Armenian orthography reform in the context of "Soviet Armenia"

The Armenian alphabet (Armenian: Հայոց գրեր, romanized: Hayocʼ grer or Հայոց այբուբեն, Hayocʼ aybuben) or, more broadly, the Armenian script, is an alphabetic writing system developed for Armenian and occasionally used to write other languages. It was developed around 405 AD by Mesrop Mashtots, an Armenian linguist and ecclesiastical leader. The script originally had 36 letters. Eventually, two more were adopted in the 13th century. In the reformed Armenian orthography (1920s), the ligature և, ev, is also treated as a letter, bringing the total number of letters to 39.

The Armenian word for 'alphabet' is այբուբեն, aybuben, named after the first two letters of the Armenian alphabet: ⟨Ա⟩ այբ, ayb, and ⟨Բ⟩ բեն, ben. Armenian is written horizontally, left to right.

Hrachia Acharian (Armenian: Հրաչեայ Աճառեան, reformed spelling: Հրաչյա Աճառյան; pronounced [həɾɑt͡ʃʰˈjɑ ɑt͡ʃɑrˈjɑn]; 8 March 1876 – 16 April 1953) was an Armenian linguist, lexicographer, etymologist, and philologist.

An Istanbul Armenian, Acharian studied at local Armenian schools and at the Sorbonne, under Antoine Meillet, and the University of Strasbourg, under Heinrich Hübschmann. He then taught in various Armenian communities in the Russian Empire and Iran before settling in the Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic in 1923, working at Yerevan State University until his death.

Classical Armenian orthography, traditional orthography or Mashtotsian orthography (Հայերէնի դասական ուղղագրութիւն in classical orthography and Հայերենի դասական ուղղագրություն in reformed orthography, Hayereni tasagan ughakrutyun), is the orthography that was developed by Mesrop Mashtots in the 5th century for writing Armenian and reformed during the early 20th century. Today, it is used primarily by the Armenian diaspora, including all Western Armenian speakers and Eastern Armenian speakers in Iran, which has rejected the Armenian orthography reform of Soviet Armenia during the 1920s. In the Armenian diaspora, some linguists and politicians allege political motives behind the reform of the Armenian alphabet.

Classical Armenian orthography uses 38 letters: the original 36 letters of the Armenian alphabet invented by Mesrop Mashtots during the 5th century, and the 2 additional letters included later in the Armenian alphabet during the Middle Ages.