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An inscription of Swampy Cree using Canadian Aboriginal Syllabics, an abugida developed by Christian missionaries for Aboriginal Canadian languages

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An abugida (from Ge‘ez አቡጊዳ ’äbugida) is a segmental writing system in which each letter (basic character) represents a consonant accompanied by a specific vowel; other vowels are indicated by modification of the consonant sign, either by means of diacritics or through a change in the form of the consonant. In some abugidas, the absence of a vowel is indicated overtly. About half the writing systems in the world, including the extensive Brahmic system used for most Indo-Aryan languages, are abugidas. Image File history File links Emblem-important. ... Image File history File links Example. ... The Brahmic family is a family of abugidas (writing systems) used in South Asia, Southeast Asia, Tibet, Mongolia, Manchuria, descended from the BrāhmÄ« script of Mauryan India. ... The UTF-8-encoded Japanese Wikipedia article for mojibake, as displayed in ISO-8859-1 encoding. ... Image File history File linksMetadata Download high-resolution version (1365x453, 386 KB) Inscription en langue crie au dialecte des plaines, se trouvant dans le parc La Fourche à Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. ... Image File history File linksMetadata Download high-resolution version (1365x453, 386 KB) Inscription en langue crie au dialecte des plaines, se trouvant dans le parc La Fourche à Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. ... Swampy Cree is spoken by people from northern Manitoba, and Western Ontario. ... Note: This page or section contains IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. ... Image File history File links Kielitynkäkuva. ... Writing systems of the world today. ... Writing systems evolved in the Early Bronze Age (late 4th millennium BC) out of neolithic proto-writing. ... In typography, a grapheme is the atomic unit in written language. ... A list of writing systems (or scripts), classified according to some common distinguishing features. ... ABCs redirects here. ... The first five letters of the Phoenician abjad, from right to left An abjad, sometimes also called a consonantary or consonantal alphabet, is a type of writing system in which there is one symbol per consonantal phoneme. ... A syllabary is a set of written symbols that represent (or approximate) syllables, which make up words. ... Egyptian hieroglyphs, which have their origins as logograms. ... This article or section does not adequately cite its references or sources. ... A Chinese character. ... Note: This article contains special characters. ... In linguistics (and phonetics), segment is used primarily “to refer to any discrete unit that can be identified, either physically or auditorily, in the stream of speech” (after A Dictionary of Linguistics & Phonetics, David Crystal, 2003, pp. ... Writing systems of the world today. ... In articulatory phonetics, a consonant is a sound in spoken language that is characterized by a closure or stricture of the vocal tract sufficient to cause audible turbulence. ... Note: This page contains IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. ... Example of a letter with a diacritic A diacritic or diacritical mark, also called an accent, is a small sign added to a letter to alter pronunciation or to distinguish between similar words. ... The Brahmic family is a family of abugidas (writing systems) used in South Asia, Southeast Asia, Tibet, Mongolia, Manchuria, descended from the BrāhmÄ« script of Mauryan India. ... The Indo-Aryan languages form a subgroup of the Indo-Iranian languages, which belong to the Indo-European family of languages. ...

The term abugida is taken from a Ge'ez name for its own fidel script, derived from its first four letters aləf, bet, gäməl, dənt, or A B G D (based on the ancestral West Semitic character order). This order also corresponds to the Greek alphabet order (Α, Β, Γ, Δ), much like the word alphabet is derived from the Greek names of their first two letters, alpha, beta. Note: This article contains special characters. ... Note: This article contains special characters. ... 14th century BC diplomatic letter in Akkadian, found in Tell Amarna. ... The Greek alphabet (Greek: ) is an alphabet consisting of 24 letters that has been used to write the Greek language since the late 8th or early 8th century BC. It was the first alphabet in the narrow sense, that is, a writing system using a separate symbol for each vowel...

The Ge'ez term "abugida" was adopted into English as a linguistic term by Peter T. Daniels. According to him, an abugida is to be contrasted with a syllabary, where symbols with consonants or vowels in common show no particular resemblance to each another, but also to be contrasted with an alphabet proper, where independent letters are used to denote consonants and vowels. Less formally, both abugidas and alphabets proper may be referred to as "alphabets". Peter T. Daniels is a scholar of writing systems. ... A syllabary is a set of written symbols that represent (or approximate) syllables, which make up words. ... ABCs redirects here. ...

Others, however, consider abugidas to be syllabaries, "semi-syllabaries", or "alpha-syllabaries".

Description

A 19th century manuscript in the Devanagari script

There are three principal families of abugidas, which function somewhat differently. The best known is the Brahmic family of India and Southeast Asia, in which vowels are marked with diacritics and syllable-final consonants, when they occur, are indicated with ligatures, diacritics, or with a special vowel-canceling mark. In the Ethiopic family, vowels are marked by modifying the shapes of the consonants, and one of these pulls double duty for final consonants. In the Cree family, vowels are marked by rotating or flipping the consonants, and final consonants are indicated with either special diacritics or superscript forms of the main initial consonants. Download high resolution version (1161x1125, 419 KB)Rigveda MS in Sanskrit on paper, India, early 19th c. ... Download high resolution version (1161x1125, 419 KB)Rigveda MS in Sanskrit on paper, India, early 19th c. ... The Brahmic family is a family of abugidas (writing systems) used in South Asia, Southeast Asia, Tibet, Mongolia, Manchuria, descended from the Brāhmī script of Mauryan India. ... Example of a letter with a diacritic A diacritic or diacritical mark, also called an accent, is a small sign added to a letter to alter pronunciation or to distinguish between similar words. ... The word ligature can mean more than one thing. ... Note: This article contains special characters. ... Note: This page or section contains IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. ...

Indic abugidas contrast vowels through marks (diacritics) around the consonants. Most overtly mark a consonant for the lack of a vowel as well; without a diacritic, a default vowel (usually [a]) is understood. Vowel diacritics may appear above, below, to the left, or to the right of the consonant, or may even surround it.

