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Encyclopedia > List of writing systems

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A list of writing systems (or scripts), classified according to some common distinguishing features. Image File history File links Broom_icon. ...


See Writing system for more information about the different kinds of writing systems. See also grapheme, a technical term used to refer to the individual base constituents of any given writing system. Writing systems of the world today. ... In typography, a grapheme is the atomic unit in written language. ...


The usual name of the script is given first (and bolded); the name of the language(s) in which the script is written follows (in brackets), particularly in the case where the language name differs from the script name. Other informative or qualifying annotations for the script may also be provided.

Alphabets:  Latin ,  Cyrillic ,  Latin and Cyrillic ,  Greek ,  Georgian or Armenian  Abjads:  Arabic ,  Arabic and Latin ,  Hebrew and Arabic  Abugidas:  North Indic ,  South Indic ,  Thaana ,  Ethiopic ,  Ethiopic and Arabic  Logographic+syllabic:  Pure logographic ,  Mixed logographic and syllabaries ,  Featural-alphabetic syllabary + limited logographic   Featural-alphabetic syllabary 
Alphabets:  Latin ,  Cyrillic ,  Latin and Cyrillic ,  Greek ,  Georgian or Armenian 
Abjads:  Arabic ,  Arabic and Latin ,  Hebrew and Arabic 
Abugidas:  North Indic ,  South Indic ,  Thaana ,  Ethiopic ,  Ethiopic and Arabic 
Logographic+syllabic:  Pure logographic ,  Mixed logographic and syllabaries ,  Featural-alphabetic syllabary + limited logographic   Featural-alphabetic syllabary 
Writing systems of the world today.
Writing systems of the world today.

Contents

Image File history File links Download high-resolution version (1357x628, 50 KB) Alphabets: Gray: Latin Blue-gray: Cyrillic Cyan: Both Latin and Cyrillic Blue: Greek Dark blues: Georgian and Armenian Abjads: Arabic: Green Arabic and Latin: Light green Hebrew and Arabic: Medium green Abugidas: North Indic: Yellow South Indic: Beige... Image File history File links Download high-resolution version (1357x628, 50 KB) Alphabets: Gray: Latin Blue-gray: Cyrillic Cyan: Both Latin and Cyrillic Blue: Greek Dark blues: Georgian and Armenian Abjads: Arabic: Green Arabic and Latin: Light green Hebrew and Arabic: Medium green Abugidas: North Indic: Yellow South Indic: Beige... Image File history File links Download high-resolution version (2714x1256, 199 KB) Modification of Writing Systems of the World 3. ... Image File history File links Download high-resolution version (2714x1256, 199 KB) Modification of Writing Systems of the World 3. ...

Pictographic/ideographic writing systems


Writing systems
History
Grapheme
List of writing systems
Types
Alphabet
Abjad
Abugida
Syllabary
Logogram-based
Related
Pictogram
Ideogram

Ideographic scripts (in which graphemes are ideograms representing concepts or ideas, rather than a specific word in a language), and pictographic scripts (in which the graphemes are iconic pictures) are not thought to be able to express all that can be communicated by language, as argued by the linguists John DeFrancis and J. Marshall Unger. Essentially, they postulate that no full writing system can be completely pictographic or ideographic; it must be able to refer directly to a language in order to have the full expressive capacity of a language. Unger disputes claims made on behalf of Blissymbols in his 2004 book Ideogram. 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 Specimen of typeset fonts and languages, by William Caslon, letter founder; from the 1728 Cyclopaedia. ... For the traditional ordering of the letters of the Arabic alphabet, see Abjad numerals. ... An abugida or alphasyllabary is a writing system composed of signs (graphemes) denoting consonants with an inherent following vowel, which are consistently modified to indicate other vowels (or, in some cases, the lack of a vowel). ... A syllabary is a set of written symbols that represent (or approximate) syllables, which make up words. ... A logogram, or logograph, is a single grapheme which represents a word or a morpheme (a meaningful unit of language). ... This article or section does not adequately cite its references or sources. ... A Chinese character. ... A Chinese character. ... John DeFrancis is a Chinese language professor emeritus and researcher at the University of Hawaii who wrote a number of Chinese instructional texts (his Readers series is particularly well regarded) in the 60s and 70s. ... J. Marshall Unger (James Marshall Unger, born 28 May 1947 in Cleveland, Ohio) is a professor of Japanese at the Ohio State University. ... Blissymbolics or Blissymbols 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. ...


