Cyrillic

A name applied to the written characters of Slavonian and Wall a chi an , ascribed to Const an tine the philosopher, known as St. Cyril, the apostle of the Slaves, circa 850 A.D. ⁂ These characters are chiefly taken from the Greek, with many additions, and the number of distinct characters exceeds forty. The Ru ian alphabet is derived from it, but is simpler.     G. R.   The name is also used for Old Bulgarian , the ecclesiastical dialect of Old Slavonic . See Church-Slavic . Czech , see Bohemian .