In many of the Brahmic scripts, a syllable beginning with a cluster is treated as a single character for purposes of vowel marking, so a vowel marker like ि -i, falling before the character it modifies, may appear several positions before the place where it is pronounced. For example, the game cricket in Hindi is क्रिकेट krikeţ; the diacritic for /i/ appears before the consonant cluster /kr/, not before the /r/. A more unusual example is seen in the Batak alphabet: Here the syllable bim is written ba-ma-i-(virama). That is, the vowel diacritic and virama are both written after the consonants for the whole syllable. Rigveda manuscript in Devanagari (early 19th century) DevanāgarÄ« (देवनागरी — in English pronounced ) (ISCII – IS13194:1991) [1] is an abugida alphabet used to write several Indian languages, including Sanskrit, Hindi, Marathi, Kashmiri, Sindhi, Bihari, Bhili, Konkani, Bhojpuri and Nepali from Nepal. ... Note: This page or section contains IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. ... Note: This page or section contains IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. ... This article is about the sport. ... Hindi (हिन्दी) is a language spoken mainly in North and Central India. ... In linguistics, a consonant cluster is a group of consonants which have no intervening vowel. ... The Batak alphabet is a type of alphabet called an abugida that is used to write the Batak languages of northern Sumatra, an Austronesian language spoken by about three million people on the Indonesian island of Sumatra. ...

In many abugidas, there is also a diacritic to suppress the inherent vowel, yielding the bare consonant. In Devanagari, क् is k, and ल् is l. This is called the virama in Sanskrit, or halant in Hindi. It may be used to form consonant clusters, or to indicate that a consonant occurs at the end of a word. For text information processing on computer, other means of expressing these functions include special conjunct forms in which two or more consonant characters are merged to express a cluster, such as Devanagari: क्ल kla. (Note that on some fonts display this as क् followed by ल, rather than forming a conjunct. This expedient is used by ISCII and South Asian scripts of Unicode.) Thus a closed syllable such as kal requires two akshara to write. Rigveda manuscript in Devanagari (early 19th century) DevanāgarÄ« (देवनागरी — in English pronounced ) (ISCII – IS13194:1991) [1] is an abugida alphabet used to write several Indian languages, including Sanskrit, Hindi, Marathi, Kashmiri, Sindhi, Bihari, Bhili, Konkani, Bhojpuri and Nepali from Nepal. ... Virama is a generic term for the diacritic character in many Brahmic scripts that is used to suppress an inherent vowel sound that occurs with every consonant character. ... Sanskrit ( , for short ) is a classical language of India, a liturgical language of Hinduism, Buddhism, Sikhism, and Jainism, and one of the 23 official languages of India. ... Hindi (DevanāgarÄ«: or , IAST: , IPA:  ), an Indo-European language spoken all over India in varying degrees and extensively in northern and central India, is one of the 22 official languages of India and is used, along with English, for central government administrative purposes. ... In linguistics, a consonant cluster is a group of consonants which have no intervening vowel. ... This article is about the machine. ... ISCII (Indian Script Code for Information Interchange) is a coding scheme for representing various Indic scripts as well as a Latin-based script with diacritic marks used to depict Romanised Indic languages. ... The Unicode Standard, Version 5. ...

In Ethiopic, which gave us the word abugida, the diacritics have fused to the consonants to the point that they must be considered modifications of the form of the letters. Children learn each modification separately, as in a syllabary; nonetheless, the graphic similarities between syllables with the same consonant is readily apparent, unlike the case in a true syllabary. The Geez language (or Giiz language) is an ancient language that developed in the Ethiopian Highlands of the Horn of Africa as the language of the peasantry. ...

In the family of abugidas known as Canadian Aboriginal Syllabics, vowels are indicated by changing the orientation of the akshara. For example, Inuktitut ᐱ pi, ᐳ pu, ᐸ pa; ᑎ ti, ᑐ tu, ᑕ ta. In Canadian syllabics it is not possible to distinguish a basic or default vowel, unlike Indic abugidas. Bare consonants are indicated either by separate raised letters, or by superscript versions of the aksharas; there is no vowel-killer mark. Note: This page or section contains IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. ... Akshara is the Sanskrit term for what can be roughly translated as alphabet. ...

The Róng script used for the Lepcha language goes further than other Indic abugidas, in that a single akshara can represent a closed syllable: Not only the vowel, but any final consonant is indicated by a diacritic. For example, the syllable [sok] would be written as something like s̥̽, here with an underring representing /o/ and an overcross representing the diacritic for final /k/. Most other Indic abugidas can only indicate a very limited set of final consonants with diacritics, such as /ŋ/ or /r/, if they can indicate any at all. The Lepcha script (also known as Róng or Róng-Ríng) is used by the Lepcha people to write the Lepcha language. ... Lepcha (ISO/DIS 639-3: lep) is a language spoken by the Lepcha community in Sikkim in India, and parts of Nepal and Bhutan. ...

Examples

The Ge'ez script, an abugida of Ethiopia

Examples of abugidas include the various scripts of the Brahmic family, Ethiopic Ge'ez, and Canadian Aboriginal Syllabics. Download high resolution version (519x768, 138 KB) Wikipedia does not have an article with this exact name. ... Download high resolution version (519x768, 138 KB) Wikipedia does not have an article with this exact name. ... Note: This article contains special characters. ... The Brahmic family is a family of abugidas (writing systems) used in South Asia, Southeast Asia, Tibet, Mongolia, Manchuria, descended from the Brāhmī script of Mauryan India. ... Note: This article contains special characters. ... Note: This page or section contains IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. ...

A typical abugida is Devanagari, in which Hindi is written. There is no basic sign representing the consonant k; rather the unmodified letter क represents the syllable ka; the a is not marked on the symbol, and thus is the so-called inherent vowel. The vowel may be changed by adding vowel marks (diacritics) to the basic character, producing other syllables beginning with k-, such as कि ki, कु ku, के ke, को ko. These diacritics are applied to other consonant characters for other syllables. For example, from ल la is formed लि li, लु lu, ले le, लो lo. Such a consonant with either an inherent or marked vowel is called an akshara. Rigveda manuscript in Devanagari (early 19th century) DevanāgarÄ« (देवनागरी — in English pronounced ) (ISCII – IS13194:1991) [1] is an abugida alphabet used to write several Indian languages, including Sanskrit, Hindi, Marathi, Kashmiri, Sindhi, Bihari, Bhili, Konkani, Bhojpuri and Nepali from Nepal. ... Hindi (DevanāgarÄ«: or , IAST: , IPA:  ), an Indo-European language spoken all over India in varying degrees and extensively in northern and central India, is one of the 22 official languages of India and is used, along with English, for central government administrative purposes. ... An inherent vowel is part of an abugida script. ... Example of a letter with a diacritic A diacritic or diacritical mark, also called an accent, is a small sign added to a letter to alter pronunciation or to distinguish between similar words. ... Akshara is the Sanskrit term for what can be roughly translated as alphabet. ...