Although a few pictographic or ideographic scripts exist today, there is no single way to read them, because there is no one-to-one correspondence between symbol and language. Hieroglyphs were commonly thought to be ideographic before they were translated, and to this day Chinese is often erroneously said to be ideographic. In some cases of ideographic scripts, only the author of a text can read it with any certainty, and it may be said that they are interpreted rather than read. Such scripts often work best as mnemonic aids for oral texts, or as outlines that will be fleshed out in speech.

Aztec or Nahuatl writing is a pictographic pre-Columbian writing system used in central Mexico by the Nahua peoples. ... Nahuatl ( [1] is a term applied to a group of related languages and dialects of the Aztecan [2] branch of the Uto-Aztecan language family, indigenous to central Mexico. ... Blissymbolics or Blissymbols 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. ... Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC) refers to an area of research, clinical, and educational practice. ... The Dongba are the shamans or priests of the Naxi people of southwestern China. ... Categories: Ethnic groups of China ... Mikmaq hieroglyphic writing was a pictographic writing scheme and memory aid used by the Mikmaq. ... It has been suggested that Lnu be merged into this article or section. ...

Logographic writing systems

In logographic writing systems, glyphs represents words or morphemes (meaningful components of words, as in mean-ing-ful), rather than phonetic elements. A word is a unit of language that carries meaning and consists of one or more morphemes. ... In morpheme-based morphology, a morpheme is the smallest lingual unit that carries a semantic interpretation. ...


Note that no logographic script is comprised solely of logograms. All contain graphemes which represent phonetic (sound-based) elements as well. These phonetic elements may be used on their own (to represent, for example, grammatical inflections or foreign words), or may serve as phonetic complements to a logogram (used to specify the sound of a logogram which might otherwise represent more than one word). In the case of Chinese, the phonetic element is built into the logogram itself; in Egyptian and Mayan, many glyphs are purely phonetic, while others function as either logograms or phonetic elements, depending on context. For this reason, many such scripts may be more properly referred to as logosyllabic or complex scripts; the terminology used is largely a product of custom in the field, and is to an extent arbitrary. A logogram, or logograph, is a single grapheme which represents a word or a morpheme (a meaningful unit of language). ... Phonetic (pho-NET-ic) is a nationwide voicemail-to-text messaging service available for most digital mobile phones in which a subscriber is provided a custom voice mailbox for the purpose of receiving all incoming voice messages as actual transcribed text for reading via short messaging (also known as SMS... In languages written in cuneiform, a phonetic complement is a sign used to indicate the type of the word it either precedes or follows. ...


Consonant-based logographies

It has been suggested that Hieroglyph (French Wiki article) be merged into this article or section. ... Development of hieratic script from hieroglyphs; after Champollion. ... Demotic script on a replica of the Rosetta stone. ... ↔--71. ...

