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Writing Systems Technical Resources

Unicode Status for Hebrew

In The Unicode Standard, Hebrew Script implementation is discussed in Chapter 9 Middle East-I — Modern and Liturgical Scripts.

Hebrew script was first encoded in The Unicode Standard version 1.0. The script is encoded in the following blocks:

BlocksCharacter RangeAdded in Unicode VersionUnicode Chart
Hebrew0590..05FF1.0U0590.pdf
Alphabetic Presentation FormsFB10..FB4F1.1UFB00.pdf

Subsequent to version 1.1, the following characters have been added to the Hebrew script:

CharactersUnicode VersionDocumentation
0591..05A12.0
05A24.1n2692.pdf/L2/03-443
05A3..05AF2.0
05BA5.0n2840.pdf/L2/04-310
05C42.0
05C5..05C64.1n2714.pdf/L2/04-089
05C74.1n2755.pdf/L2/04-150
05EF11.0L2/16-305

Documentation refers to ISO Working Group and Unicode proposals

A number of proposals for its inclusion have been submitted to the Unicode Technical Committee and WG2:

  • 1995-05-21 Further clarifications regarding WG2 N1195 — The Standards Institution of Israel (SII) (WG2 N1217 (not online))

  • 1996-12-15 Hebrew alphabet coded character set for bibliographic information interchange — The following 13 standards were provided by Randall Barry (LoC) for synchronization with ISO/IEC 19646 (L2/98-192 (not online))

  • 1997-05-11 Name for the character coded FB1D — The Standards Institution of Israel (WG2 N1557 (not online))

  • 1998-02-05 Table of replies to DIS 8859-8 - Latin Hebrew — SC2/WG3 N428 (L2/98-120 (not online))

  • 1998-05-09 Proposal to add the Hebrew Tetragrammaton to ISO/IEC 10646 — Mark E. Shoulson; Michael Everson (WG2 N1740, N1740w97 (not online), L2/98-198 (not online))

  • 1998-05-25 Additional Hebrew cantillation characters for the UCS — Michael Everson (WG2 N1749 (not online), L2/98-216 (not online))

  • 1998-07-06 Application for Registration No.219, Hebrew alphabet coded character set for bibliographic information interchange, part 1 — NB Ireland (L2/98-242 (not online))

  • 1998-07-06 Application for Registration No.220,Hebrew alphabet coded character set for bibliographic information interchange, part 2 — NB Ireland (L2/98-243 (not online))

  • 1998-07-07 Israeli Response to the Tetragrammaton Proposal, N 1740 — Jonathan Rosenne (WG2 N1807, WG2 N1807.txt, WG2 N1807.doc, WG2 N1807w97.doc)

  • 1998-09-12 Responses to NCITS/L2 and Unicode Consortium comments on numerous proposals — Michael Everson (WG2 N1847)

  • 1999-07-24 On the apostrophe and quotation mark, with a note on Egyptian transliteration characters — Michael Everson (WG2 N2043, L2/99-246)

  • 2000-12-06 Hebrew cantillation marks and their encoding — Helmut Richter (L2/00-427 (not online))

  • 2000-12-22 Arguments for adding U+FB1D to the Composition Exclusion list — Peter Constable (L2/01-008)

  • 2001-01-18 Supporting Martin Dürst’s proposal in L2/01-004 (add U+FB1D to the composition exclusion list) — Jonathan Rosenne (L2/01-038)

  • 2001-01-28 YOD WITH HIRIQ — Martin Dürst (L2/01-077)

  • 2002-05-02 Documents for the Discussion of Bibliographic Character Sets — Cathy Wissink (L2/02-189)

  • 2003-06-09 Proposal to Encode Alternative Characters for Biblical Hebrew — Peter Constable, John Hudson, Eli Evans, Kent Richards, Paul Nelson, Ralph Hancock, Kirk Lowery (L2/03-195)

  • 2003-07-18 E-mail: “A threat to the integrity of the Hebrew language?” — Peter Kirk (L2/03-227)

  • 2003-08-05 More on Meteg and CGJ (1) — Ken Whistler (L2/03-234)

  • 2003-08-05 More on Meteg and CGJ (2) — Ken Whistler (L2/03-235)

  • 2003-08-05 More on Meteg and CGJ (3) — Ken Whistler (L2/03-236)

  • 2003-08-13 E-mail to ANSI regarding Hebrew encoding — Elaine Keown (L2/03-261)

  • 2003-08-18 E-mail re: Unicode Collation Algorithm: 4.0 — Mati Allouche (L2/03-263)

  • 2003-08-24 Hebrew Issues - DRAFT 2003-08-24 — Jony Rosenne (L2/03-297)

  • 2003-08-25 Issues in the Representation of Pointed Hebrew in Unicode — Peter Kirk (L2/03-299)

  • 2003-12-11 Proposal to add Atnah Hafukh to the BMP of the UCS — Mark Shoulson, Peter Kirk, Michael Everson (WG2 N2692, L2/03-443)