Though now an abugida, the Ge'ez alphabet was actually an abjad until the 4th century AD. In the Ge'ez abugida, the form of the letter itself may be altered. For example, ሀ hä (basic form), ሁ hu (with a right-side diacritic that does not alter the letter), ሂ hi (with a subdiacritic that compresses the letter, so that the whole fidel occupies the same amount of space), ህ hə (where the letter is modified with a kink in the left arm). Note: This article contains special characters. ... The first five letters of the Phoenician abjad, from right to left An abjad, sometimes also called a consonantary or consonantal alphabet, is a type of writing system in which there is one symbol per consonantal phoneme. ... As a means of recording the passage of time, the 4th century was that century which lasted from 301 to 400. ...

Special features

The Pahawh Hmong script represents both consonants and vowels with full letters. However, the graphic order is vowel-consonant even though they are pronounced as consonant-vowel. This is rather like the /o/ vowel in the Indic abugidas. Pahawh Hmong is unusual in that, while the inherent vowel /au/ is unwritten, so is the inherent consonant /k/. For the syllable /kau/, which requires one or the other of the inherent sounds to be overt, it is /au/ that is written. That is, a Pahawh akshara appears to be a vowel with an inherent consonant rather than the other way around. The Pahawh Hmong script is an alphabet writing system for the Hmong language invented by Shong Lue Yang in 1959. ...

It is difficult to draw a dividing line between abugidas and other segmental scripts. For example, the Meroitic script of ancient Sudan did not indicate an inherent a (one symbol stood for both m and ma, for example), and is thus similar to Brahmic family abugidas. However, the other vowels were indicated with full letters, not diacritics or modification, so the system was essentially an alphabet that did not bother to write the most common vowel. In linguistics (and phonetics), segment is used primarily “to refer to any discrete unit that can be identified, either physically or auditorily, in the stream of speech” (after A Dictionary of Linguistics & Phonetics, David Crystal, 2003, pp. ... The Meroitic script is an alphabet of Egyptian (Hieroglyphic) origin used in Kingdom of Meroë. Some scholars, e. ...

Thaana is also like an abugida in that vowels are marked with diacritics. However, all vowels are marked, as is the absence of a vowel; there is no inherent vowel. Normally no letter may occur without a diacritic. That is, it is equivalent to an abjad with obligatory vowel marking, like the Arabic alphabet as used for Kurdish in Iraq, as is thus essentially alphabetic. Note that it developed among a population that was already literate with an abugida for their language. Thaana (written ‎ in Thaana) is the writing system for the Dhivehi language spoken in the Maldives. ... The first five letters of the Phoenician abjad, from right to left An abjad, sometimes also called a consonantary or consonantal alphabet, is a type of writing system in which there is one symbol per consonantal phoneme. ... The Arabic alphabet is the script used for writing languages such as Arabic, Persian, Urdu, and others. ... The Kurdish language (Kurdish: Kurdî or کوردی) is the language spoken by Kurds. ...

Several systems of shorthand use diacritics for vowels, but they do not have an inherent vowel, and are thus more similar to Thaana and Kurdish than to the Brahmic scripts. The Gabelsberger shorthand system and its derivatives modify the following consonant to represent vowels. The Pollard script, which was based on shorthand, also uses diacritics for vowels; the placements of the vowel relative to the consonant indicates tone. Shorthand is an abbreviated, symbolic writing method that improves speed of writing or brevity as compared to a normal method of writing a language. ... Gabelsberger shorthand, named for its creator Franz Xaver Gabelsberger, is a form of shorthand previously common in Germany. ... The Pollard script, also known as Pollard Miao, is an abugida or writing system invented by Methodist missionary Sam Pollard. ... Some web browsers may not be able to view this correctly; you may see transcriptions in parentheses after the character, like this: () instead of on top of the character as intended. ...

Evolution

An example of Brāhmī script - Ashoka's Major Rock Edict at Girnar.

As the term alphasyllabary suggests, abugidas have been considered an intermediate step between alphabets and syllabaries. Historically, abugidas appear to have evolved from abjads (vowelless alphabets). They contrast with syllabaries, where there is a distinct symbol for each syllable or consonant-vowel combination, and where these have no systematic similarity to each other, and typically develop directly from logographic scripts. Compare the Devanagari examples above to sets of syllables in the Japanese hiragana syllabary: か ka, き ki, く ku, け ke, こ ko have nothing in common to indicate k; while ら ra, り ri, る ru, れ re, ろ ro have neither anything in common for r, nor anything to indicate that they have the same vowels as the k set. http://www. ... http://www. ... Ashokas Major Rock Edict is one of the most important Edicts of Ashoka, and is located outside the town of Junagadh on the Saurashtra peninsula in the state of Gujarat, India. ... Girnar (also known as Girnar Hill) is a collection of mountains in the Junagadh District of Gujarat, India. ... ABCs redirects here. ... A syllabary is a set of written symbols that represent (or approximate) syllables, which make up words. ... The first five letters of the Phoenician abjad, from right to left An abjad, sometimes also called a consonantary or consonantal alphabet, is a type of writing system in which there is one symbol per consonantal phoneme. ... Egyptian hieroglyphs, which have their origins as logograms. ... Hiragana ) is a Japanese syllabary, one component of the Japanese writing system, along with katakana and kanji; the Latin alphabet is also used in some cases. ...

Most Indian and Indochinese abugidas appear to have first evolved from abjads with the Kharoṣṭhī and Brāhmī scripts; the abjad in question is usually considered to be the Aramaic one, but while the link between Aramaic and Kharosthi is more or less undisputed, this is not the case with Brahmi. The Kharosthi family does not survive today, but Brahmi's descendants include most of the modern scripts of South and Southeast Asia. Although Ge'ez derived from a different abjad, one theory is that its evolution into an abugida may have been influenced by Christian missionaries from India. The KharoṣṭhÄ« script, also known as the GāndhārÄ« script, is an ancient alphabetic script used by the Gandhara culture of historic northwest India to write the Gandhari and Sanskrit languages (the Gandhara kingdom was located along the present-day border between Afghanistan and Pakistan between the Indus... BrāhmÄ« refers to the pre-modern members of the Brahmic family of scripts. ... Bilingual inscription (Greek and Aramaic) by the Indian emperor Ashoka the Great, 3rd century BC. The Aramaic alphabet is an abjad alphabet designed for writing the Aramaic language. ... Map of South Asia (see note on Kashmir). ... Location of Southeast Asia Southeast Asia is a subregion of Asia. ...