Syllable-based logographies

Anatolian hieroglyphs are an indigenous hieroglyphic script native to western Anatolia first appears on Luwian royal seals, from ca. ... Luwian (sometimes spelled Luvian) is part of the Anatolian branch of the Indo European language family and has been preserved in three forms: (1) Cuneiform Luwian, (2) Hieroglyphic-Luwian and (3), the somewhat later Lycian. ... The cuneiform script is one of the earliest known forms of written expression. ... The Sumerian language ( EME.GIR15 native tongue) of ancient Sumer was spoken in Southern Mesopotamia from at least the 4th millennium BCE. Sumerian was gradually replaced by Akkadian as a spoken language in the beginning of the 2nd millenium BCE, but continued to be used as a sacred, ceremonial, literary... Akkadian (lišānum akkadÄ«tum) was a Semitic language (part of the greater Afro-Asiatic language family) spoken in ancient Mesopotamia, particularly by the Assyrians and Babylonians. ... 14th century BC diplomatic letter in Akkadian, found in Tell Amarna. ... Elamite is an extinct language, which was spoken by the ancient Elamites (also known as Ilamids). ... Hittite is the extinct language once spoken by the Hittites, a people who once created an empire centered on ancient Hattusas (modern BoÄŸazkale) in north-central Anatolia (modern Turkey). ... Luwian (sometimes spelled Luvian) is part of the Anatolian branch of the Indo European language family and has been preserved in three forms: (1) Cuneiform Luwian, (2) Hieroglyphic-Luwian and (3), the somewhat later Lycian. ... Hurrian is a conventional name for the language of the Hurrians (Khurrites), a people who entered northern Mesopotamia around 2300 BC and had mostly vanished by 1000 BC. Hurrian was the language of the Mitanni kingdom in northern Mesopotamia, and was likely spoken at least initially in Hurrian settlements in... Urartian is the conventional name for the language spoken by the inhabitants of the ancient kingdom of Urartu in Northeast Anatolia (present-day Turkey), in the region of Lake Van. ... Various styles of Chinese calligraphy. ... Japanese writing Kanji Kana Hiragana Katakana Hentaigana Manyōgana Uses Furigana Okurigana Rōmaji Kanji (Japanese:  ) 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. ... Hanja is the Korean name for Chinese characters. ... Hán tá»± (漢字, lit. ... Chữ nho (字儒) is one of the Chinese based scripts used for writing the Vietnamese language. ... 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 Chorti language (Chorti) is a langauge of the Mayan language family. ... Yucatec Maya (or Yukatek in the revised orthography of the Academia de Lenguas Mayas, now preferred by scholars) is a Mayan language spoken in the Yucatán Peninsula, northern Belize and parts of Guatemala. ... The Classic Maya language is the oldest historically attested member of the Maya language family. ... The Yi scripts, also known as Cuan or Wei, are used to write the Yi languages. ... Yi (also Moso, Lolo, Noso, ) is a family of closely related Tibeto-Burman languages spoken by the Yi people. ... Adinkra are symbols common in Western African societies that represent concepts or aphorisms. ... The Akan language belongs to the Kwa language family. ...

Logographies based on Chinese

Categories: Ethnic groups of China ... Categories: Ethnic groups of China ... The Jurchens (Chinese: 女真, pinyin: nǚzhēn) were a Tungusic people who inhabited parts of Manchuria and northern Korea until the seventeenth century, when they became the Manchus. ... 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. ... Khitan script was the writing system of Khitan people. ... The Khitan language is a now-extinct language once spoken by the Khitan people. ... The Tangut, also known as the Western Xia were a Qiangic-Tibetan people who moved to the highlands of western Sichuan sometime before the 10th century AD. They spoke Tangut language a now-extinct Tibeto-Burman language. ... Tangut (also Xixia) is the ancient northerneastern Tibeto-Burman language spoken in the Tangut Empire. ... The Zhuang (Simplified Chinese: 壮族; Traditional Chinese: 壯族; Hanyu Pinyin: ; own name: BouчcueÅ‹ÑŒ/Bouxcuengh) are an ethnic group of people who mostly live in the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region in southern China. ... The Zhuang language (autonym: Cuengh or CueÅ‹ÑŒ; Chinese: 壮语; Hanyu Pinyin: ) is used by the Zhuang people in the Peoples Republic of China. ...

Syllabaries

In a syllabary, graphemes represent syllables or moras. (Note that the 19th century term syllabics usually referred to abugidas rather than true syllabaries.) A syllabary is a set of written symbols that represent (or approximate) syllables, which make up words. ... A syllable (Ancient Greek: ) is a unit of organization for a sequence of speech sounds. ... Mora can mean: Cameroon Mora, Cameroon Costa Rica Mora Canton Portugal Mora, Portugal Sweden Mora, Sweden - a municipality of Dalarna County in Sweden Mora Court District - a district of Dalecarlia in Sweden United States Mora, Minnesota, United States Mora County, New Mexico, United States Mora (linguistics): A unit of sound...

