Skills on AI

Locale Be 001

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Use when working with the Belarusian locale (`be-001`) — its endonym Беларуская, Cyrillic script, left-to-right (LTR) direction, or spoken-population data. Reference data and translation guidance (register, grammar, idiom, typography) for this specific locale; see [[locale]] for general i18n/l10n concepts (BCP 47, plural rules, RTL) that apply across all locales.

Reference data for the Belarusian locale — endonym Беларуская, written in the Cyrillic script, left-to-right (LTR).

Identifiers

  • BCP 47 tag: be-001
  • ISO 639-1: be
  • ISO 639-3: bel
  • Script: Cyrl (Cyrillic)
  • Region: 001 (World)
  • Text direction: ltr — left-to-right (LTR)

Speakers (approximate)

  • L1 (native): 5,000,000
  • L2 (additional): 1,300,000
  • L1+L2 (total): 6,300,000

Regional variants

This is the base/macro locale for Belarusian. Region-specific variants in this dataset:

Pluralization

CLDR plural categories for this locale: one, few, many, other (4 forms).

  • one — n % 10 = 1 and n % 100 != 11 (e.g. 1, 21, 31, 41, …)
  • few — n % 10 = 2..4 and n % 100 != 12..14 (e.g. 2~4, 22~24, 32~34, 42~44, …)
  • many — n % 10 = 0 or n % 10 = 5..9 or n % 100 = 11..14 (e.g. 0, 5~19, 100, 1000, …)
  • other — everything else

See Unicode Messageformat for writing plural messages using these categories.

Translating into this locale

Belarusian is an East Slavic language written in Cyrillic, with the letters і, ў, ’ (apostrophe). The official orthography is the 2008 version (so-called narkamaŭka), while the classical orthography (Taraškievica) is used in some communities and media. Choose the orthography before translating. See Locale Be By.

Translate ideas, not words.

  • Do not translate through Russian. Belarusian has its own vocabulary and grammar; Russian forms are errors.
  • Belarusian spelling reflects pronunciation: akanne (unstressed "о" written as "а": "вада", "малако") and yakanne ("я" in unstressed positions: "вясна"). Spell by the standard, not by the Russian form.
  • Re-express idioms by meaning.

Grammar.

  • Six cases (the vocative survives in some forms) and three genders.
  • Plurals: one, few, many, and other categories.
  • The letter ў (short u) replaces "в" or "л" in certain positions after a vowel: "у школе", "праўда".

Register.

  • "Вы" is the polite form; "ты" is informal. Use "вы" in UI and public text.

Orthography and typography.

  • Quotation marks «…»; decimal comma; non-breaking space for thousands; currency Belarusian ruble (Br); dates 17 кастрычніка 2026 г..
  • The apostrophe ’ appears in words like аб’ява. Do not replace it with Russian ъ.

Common pitfalls

  • Using Russian spelling or vocabulary.
  • Dropping ў or the apostrophe.
  • Mixing narkamaŭka and Taraškievica.
  • Translating through Russian.

Learn more

  • Locale for BCP 47 identifiers, locale-sensitive formatting, pluralization, and text-direction concepts that apply across all locales.
  • Unicode Messageformat for writing plural/selection messages correctly for this locale's grammar.
  • Правілы беларускай арфаграфіі і пунктуацыі (2008)
  • Yakub Kolas Institute of Linguistics, National Academy of Sciences of Belarus

View locale-be-001/SKILL.md on GitHub