Other types of writing systems

• Abjad
• Alphabet
• Logogram
• Syllabary

The first five letters of the Phoenician abjad, from right to left An abjad, sometimes also called a consonantary or consonantal alphabet, is a type of writing system in which there is one symbol per consonantal phoneme. ... ABCs redirects here. ... Egyptian hieroglyphs, which have their origins as logograms. ... A syllabary is a set of written symbols that represent (or approximate) syllables, which make up words. ...

Partial list of abugidas

A list of writing systems (or scripts), classified according to some common distinguishing features. ...

True abugidas

• Brahmic family, descended from Brāhmī (c. 6th century BC)
  • Ahom
  • Balinese
  • Balti
  • Batak
  • Baybayin, pre-colonial script of Tagalog and other Philippine languages
  • Bengali
  • Box-head a script in India
  • Bugis also known as Makassar or Lontara
  • Buhid, used by Mangyans in Mindoro, Philippines
  • Burmese
  • Chalukya
  • Cham
  • Chola
  • Devanagari (used to write Nepali, Sanskrit, Pali, modern Hindi, Marathi etc.)
  • Dehong Dai
  • Grantha
  • Gujarati
  • Gurmukhi script
  • Hanuno'o, a script used by Mangyans in Mindoro, Philippines
  • Javanese script
  • Kadamba
  • Kaithi
  • Kannada
  • Khmer
  • Lanna
  • Lepcha
  • Limbu
  • Lao (before spelling reforms)
  • Malayalam
  • Manipuri
  • Modi used to write Marathi
  • Oriya
  • Old Kawi progenitor of Indonesian and Philippine scripts
  • Pallavi
  • Phags-Pa created for Kublai Khan's Yuan China
  • Ranjana
  • Redjang
  • Sharda
  • Siddham used to write Sanskrit
  • Sinhala
  • Sorang Sompeng
  • Sourashtra
  • Soyombo
  • Syloti Nagri
  • Tagbanwa in Palawan, Philippines
  • Tai Dam
  • Tamil
  • Telugu
  • Thai
  • Tibetan
  • Tirhuta used to write Maithili
  • Tocharian - extinct
  • Varang Kshiti
  • Vatteluttu aka round script
• Kharoṣṭhī (extinct), from the 3rd century BC
• Ge'ez (Ethiopic), from the 4th century AD
• Canadian Aboriginal Syllabics
  • Cree-Ojibwe Syllabics
  • Inuktitut Syllabics
  • Blackfoot Syllabics
  • Carrier Syllabics