The Afaka script (afaka sikifi) is a syllabary of 56 letters devised in 1908 for the Ndyuka language, an English creole of Surinam. ... Ndyuka (or Ndjuka, officially Ndyukátongo) is a language of Suriname. ... Yugtun is a dialect of Yupik spoken in Central Alaska. ... The Yupik (Yupik/Юпик) people speak several distinct languages, depending on their location. ... Cherokee is an Iroquoian language spoken by the Cherokee people. ... Original distribution of the Cherokee language Cherokee (; Tsalagi) is an Iroquoian language spoken by the Cherokee people which uses a unique syllabary writing system. ... Mycenaean is the most ancient attested form of the Greek language, spoken on the Greek mainland and on Crete in the 16th to 11th centuries BC, before the Dorian invasion. ... Japanese writing Kanji Kana Hiragana Katakana Hentaigana Manyōgana Uses Furigana Okurigana Rōmaji 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. ... This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ... The Mende language is a major language of Sierra Leone, with some speakers in neighboring Liberia. ... Chief Gbili - Liberian, invented Kpelle syllabary ca. ... Kpelle language is spoken by the Kpelle people. ... This article is about the ancient syllabary. ... Mycenaean is the most ancient attested form of the Greek language, spoken on the Greek mainland and on Crete in the 16th to 11th centuries BC, before the Dorian invasion. ... Manyōgana (万葉仮名) is an ancient form of Japanese kana based on kanji (Chinese characters). ... Nü Shu written in Nü Shu (right to left). ... This article or section does not adequately cite its references or sources. ... Vai language is a language of Liberia. ... The Yi scripts, also known as Cuan or Wei, are used to write the Yi languages. ... Yi (also Moso, Lolo, Noso, ) is a family of closely related Tibeto-Burman languages spoken by the Yi people. ...

Part syllabic, part alphabetic scripts

In these systems, some consonant-vowel combinations are written as syllables, but others are written as consonant plus vowel. In the case of Old Persian, all vowels were written regardless, so it was effectively a true alphabet despite its syllabic component. In Japanese a similar system plays a minor role in foreign borrowings; for example, [tu] is written [to]+[u], and [ti] as [te]+[i].

The Iberian alphabet was an alphabet, with some of the features of a syllabary, that was used to write the Iberian and Celtiberian languages. ... Celtiberian (also Hispano-Celtic) is an extinct Celtic language spoken by the Celtiberians in northern Spain before and during the Roman Empire. ... Old Persian cuneiform is the primary script used in Old Persian writings. ... Sketch of the first column of the Behistun Inscription Old Persian is the oldest attested Persid language. ...

Segmental scripts

A segmental script has graphemes which represent the phonemes (basic unit of sound) of a language. This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ...


Note that there need not be (and rarely is) a one-to-one correspondence between the graphemes of the script and the phonemes of a language. A phoneme may be represented only by some combination or string of graphemes, the same phoneme may be represented by more than one distinct grapheme, the same grapheme may stand for more than one phoneme, or some combination of all of the above.


Segmental scripts may be further divided according to the types of phonemes they typically record:


Abjads

An abjad is a segmental script containing symbols for consonants only, or where vowels are optionally written with diacritics ("pointing") or only written word-initially. For the traditional ordering of the letters of the Arabic alphabet, see Abjad numerals. ... 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. ...