  • 2004-03-04 Proposal to add two Masoretic punctuation marks to the BMP of the UCS — Mark Shoulson, Peter Kirk, John Hudson, Michael Everson, Peter Constable (WG2 N2714, L2/04-089)

  • 2004-04-15 Application for Registration No. 234, Latin/Hebrew character set for 8 bit codes (SC2-N3728) — Israel N B (L2/04-243)

  • 2004-05-03 Proposal to add QAMATS QATAN to the BMP of the UCS — Michael Everson, Mark Shoulson (WG2 N2755, L2/04-150)

  • 2004-06-05 On the Hebrew vowel Holam — Peter Kirk (L2/04-193)

  • 2004-06-05 On the Hebrew mark Meteg — Peter Kirk (L2/04-194)

  • 2004-06-07 Responses to Several Hebrew Related Items — Jony Rosenne (L2/04-213)

  • 2004-07-17 Proposal to add Babylonian Pointing to ISO 10646 — Elaine Keown (WG2 N2759, WG2 N2839, L2/04-162)

  • 2004-07-20 Registration No. 234, Latin/Hebrew character set for 8 bit codes — SC2 (L2/04-334)

  • 2004-07-29 Proposal to add Hebrew Point Holam Haser For Vav — Michael Everson, Mark Shoulson (WG2 N2840, L2/04-310)

  • 2004-07-29 Background material for the proposal on the Hebrew vowel HOLAM — Peter Kirk (L2/04-306)

  • 2004-07-29 New proposal on the Hebrew vowel HOLAM — Peter Kirk, Avi Shmidman, John Cowan, Ted Hopp, Trevor Peterson, Kirk Lowery, Elaine Keown, Stuart Robertson (L2/04-307)

  • 2004-08-02 Response to “Proposal to add HEBREW POINT HOLAM HASER FOR VAV” to the BMP of the UCS (L2/04-310) — Peter Kirk (L2/04-313)

  • 2004-08-02 UTC - Holam proposals — Jony Rosenne (L2/04-326)

  • 2004-08-03 Distinction of Vav Haluma and Holam Male — John Hudson (L2/04-327)

  • 2004-08-12 Proposal to change the provisional code point allocations for proposed characters HEBREW POINT HOLAM HASER FOR VAV and HEBREW POINT QAMATS QATAN — Peter Kirk (L2/04-346)

  • 2004-08-18 Disunification costs regarding HOLAM and VAV in Hebrew — Michael Everson, Mark Shoulson (WG2 N2844, L2/04-344)

  • 2006-04-06 Konstantinov comment on Hebrew Maqaf — Ilya Konstantinov (L2/06-104)

  • 2006-10-16 Yiddish Digraphs — Mark Davis (L2/06-333)

  • 2012-02-02 Proposal for additional annotations for some modifier letters used for transliteration of Hebrew — Karl Pentzlin (WG2 N4281, L2/12-065)

  • 2012-07-29 Handling fake Gershayim and Garesh in Hebrew words (UAX #29) — Mark Davis (L2/12-283)

  • 2012-11-03 Sorting all RTL scripts together — Roozbeh Pournader (L2/12-377)

  • 2013-11-01 Prevent line break between ‘/’ and Hebrew letter — Peter Edberg (L2/13-211)

  • 2015-03-10 Typographic Concerns and the Hebrew Nomina Sacra — Mark Shoulson (L2/15-092)

  • 2016-04-18 Proposal of an additional character to the Hebrew Unicodes: Sheva Na — Eliezer May (L2/16-086)

    • Recommendations to UTC #147 May 2016 on Script Proposals — Deborah Anderson, Ken Whistler, Roozbeh Pournader, Andrew Glass, Laurentiu Iancu (L2/16-156) (See section 3 for recommendations)

    • UTC #147 Minutes (L2/16-121) (See C.11 for decision and action items)

  • 2016-10-28 Proposal to add HEBREW YOD TRIANGLE to ISO/IEC 10646 — Mark E. Shoulson (L2/16-305)

    • Recommendations to UTC #150 January 2017 on Script Proposals (L2/17-037) (See point 16.)

    • UTC #150 Minutes (L2/17-016) (See C.12 for decision and action items)

  • 2019-04-28 SBL Hebrew Font User Manual (Font version 1.50) — John Hudson (L2/19-183)

    • Recommendations to UTC #159 April-May 2019 on Script Proposals (L2/19-173) (See point 8.)

    • UTC #159 Minutes (L2/19-122) (See C.19 for decision and action items)

  • 2020-03-27 Proposal to fix Hebrew in UAX #14 by ruling out LB21a..b — Marcel Schneider (L2/20-087)

  • 2024-12-05 Proposal to encode Hebrew Point Sheva Na — Jonathan Mosesson (L2/24-274)

    • Recommendations to UTC #182 January 2025 on Script Proposals (L2/25-010) (See point 1.2.)

    • UTC #182 Minutes (L2/25-003) (See D.1 1.2 for decision and action items)