The Brahmic family is a family of abugidas (writing systems) used in South Asia, Southeast Asia, Tibet, Mongolia, Manchuria, descended from the BrāhmÄ« script of Mauryan India. ... BrāhmÄ« refers to the pre-modern members of the Brahmic family of scripts. ... The Ahoms established the Ahom kingdom (1228-1826) in parts of present-day Assam and ruled it for nearly 600 years. ... Basic signs of the Balinese script The Balinese alphabet is a type of alphabet called an abugida that was used to write the Balinese language, an Austronesian language spoken by about three million people on the Indonesian island of Bali. ... Balti can refer to: BălÅ£i - a city and county in Moldavia Balti dynasty - a branch of the ancient Visigoths Balti language - a language spoken in Baltistan in Kashmir Balti - Muslims of Tibetan origin from Baltistan Balti - a style of food devised in Birmingham in England Balti - an eating... Batak designates two distinct peoples, one living in Indonesia, the other in the Philippines. ... Baybayin (sometimes called Alibata) is a pre-Hispanic Tagalog writing system that originated from the Javanese script Kavi. ... Tagalog (pronunciation: ) is one of the major languages of the Republic of the Philippines. ... It has been suggested that Robert B. Wray be merged into this article or section. ... This article is about ethnic groups of South Sulawesi. ... Buhid (ᝊᝓᝑᝒ), or Mangyan, is an indigenous Brahmic script of the Philippines, and is used today by the Mindoro people to write Tagalog, the national language of the Philippines. ... Beach in Northern Mindoro Mindoro is the seventh-largest island in the Philippines. ... The Chalukya dynasty (Kannada: ಚಾಲುಕ್ಯರು) was a powerful Indian royal dynasty that ruled large parts of southern and central India between the 6th and the 12th century C.E. They began to assert their independence at the decline of the Satavahana empire and rapidly rose to prominence during the reign of... Cham can mean the following: a Jewish variant spelling of Ham a people living in Northern Greece of Albanian descent, also spelled as Çam: see Cham Albanians. ... The Cholas were the most famous of the three dynasties that ruled ancient Tamil Nadu. ... Rigveda manuscript in Devanagari (early 19th century) DevanāgarÄ« (देवनागरी — in English pronounced ) (ISCII – IS13194:1991) [1] is an abugida alphabet used to write several Indian languages, including Sanskrit, Hindi, Marathi, Kashmiri, Sindhi, Bihari, Bhili, Konkani, Bhojpuri and Nepali from Nepal. ... Nepali (Khaskura) is an Indo-Aryan language spoken in Nepal, Bhutan, and some parts of India and Myanmar (Burma). ... Sanskrit ( , for short ) is a classical language of India, a liturgical language of Hinduism, Buddhism, Sikhism, and Jainism, and one of the 23 official languages of India. ... Pāli is a Middle Indo-Aryan dialect or prakrit. ... Hindi (हिन्दी) is a language spoken mainly in North and Central India. ... Marathi (मराठी ) is an Indo-Aryan language spoken by the Marathi people of western India. ... Grantha (from Sanskrit ग्रन्थ grantha meaning book or manuscript) is an ancient script that was prevalent in South India. ... The Gujarāti script (ગુજરાતી લિપિ GujÇŽrātÄ« Lipi), which like all NāgarÄ« writing systems is strictly speaking an abugida rather than an alphabet, is used to write the Gujarati and Kutchi languages. ... The Gurmukhi (ਗੁਰਮੁਖੀ) script, derived from the Landa alphabet and standardised by Guru Angad Dev in the 16th century, was designed to write the Punjabi language (ਪੰਜਾਬੀ). ... Beach in Northern Mindoro Mindoro is the seventh-largest island in the Philippines. ... Javanese script is the script that Javanese is originally written in (not to be confused with Javascript, which is a programming language). ... An ancient royal family of Karnataka, who ruled from their capital of Banavasi, later branched into Goa, Hanagal and Chandavar. ... Wikipedia does not have an article with this exact name. ... Note: This page or section contains IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. ... This article or section uses Khmer characters which may be rendered as boxes or other nonsensical symbols. ... Lanna (English One Million Thai Rice Fields, Thai: ) was a kingdom in the north of Thailand around the city of Chiang Mai. ... The Lepcha (population: 50,000) are the aboriginal inhabitants of present day Sikkim. ... The Limbu (meaning: archer) or Yakthumba are an ethnic group that belong to the Kiranti group or Kirat confederation that includes the Rai and Sunuwar who are believed to be the descendants of the ancient Mongolian people and are still known as Mongolians in Nepal. ... The Malayalam script is an abugida of the Brahmic family, used to write the Malayalam language. ... See: Manipuri (People Of Manipur) Manipuri (Meiteilon Language) Manipuri (Bishnupriya Language This is a disambiguation page, a list of pages that otherwise might share the same title. ... Wikipedia does not have an article with this exact name. ... Marathi (मराठी ) is an Indo-Aryan language spoken by the Marathi people of western India. ... The Oriya script is used to write the Oriya language. ... Old Kawi is the oldest Kawi script used on Bali in 775 AD. It is written on palm leaves. ... In Indian classical music pallavi is the thematic line of a song. ... The Mongolian language historically has four writing systems that have been used over the centuries. ... Sharda was a playback singer in Hindi films in the 60s and 70s. ... Siddham (Sanskrit सिद्धम्, accomplished or perfected) — is the name of a North Indian script used for writing Sanskrit. ... Sanskrit ( , for short ) is a classical language of India, a liturgical language of Hinduism, Buddhism, Sikhism, and Jainism, and one of the 23 official languages of India. ... The Sinhala script is used to write the Sinhala language. ... Sora (also Saora, Saonras, Shabari, Sabar, Saura, Savara, Sawaria, Swara, Sabara) is a Munda language of India, spoken by some 288,000 native speakers (1997) in South Orissa, mainly in the Ganjam District, but also in the Koraput and Phulbani districts; other communities exist in Andhra Pradesh (Srikakulam District), Madhya... Sourashtra (alternate names and spellings: Palkar, Sowrashtra, Saurashtra, Saurashtri, Patnuli) is an Indo-Aryan language spoken in parts of the Southern Indian State of Tamil Nadu. ... The Soyombo script was created by Bogdo Zanabazar, a Mongolian monk and scholar, in 1686. ... Sylheti Nagari is the original script used for writing the Sylheti language. ... Tagbawna is one of the indigenous writing systems of the Philippines. ... Tai Dam is a Tai language spoken in Vietnam, Laos, Thailand, and China (mostly in Jinping 金平). It is called paːsaː tai dam ภาษาไทดำ (Black Tai) in Thai and DÇŽidānyÇ” 傣担语 in Chinese. ... Note: This page or section contains IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. ... Telugu script, an abugida from the Brahmic family of scripts, is used to write Telugu, a Dravidian Language found in the Southern Indian state of Andhra Pradesh as well as several other neighboring states. ... The Thai alphabet is used to write the Thai language and other minority languages in Thailand. ... This article or section is in need of attention from an expert on the subject. ... Mithilakshar (also known as Tirhuta) is the traditional script of the Maithili language, which is is spoken in the Indian state of Bihar and eastern Nepal. ... Maithili (मैथिली MaithilÄ«) is a language of the family of Indo-Aryan languages, which are part of the Indo-Iranian branch of the Indo-European languages. ... Tocharian is one of the most obscure branches of the Indo-European language group. ... To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ... An example of the Vatteluttu script from an inscription by Rajaraja Chola I at the Brihadisvara temple in Thanjavur. ... The KharoṣṭhÄ« script, also known as the GāndhārÄ« script, is an ancient alphabetic script used by the Gandhara culture of historic northwest India to write the Gandhari and Sanskrit languages (the Gandhara kingdom was located along the present-day border between Afghanistan and Pakistan between the Indus... Note: This article contains special characters. ... Note: This page or section contains IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. ... Cree syllabics are the variations on Canadian Aboriginal Syllabics that are used to write Cree language dialects. ... The Ojibwe language is an Algonquian American Indian language spoken throughout the Great Lakes region and westward onto the northern plains. ... The Inuktitut syllabary (Inuktitut: ᑎᑎᕋᐅᓯᕐᒃ ᓄᑖᕐᒃ titirausiq nutaaq) is a writing system used by Inuit people in Nunavut and in Nunavik, Quebec. ... Blackfoot is the name of any of the Algonquian languages spoken by the Blackfoot tribe of Native Americans, who currently live in the northwestern plains of North America. ...

Abugida-like scripts

• Meroitic (extinct)
• Thaana
• Pitman shorthand
• Pollard script

The Meroitic script is an alphabet of Egyptian (Hieroglyphic) origin used in Kingdom of Meroë. Some scholars, e. ... Thaana (written ‎ in Thaana) is the writing system for the Dhivehi language spoken in the Maldives. ... Pitman Shorthand is a system of shorthand for the English language developed by Sir Isaac Pitman (1813–1897), who first presented it in 1837. ... The Pollard script, also known as Pollard Miao, is an abugida or writing system invented by Methodist missionary Sam Pollard. ...

External links

• Syllabic alphabets - Omniglot's list of abugidas, including examples of various writing systems
• [1] - list of abugidas and other scripts (in Spanish)