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 Arabic and various other languages, together with various closely related scripts that typically differ in the presence or absence of a few letters. ... Arabic ( or just ) is the largest living member of the Semitic language family in terms of speakers. ... Note: This page contains phonetic information presented in the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) using Unicode. ... Balochi, a north-western Iranian language, is the principal language of Balochistan. ... Kashmiri (कॉशुर, کٲشُر) is a northern Indo-Aryan language spoken primarily in the valley of Kashmir, a region situated mostly in the Indian Jammu and Kashmir state. ... Pashto (پښتو; also known as Afghan, Pushto, Pashto, Pashtoe, Pashtu, and Pukhto) is the language spoken by the ethnic Afghan otherwise known as the Pashtun people who inhabit Afghanistan and the Western provinces of Pakistan. ... Persian (Local names: فارسی Fârsi or پارسی Pârsi)* is an Indo-European language spoken in Iran, Afghanistan and Tajikistan as well as by minorities in Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, India, Pakistan, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Southern Russia, neighboring countries, and elsewhere. ... Punjabi (also Panjabi; in GurmukhÄ«, in ShāhmukhÄ«, in transliteration) is the language of the Punjabi people and the Punjab regions of India and Pakistan. ... SindhÄ« (सिन्धी, سنڌي) is the language of the Sindh region of South Asia, which is now a province of Pakistan. ... Uyghur (in Uyghur: ئۇغۇرچه Uyƣurqə or ئۇغۇر تىلى Uyƣur tili; in Chinese: 维吾尔语 Wéiwúěryǔ) is a Turkic language spoken by the Uyghur people in Xinjiang... The phrase Zaban-e Urdu-e Mualla written in Urdu Urdu () is an Indo-European language of the Indo-Aryan family that developed under Persian, Turkish, Arabic, Hindi, and Sanskrit influence in South Asia during the Delhi Sultanate and Mughal Empire (1200-1800). ... This page meets Wikipedias criteria for speedy deletion. ... Dhivehi is an Indo-Aryan language and the official language of the Republic of the Maldives. ... 11th century book in Syriac Serto. ... Syriac ( Suryāyā) is an Eastern Aramaic language that was once spoken across much of the Fertile Crescent. ... Note: This article contains special characters. ... “Hebrew” redirects here. ... Yiddish (ייִדיש, Jiddisch) is a Germanic language spoken by about four million Jews throughout the world. ... The Jawi alphabet. ... Arabic ( or just ) is the largest living member of the Semitic language family in terms of speakers. ... The Malay language, also known locally as bahasa Melayu, is an Austronesian language spoken by the Malay people who reside in the Malay Peninsula, southern Thailand, the Philippines, Singapore, central eastern Sumatra, the Riau islands, and parts of the coast of Borneo. ... 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. ... Petra, the Nabataean capital The Nabataeans were a trading people of ancient Arabia, whose oasis settlements in the time of Josephus gave the name of Nabatene to the borderland between Syria and Arabia, from the Euphrates to the Red Sea. ... The current version of this article or section is written in an informal style and with a personally invested tone. ... The Pahlavi script was used broadly in the Sasanid Persian Empire to write down Middle Persian for secular, as well as religious purposes. ... Pahlavi is a term that refers: (1) to a script used in Iran derived from the Aramaic script, and (2) more broadly, to Middle Persian, the Middle Iranian language written in this script. ... The Phoenician alphabet is a continuation of the Proto-Canaanite alphabet, by par convention taken to begin with a cut-off date of 1050 BC. It was used by the Phoenicians to write Phoenician, a Northern Semitic language. ... Phoenician was a language originally spoken in the coastal region of what is now Lebanon. ... For other uses, see Canaan (disambiguation). ... 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 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. ... 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. ... Aramaic is a group of Semitic languages with a 3,000-year history. ... Arabic ( or just ) is the largest living member of the Semitic language family in terms of speakers. ... “Hebrew” redirects here. ... This article needs to be cleaned up to conform to a higher standard of quality. ... Tuareg or Tamasheq/Tamajaq/Tamahaq is a Berber language or family of closely related languages spoken by the Tuareg, in parts of Mali, Niger, Algeria, Libya and Burkina Faso (with a few speakers, the Kinnin, even in Chad[1].) They are quite mutually comprehensible, and are commonly regarded as a... 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 Ugaritic language is only known in the form of writings found in the lost city of Ugarit in Syria since its discovery by French archaeologists in 1928. ... Hurrian is a conventional name for the language of the Hurrians (Khurrites), a people who entered northern Mesopotamia around 2300 BC and had mostly vanished by 1000 BC. Hurrian was the language of the Mitanni kingdom in northern Mesopotamia, and was likely spoken at least initially in Hurrian settlements in...

