, ⟨j⟩, ⟨x⟩; ⟨b⟩, ⟨v⟩; ⟨y⟩, ⟨ll⟩; ⟨i⟩, ⟨y⟩) or letters that represent more than one sound (⟨c⟩, ⟨g⟩, ⟨r⟩, ⟨x⟩, ⟨y⟩), and other variances (⟨h⟩; ⟨u⟩ after ⟨g⟩ and ⟨q⟩). Bello proposed several modifications that he believed should be undertaken in two stages:

  1. Substitute ⟨j⟩ for "strong" ⟨g⟩ sounds (jeneral, jinebra);
  2. Substitute ⟨z⟩ for "weak" ⟨c⟩ sounds (zerdo, zisma);
  3. Remove silent ⟨h⟩s (ombre) and the silent ⟨u⟩ of ⟨qu⟩- (qeso);
  4. Substitute ⟨i⟩ for ⟨y⟩s used as vowels (rei, i);
  5. Always write ⟨rr⟩ where a rolled ⟨r⟩ is pronounced (rrazón, alrrededor).
  1. Substitute ⟨q⟩ for "strong" c sounds (qasa);
  2. Remove the silent ⟨u⟩ in ⟨gu⟩- (gerra, ginda).

On October 17, 1843, Domingo Faustino Sarmiento (the Bello rector of the University of Chile) presented a project to the Faculty of Humanities and Philosophy: Report on American Orthography.[1]

On February 19, 1844, the Faculty judged the reform to be radical, but recommended some of Bello's ideas. The government of Chile followed this recommendation and that year introduced the following reforms:

  1. Substituting ⟨j⟩ for "strong" ⟨g⟩ sounds (jeneral, jinebra)
  2. Removing silent ⟨h⟩ (ombre);
  3. Substituting ⟨i⟩ for ⟨y⟩ used as vowels (rei, i);
  4. Writing ⟨s⟩ instead of ⟨x⟩ before consonants (testo).

The changes influenced Argentina, Ecuador, Colombia, Nicaragua, and Venezuela. With time, however, Spanish orthography returned to how it had been previously. The last country to return to standard orthography was Chile, where President Carlos Ibáñez del Campo established the use of RAE orthography in teaching and official documents in Decree No. 3,876 of July 20, 1927, going into effect on October 12, 1927.

The poet and Nobel Prize winner Juan Ramón Jiménez used an orthography similar to that of Bello in his work.

See also

Bibliography