v • d • e Writing systems
Overview	History of writing · Graphemes ·
Lists	List of writing systems · List of languages by writing system · List of writing systems by number of native users · List of languages by first written accounts · List of undeciphered writing systems · List of inventors of writing systems
Types	Abjads (Numerals) Aramaic · Arabic · Hebrew · Jawi · Nabatean · Pahlavi · Phoenician · Proto-Canaanite · Psalter · Sabaean · Samaritan · South Arabian · Sogdian · Syriac · Tifinagh · Ugaritic Abugidas Brahmic family: Ahom · Balinese · Batak · Baybayin · Brāhmī · Buhid · Burmese · Chakma · Cham · Devanāgarī · Dhives Akuru · Eastern Nagari · Grantha · Gujarati · Gupta · Gurmukhī · Hanunó'o · Javanese · Kadamba  · Kaithi · Kalinga · Kannada · Khmer · Lanna · Lao · Lepcha · Limbu · Lontara · Malayalam · Meitei Mayek · Mithilakshar · Modi · Mon · Nāgarī · Nepal  · Old Kawi · Old Sundanese · Oriya · Pallava · Phagspa · Ranjana · Rejang · Śāradā · Saurashtra · Sinhala · Siddhaṃ · Soyombo · Sundanese · Sylheti Nagari · Tagbanwa · Tai Dam · Tai Le · Takri · Tamil · Telugu · Thai · Tibetan · Tocharian · Varang Kshiti Other: Boyd's Syllabic Shorthand · Canadian Aboriginal · Ge'ez · Hebrew cursive · Japanese braille · Kharosthi · Meroitic · Pitman Shorthand · Pollard script · Sorang Sompeng · Thaana · Thomas Natural Shorthand Alphabets Linear: Arabic · Armenian · Avestan · Beitha Kukju · Coptic · Cyrillic · Eclectic Shorthand · Elbasan · Fraser · Gabelsberger shorthand · Georgian · Glagolitic · Gothic · Gregg Shorthand · Greek · Greco-Iberian alphabet · Hangul · International Phonetic · Latin · Manchu · Mandaic · Mongolian · Neo-Tifinagh · N'Ko · Ogham · Ol Chiki · Old Hungarian · Old Italic · Old Permic · Orkhon · Osmanya · Runic · Shavian alphabet · New Tai Lue · Bassa Vah · Visible Speech · Zhùyīn fúhào · Pahawh Hmong Non-linear: Braille · Hebrew braille · Korean braille · Maritime flags · Morse code · New York Point · Semaphore line · Flag semaphore Ideo- & Pictograms Blissymbol · DanceWriting · Dongba · Mi'kmaq · New Epoch Notation Painting · SignWriting Logograms Egyptian consonant-based: Demotic · Hieratic · Hieroglyphs Syllable-based: Anatolian · Cuneiform  · Dongba script · Maya · Tangut script · Yi Chinese-based: Chinese characters (Traditional · Simplified) · Chữ Nôm · Hanja · Geba · Jurchen · Kanji · Khitan · Zhuang Writing systems of the world today. ... Writing systems evolved in the Early Bronze Age (late 4th millennium BC) out of neolithic proto-writing. ... In typography, a grapheme is the atomic unit in written language. ... Image File history File links Kielitynkäkuva. ... A list of writing systems (or scripts), classified according to some common distinguishing features. ... . ... This is a list of languages by first written accounts which consists of the approximate dates for the first written accounts that are known for various languages. ... Wikipedia does not yet have an article with this exact name. ... This is a chronological list of any individuals, legendary or real, who are purported by traditions to have invented alphabets or other writing systems, whether this is proven or not. ... A list of writing systems (or scripts), classified according to some common distinguishing features. ... The first five letters of the Phoenician abjad, from right to left An abjad, sometimes also called a consonantary or consonantal alphabet, is a type of writing system in which there is one symbol per consonantal phoneme. ... The Abjad numerals are a decimal numeral system which was used in the Arabic-speaking world prior to the use of the Hindu-Arabic numerals from the 8th century, and in parallel with the latter until Modern times. ... Bilingual inscription (Greek and Aramaic) by the Indian emperor Ashoka the Great, 3rd century BC. The Aramaic alphabet is an abjad alphabet designed for writing the Aramaic language. ... The Arabic alphabet is the script used for writing languages such as Arabic, Persian, Urdu, and others. ... Note: This article contains special characters. ... It has been suggested that this article or section be merged with Yawi. ... The Nabatean alphabet is a consonantal alphabet (abjad) that was used by the Nabateans in the 2nd century BC. Important inscriptions are found in Petra. ... The Pahlavi script was used broadly in the Sasanid Persian Empire to write down Middle Persian for secular, as well as religious purposes. ... The Phoenician alphabet is a continuation of the Proto-Canaanite alphabet, by convention taken to begin with a cut-off date of 1050 BCE. It was used by the Phoenicians to write Phoenician, a Northern Semitic language. ... The Proto-Canaanite alphabet is an abjad of twenty-plus acrophonic glyphs, which is found in Levantine texts of the Late Bronze Age (from ca. ... The Samaritan alphabet is a direct descendant of the paleo-Hebrew variety of the Phoenician alphabet, the more commonly known Hebrew alphabet having been adapted from the Aramaic alphabet under the Persian Empire. ... The ancient South Arabian alphabet (also known as musnad) branched from the Proto-Sinaitic alphabet in ca. ... The Sogdian alphabet is derived from Syriac, the descendant script of Aramaic alphabet. ... 11th century book in Syriac Serto. ... This article needs to be cleaned up to conform to a higher standard of quality. ... The Ugaritic alphabet is a cuneiform version of the Levantine consonant alphabet (abjad), used from around 1300 BC for the Ugaritic language, an extinct Canaanite language discovered in Ugarit, Syria. ... The Brahmic family is a family of abugidas (writing systems) used in South Asia, Southeast Asia, Tibet, Mongolia, Manchuria, descended from the BrāhmÄ« script of Mauryan India. ... Basic signs of the Balinese script The Balinese alphabet is a type of alphabet called an abugida that was used to write the Balinese language, an Austronesian language spoken by about three million people on the Indonesian island of Bali. ... Baybayin (sometimes called Alibata) is a pre-Hispanic Tagalog writing system that originated from the Javanese script Kavi. ... Variation of BrāhmÄ« with dates. ... An indigenous Brahmic script of the Philippines. ...   The Eastern (Vietnamese) Cham Writing Script The Cham alphabet is used to write Cham, an Austronesian language spoken by the Cham people in Vietnam and Cambodia. ... () is an abugida script used to write several Indo-Aryan languages, including Sanskrit, Hindi, Gujarati,Marathi, Sindhi, Bihari, Bhili, Marwari, Konkani, Bhojpuri, Pahari (Garhwali and Kumaoni), Santhali, Nepali, Newari, Tharu and sometimes Kashmiri and Romani. ... This page meets Wikipedias criteria for speedy deletion. ... The Kanai Baraxiboa rock inscription near Guwahati. ... Grantha (Punjabi , Tamil , from Sanskrit ग्रन्थ grantha meaning book or manuscript) is an ancient script that was prevalent in South India. ... The Gujarati script (ગુજરાતી લિપિ GujarātÄ« Lipi), which like all NāgarÄ« writing systems is strictly speaking an abugida rather than an alphabet, is used to write the Gujarati and Kutchi languages. ... The Gupta script was used for writing Sanskrit and is associated with the Gupta Empire of India which was a period of material prosperity and great religious and scientific developments. ... The GurmukhÄ« (ਗੁਰਮੁਖੀ) script is derived from the Later Sharada script and was standardized by the second Sikh guru, Guru Angad Dev, in the 16th century for writing the Punjabi language. ... Javanese script is the script that Javanese is originally written in (not to be confused with Javascript, which is a programming language). ... The Kadamba script marks the birth of a dedicated Kannada script that was used for Kannada language. ... Wikipedia does not have an article with this exact name. ... Note: This page or section contains IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. ... This article or section uses Khmer characters which may be rendered as boxes or other nonsensical symbols. ... Kham Mueang in its own alphabet The Northern Thai language or Kham Mueang (คำเมือง) is the language of the Thai Yuan people of Lannathai, Thailand. ...   