True alphabets

A true alphabet contains separate letters (not diacritic marks) for both consonants and vowels. A Specimen of typeset fonts and languages, by William Caslon, letter founder; from the 1728 Cyclopaedia. ... A diacritical mark or diacritic, also called an accent mark, is a small sign added to a letter to alter pronunciation or to distinguish between similar words. ... 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. ...


Linear nonfeatural alphabets

Linear alphabets are composed of lines on a surface, such as ink on paper.

The Arabic alphabet is the script used for writing Arabic and various other languages, together with various closely related scripts that typically differ in the presence or absence of a few letters. ... The Kurdish language is a language spoken in the region called Kurdistan, including Kurdish populations in parts of Iran, Iraq, Syria and Turkey. ... The Avestan alphabet was created in the 3rd century AD for writing the hymns of Zarathustra (a. ... Avestan is an Eastern Old Iranian language that was used to compose the sacred hymns and canon of the Zoroastrian Avesta. ... 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 an alphabet used for several East and South Slavic languages—Belarusian, Bosnian, Bulgarian, Macedonian, Russian, Rusyn, Serbian, and Ukrainian—and many other languages of the former Soviet Union, Asia and Eastern Europe. ...  Countries where a West Slavic language is the national language  Countries where an East Slavic language is the national language  Countries where a South Slavic language is the national language The Slavic languages (also called Slavonic languages), a group of closely related languages of the Slavic peoples and a subgroup... Serbian (српски језик; srpski jezik) is one of the standard versions of the Shtokavian dialect, used primarily in Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, Croatia, and by Serbs in the Serbian diaspora. ... This is a list of languages that have been written in the Cyrillic alphabet at one time or another. ... 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. ... The Fraser alphabet is an artificial script invented around 1915 by the missionary James O. Fraser to write the Lisu language. ... Lisu is a Sino-Tibetan language spoken in Yunnan (southwestern China), northern Burma, and Thailand and a small part of India. ... Gabelsberger shorthand, named for its creator Franz Xaver Gabelsberger, is a form of shorthand previously common in Germany. ... The Megrelian language (Megruli ena in Georgian, Margaluri nina in Megrelian), sometimes called Mingrelian, is a language spoken in northwest Georgia. ... The Georgian alphabet is the script currently used to write the Georgian language and occasionally other languages of the Caucasus. ... The Georgian alphabet is the script currently used to write the Georgian language and occasionally other languages of the Caucasus. ... The Georgian alphabet is the script currently used to write the Georgian language and occasionally other languages of the Caucasus. ... The Georgian alphabet is the script currently used to write the Georgian language and occasionally other languages of the Caucasus. ... Tablet inscribed with the Glagolitic alphabet The Glagolitic alphabet or Glagolitsa is the oldest known Slavonic alphabet. ... Old Church Slavonic (Old Bulgarian, Old Macedonian, and Old Slavic) is the first literary Slavic language, developed from the Slavic dialect of Thessaloniki (Solun) by the 9th century Byzantine missionaries, Saints Cyril and Methodius. ...   The Gothic alphabet is an alphabetic writing system attributed by Philostorgius to Wulfila, used exclusively for writing the ancient Gothic language. ... Because of technical limitations, some web browsers may not display some special characters in this article. ... Not to be confused with 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. ... The Latin alphabet, also called the Roman alphabet, is the most widely used alphabetic writing system in the world today. ... Latin is an ancient Indo-European language originally spoken in Latium, the region immediately surrounding Rome. ... Manchu and Chinese writing in the Forbidden City The word “Manju” (Manchu) written in Manchu script. ... The Manchu language is a Tungusic language spoken by Manchus in Manchuria; it