Lepcha script is used by the Lepcha people. ... The Limbu alphabet, or Kirat-Sirijonga script, is a Brahmic script used to write the Limbu language of northern India and Nepal. ... The Lontara script was a native scripts used for writing the Buginese language and also other Malayo-Polynesian languages of southeast Asia. ... The Malayalam script is an abugida of the Brahmic family, used to write the Malayalam language. ...   Sample of Meitei Mayek script, showing the main consonants in the alphabet Meitei Mayek script (also Meithei Mayek, Meetei Mayek, Manipuri script) (Manipuri: Meetei Mayek) is a syllabic script used for the Meitei language (Manipuri), one of the official languages of the Indian state of Manipur. ... Mithilakshar (also known as Tirhuta) is the traditional script of the Maithili language, which is is spoken in the Indian state of Bihar and eastern Nepal. ... Wikipedia does not have an article with this exact name. ... Old Kawi is the oldest Kawi script used on Bali in 775 AD. It is written on palm leaves. ... The Oriya script is used to write the Oriya language. ... It has been suggested that this article or section be merged with Tamil script. ... The word Wiki in Phagspa characters The Phagspa script (also square script) was an Abugida designed by the Lama Phagspa for the emperor Kublai Khan during the Yuan Dynasty in China, as a unified script for all languages within the Mongolian Empire. ... The Newari script also known as the Ranjana script is used for writing the Newari language of Nepal. ... The Rejang script, sometimes spelt Redjang and locally known as Aksara Kaganga (Ka Ga Nga alphabet) after its first three letters, is an abugida of the Brahmic family, and is related to other scripts of the region, like Batak, Buginese, and Kerinci. ...   Saurashtra was a script used to write the Saurashtra language. ... The Sinhala script is used to write the Sinhala language. ... Soyombo script - Wikipedia /**/ @import /skins-1. ... Sundanese is a script that once was used to write the Sundanese language. ... Sylheti Nagari is the original script used for writing the Sylheti language. ... Tagbanwa is one of the indigenous writing systems of the Philippines. ... Tai Dam is a Tai language spoken in Vietnam, Laos, Thailand, and China (mostly in Jinping 金平). It is called paːsaː tai dam ภาษาไทดำ (Black Tai) in Thai and DÇŽidānyÇ” 傣担语 in Chinese. ...   Tai Le is a script used for the Tai Nüa language. ... The Takri script is an abugida writing system of the Brahmic family of scripts. ... Note: This page or section contains IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. ... Telugu script, an abugida from the Brahmic family of scripts, is used to write Telugu, a Dravidian Language found in the Southern Indian state of Andhra Pradesh as well as several other neighboring states. ... This article or section is in need of attention from an expert on the subject. ... To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ... Boyds Syllabic Shorthand is a system of shorthand invented by Robert Boyd, published originally in 1903, and updated in 1912. ... Note: This page or section contains IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. ... Note: This article contains special characters. ... Hebrew cursive script is a style of Hebrew calligraphy that is very popular for writing Modern Hebrew by hand, since it is arguably easier to learn and faster to write than the traditional Hebrew script. ... Japanese braille is a braille code for writing the Japanese language. ... The Kharoṣṭhī script, also known as the Gāndhārī script, is an ancient alphabetic script used by the Gandhara culture of historic northwest India to write the Gandhari and Sanskrit languages (the Gandhara kingdom was located along the present-day border between Afghanistan and Pakistan between the Indus River and the... The Meroitic script is an alphabet of Egyptian (Hieroglyphic) origin used in Kingdom of Meroë. Some scholars, e. ... Pitman Shorthand is a system of shorthand for the English language developed by Sir Isaac Pitman (1813–1897), who first presented it in 1837. ... The Pollard script, also known as Pollard Miao, is an abugida or writing system invented by Methodist missionary Sam Pollard. ... Sora (also Saora, Saonras, Shabari, Sabar, Saura, Savara, Sawaria, Swara, Sabara) is a Munda language of India, spoken by some 288,000 native speakers (1997) in South Orissa, mainly in the Ganjam District, but also in the Koraput and Phulbani districts; other communities exist in Andhra Pradesh (Srikakulam District), Madhya... Thomas Natural Shorthand is an English shorthand system created by Charles A. Thomas which was first published in 1935. ... ABCs redirects here. ... The Arabic alphabet is the script used for writing languages such as Arabic, Persian, Urdu, and others. ... The Avestan alphabet was created in the 3rd century AD for writing the hymns of Zarathustra (a. ... Beitha Kukju was an Albanian who invented a script used for the Albanian language in about 1840, called the Beitha Kukju script after its inventor. ... The Coptic alphabet is an alphabet used for writing the Coptic language. ... The Cyrillic alphabet (pronounced also called azbuka, from the old name of the first two letters) is actually a family of alphabets, subsets of which are used by certain Slavic languages — Belarusian, Bulgarian, Macedonian, Russian, Rusyn, Serbian, and Ukrainian—as well as many other languages of the former Soviet Union... Eclectic shorthand (sometimes called Cross shorthand or Eclectic-Cross shorthand after its founder, J.G. Cross) is an English shorthand system of the 19th century. ... Elbasan script is an eighteenth-century script used for the Albanian language. ... The Fraser alphabet is an artificial script invented around 1915 by the missionary James O. Fraser to write the Lisu language. ... Gabelsberger shorthand, named for its creator Franz Xaver Gabelsberger, is a form of shorthand previously common in Germany. ... The Glagolitic alphabet or Glagolitsa is the oldest known Slavic alphabet. ...   