is the language of the Manchu, though now most Manchus speak Mandarin Chinese and there are fewer than 70 native speakers of Manchu out of a total of nearly 10 million ethnic Manchus. ... The Mandaic alphabet is based on the Aramaic alphabet, and is used for writing the Mandaic language. ... The Mandaic language is the liturgical language of the Mandaean religion; a vernacular form is still spoken by a small community in Iran around Ahwaz. ... Aramaic is a group of Semitic languages with a 3,000-year history. ... This article needs to be cleaned up to conform to a higher standard of quality. ... The Berber languages (or Tamazight) are a group of closely related languages mainly spoken in Morocco and Algeria. ... 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. ... Maninka is a Niger-Congo; Mande language spoken by 3,300,000 (including all varieties) in Guinea and Mali where it is the official langauge and also in Liberia, Senegal, and Sierra Leone where it has no official status. ... Bambara, also known as Bamanankan in the language itself, is a language spoken in Mali by as many as six million people (including second language users). ... Bambara, also known as Bamanankan in the language itself, is a language spoken in Mali by as many six million people. ... Note: This article contains special characters. ... The Goidelic languages (also sometimes called the Gaelic languages or collectively Gaelic) have historically been part of a dialect continuum stretching from the south of Ireland, the Isle of Man, to the north of Scotland. ... The Brythonic languages (or Brittonic languages) form one of the two branches of the Insular Celtic language family. ... The Pictish language is the extinct language of the Picts, in what is now Scotland. ... 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. ... Languages in Iron Age Italy, 6th century BC Etruscan was a language spoken and written in the ancient region of Etruria (current Tuscany plus western Umbria and northern Latium) and in parts of what are now Lombardy, Veneto, and Emilia-Romagna (where the Etruscans were displaced by Gauls), in Italy. ... Denarius of Marsican Confederation with Oscan legend. ... Languages in Iron Age Italy, 6th century BC Umbrian, an Italic language, is a dead language formerly spoken in the ancient Italian region of Umbria. ... 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. ... The name may refer to Komi Republic Komi peoples Komi-Zyrians Komi-Permyaks Komi language Komi-Zyrian language Komi-Permyak language Komi is also a rule in a board game Go. ... Orkhon script The Orkhon script is the earliest known Turkic alphabet. ... The Turkic languages constitute a language family of some thirty languages, spoken across a vast area from Eastern Europe to Siberia and Western China with an estimated 140 million native speakers and tens of millions of second-language speakers. ...   The Osmanya alphabet is a script for the Somali language invented between 1920 and 1922 by the Sultan of Obbias brother, Cismaan Yuusuf Keenadiid. ... For other uses, see Rune (disambiguation). ... This article or section does not adequately cite its references or sources. ... The Santali alphabet, also known as Ol Cemet (language of writing), Ol Ciki, Ol Chiki, or Ol, was created in 1925 by Pandit Raghunath Murmu for the Santali language. ... Santali is a language in the Munda subfamily of Austro-Asiatic, related to Ho and Mundari. ... The Dai (or the Thai peoples of China) is the officially recognized name of an ethnic group living in Xishuangbanna Dai Autonomous Prefecture and the Dehong Dai and Jingpo Autonomous Prefecture (both in southern Yunnan Province of China), and also in Laos, Vietnam, Thailand, and Myanmar. ... The Bassa are a people of Liberia, living in Grand Bassa, Rivercess, and Montserrado counties, who speak a Kru language. ... Zhuyin fuhao (Traditional Chinese: ; Simplified Chinese: ; Hanyu Pinyin: ; Tongyong Pinyin: ; Wade-Giles: Chu-yin fu-hao), or Symbols for Annotating Sounds, often abbreviated as Zhuyin, or known as Bopomofo (ㄅㄆㄇㄈ) after the first four letters of this Chinese phonemic alphabet (bo po mo fo), is the national phonetic system of the... The Formosan languages are a group of Austronesian languages spoken 2% of the population of Taiwan, almost exclusively aboriginals. ...