The Gothic alphabet is an alphabetic writing system attributed by Philostorgius to Wulfila, used exclusively for writing the ancient Gothic language. ... Gregg Shorthand is a form of shorthand that was invented by John Robert Gregg in 1888. ... Paleohispanic scripts A Greco-Iberian alphabet Lead plaque from la Serreta (Alcoi). ... Jamo redirects here. ... Articles with similar titles include the NATO phonetic alphabet, which has also informally been called the “International Phonetic Alphabet”. For information on how to read IPA transcriptions of English words, see IPA chart for English. ... Abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz redirects here. ... Manchu and Chinese writing in the Forbidden City The word “Manju” (Manchu) written in Manchu script. ... The Mandaic alphabet is based on the Aramaic alphabet, and is used for writing the Mandaic language. ... This article needs to be cleaned up to conform to a higher standard of quality. ... The word NKo written in the NKo alphabet NKo is both a script devised by Solomana Kante in 1949 as a writing system for the Mande languages of West Africa, and the name of the literary language itself written in the script. ... Note: This article contains special characters. ... The Ol Chiki script, also known as Ol Cemet (language of writing), Ol Ciki, Ol (and sometimes as the Santali alphabet, was created in 1925 by Pandit Raghunath Murmu for the Santali language. ... Hungarian Runes (Hungarian: , ( ) or simply ) is a type of runic writing system used by the Magyars (mainly by Székely Magyars) prior to AD 1000. ... Note: This article contains special characters. ... The Old Permic script, sometimes called Abur, is an original ancient Permic writing system introduced by a Russian missionary Stepan Khrap, also known as Saint (Stephen of Perm) (Степан Храп, св. Стефан Пермский) in 1372. ... Orkhon tablet Inscription in Kyzyl using Orkhon script Orkhon script The Orkhon script (also spelled Orhon script, also Orkhon-Yenisey script, Old Turkic script, Göktürk script, Turkish: Orhon Yazıtları) is the alphabet used by the Göktürk from the 8th century to record the Old Turkic... An Arabic-based script for the Somali language, now replaced both officially and in practise by the Latin alphabet. ... Rune redirects here. ... Note: This page contains IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. ...   New Tai Lue is an alphabet used for the Tai Lü language. ... Visible speech is the name of the system used by Alexander Melville Bell, who was known internationally as a teacher of speech and proper elocution and an author of books on the subject. ... Zhuyin fuhao (Chinese: ; written in Zhuyin fuhao: ㄓㄨˋ 一ㄋ ㄈㄨˊ ㄏㄠˋ), often abbreviated as Zhuyin, is a phonetic system for transcribing Chinese, especially Mandarin, for people learning to read, write or speak Mandarin. ... The Pahawh Hmong script is an alphabet writing system for the Hmong language invented by Shong Lue Yang in 1959. ... Listen to this article ( info/dl) This audio file was created from a revision dated 2006-09-06, and may not reflect subsequent edits to the article. ... Hebrew Braille is the system of braille used by Hebrew speakers and specifically, in the State of Israel. ... Korean Braille is related to other braille systems found around the world. ... The system of international maritime signal flags is a way of representing individual letters of the alphabet in signals to or from ships. ... 1922 Chart of the Morse Code Letters and Numerals Morse code is a method for transmitting telegraphic information, using standardized sequences of short and long elements to represent the letters, numerals, punctuation and special characters of a message. ... New York Point is a system of writing for the blind invented by William Bell Wait (1839-1916), a teacher in the New York Institute for the Education of the Blind. ... A Chinese character. ... This article or section does not adequately cite its references or sources. ... Blissymbols or Blissymbolics were conceived of as an ideographic writing system consisting of several hundred basic symbols, each representing a concept, which can be composed together to generate new symbols that represent new concepts. ... DanceWriting is a form of Dance notation. ... The Dongba are the shamans or priests of the Naxi people of southwestern China. ... Mikmaq hieroglyphic writing was a pictographic writing scheme and memory aid used by Mikmaq people both before and after European contact. ... New Epoch Art Notation is a conceptual writing system for pure visual images. ... A sign for photo model using SignWriting in the dictionary of the Flemish Sign Language Sign Writing is a system of writing the movements and handshapes of sign languages. ... Egyptian hieroglyphs, which have their origins as logograms. ... Demotic (from δημοτικά dimotika popular) refers to both the ancient Egyptian script derived from northern forms of hieratic used in the Delta, as well as the stage of the Egyptian language following Late Egyptian and preceding Coptic. ... Development of hieratic script from hieroglyphs; after Champollion. ... A section of the Papyrus of Ani showing cursive hieroglyphs. ... Drawing of the hieroglyphic seal found in the Troy VIIb layer. ... Cuneiform redirects here. ... The Dongba are the shamans or priests of the Naxi people of southwestern China. ... Maya glyphs in stucco at the Museo de sitio in Palenque, Mexico The Maya script, commonly known as Maya hieroglyphs, was the writing system of the pre-Columbian Maya civilization of Mesoamerica, presently the only deciphered script of the Mesoamerican writing systems. ... The Tangut script is logographic, used for writing the Tangut language. ... The Yi scripts, also known as Cuan or Wei, are used to write the Yi languages. ... Japanese name Kanji: Hiragana: Korean name Hangul: Hanja: Vietnamese name Quốc ngữ: Hán tá»±: A Chinese character or Han character (simplified Chinese: ; traditional Chinese: ; pinyin: ) is a logogram used in writing Chinese, Japanese, sometimes Korean, and formerly Vietnamese. ... Traditional Chinese characters refers to one of two standard sets of printed Chinese characters. ... Simplified Chinese character (Simplified Chinese: or ; traditional Chinese: or ; pinyin: or ) is one of two standard sets of Chinese characters of the contemporary Chinese written language. ... Chữ nôm (𡦂喃 lit. ... Korean writing systems Hangul Hanja Hyangchal Gugyeol Idu Mixed script Korean romanization Revised Romanization of Korean McCune-Reischauer Yale Romanization Hanja is the Korean name for Chinese characters. ... The Jurchens (Chinese: 女真, pinyin: nǚzhēn) were a Tungus people who inhabited parts of Manchuria and northern Korea until the seventeenth century, when they became the Manchus. ... Japanese writing Kanji Kana Hiragana Katakana Hentaigana Manyōgana Uses Furigana Okurigana Rōmaji   ) are the Chinese characters that are used in the modern Japanese logographic writing system along with hiragana (平仮名), katakana (片仮名), and the Arabic numerals. ... The Khitan language is a now-extinct language once spoken by the Khitan people. ... Zhuang logograms or sawndip is a logogram created as a derivative characters of Han characters and used by Zhuang in Guangxi, China. ... Aztec Semi-syllabaries Full semi-syllabaries: Celtiberian script  · Northeastern Iberian script  · Southeastern Iberian script Redundant semi-syllabaries: Southwestern script Syllabaries Afaka · Cherokee · Cypriot · Hiragana · Katakana · Kikakui · Kpelle · Linear B · Man'yōgana · Nü Shu · Old Persian Cuneiform · Vai · Woleaian · Yi · Yugtun