Featural linear alphabets

A featural script has elements that indicate the components of articulation, such as bilabial consonants, fricatives, or back vowels. Scripts differ in how many features they indicate. A featural alphabet is an alphabet wherein the shapes of the letters are not arbitrary, but encode phonological features of the phonemes they represent. ... In phonetics, a bilabial consonant is a consonant articulated with both lips. ... Fricatives (or spirants) are consonants produced by forcing air through a narrow channel made by placing two articulators close together. ... A back vowel is a type of vowel sound used in some spoken languages. ...

Gregg Shorthand is a form of shorthand that was invented by John Robert Gregg in 1888. ... Jamo redirects here. ... Note: This page contains IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. ... First article of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (in English) The Tengwar are an artificial script which was invented by J. R. R. Tolkien. ... 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. ...

Manual alphabets

Manual alphabets are frequently found as parts of sign languages. They are not used for writing per se, but for spelling out words while signing. Fingerspelling (somtimes known as dactylology) is the representation of the letters of a writing system, and sometimes numeral systems, using only the hands. ... Sign language interpreter on stage A sign language (also signed language) is a language which uses manual communication, body language and lip patterns instead of sound to convey meaning—simultaneously combining handshapes, orientation and movement of the hands, arms or body, and facial expressions to express fluidly a speakers...

The American Sign Language Alphabet is a manual alphabet that augments the vocabulary of American Sign Language when spelling individual letters of a word is the preferred or only option, such as with proper names or the titles of works. ... Several manual alphabets in use around the world employ two hands for some or all of the letters. ... The Commonwealth of Nations (CN), usually known as The Commonwealth, is a voluntary association of 53 independent sovereign states all of which are former colonies of the United Kingdom, except for Mozambique and the United Kingdom itself. ... 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. ... is an Indo-Aryan language, part of the greater Indo-European language family. ... The Korean manual alphabet is used by the Deaf in South Korea who speak Korean Sign Language. ... Soviet redirects here. ... Motto: De Madrid al Cielo (From Madrid to Heaven) Location Coordinates: Country Spain Autonomous Community Comunidad Autónoma de Madrid Province Madrid Administrative Divisions 21 Neighborhoods 127 Founded 9th century Government  - Mayor Alberto Ruiz-Gallardón (PP) Area  - Land 607 km² (234. ...

Other non-linear alphabets

These are other alphabets composed of something other than lines on a surface.

Braille code where the word (, French for first) can be read. ... Korean Braille is related to other braille systems found around the world. ... 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. ... The system of international maritime signal flags is a way of representing individual letters of the alphabet in signals to or from ships. ... It has been suggested that Farnsworth method and Koch method be merged into this article or section. ... Trinary is an artistic language in David Brins Uplift series of science fiction novels, spoken largely by dolphins or neo-fins. ... It has been suggested that Farnsworth method and Koch method be merged into this article or section. ... A Chappe semaphore tower near Saverne, France // The semaphore or optical telegraph is an apparatus for conveying information by means of visual signals, with towers with pivoting blades or paddles, shutters, in a matrix, or hand-held flags etc. ...

Abugidas

An abugida, or alphasyllabary, is a segmental script in which vowel sounds are denoted by diacritical marks or other systematic modification of the consonants. Generally, however, if a single letter is understood to have an inherent unwritten vowel, and only vowels other than this are written, then the system is classified as an abugida regardless of whether the vowels look like diacritics or full letters. The vast majority of abugidas are found from India to Southeast Asia and belong historically to the Brāhmī family. An abugida or alphasyllabary is a writing system composed of signs (graphemes) denoting consonants with an inherent following vowel, which are consistently modified to indicate other vowels (or, in some cases, the lack of a vowel). ... Note: This page contains IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. ... A diacritic mark or accent mark is an additional mark added to a basic letter. ... 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. ...


Abugidas of the Brāhmī family

BrāhmÄ« refers to the pre-modern members of the Brahmic family of scripts. ... Prakrit (also spelt Pracrit) (Sanskrit: , original, natural, artless, normal, ordinary, usual, i. ... The Sanskrit language ( , for short ) is an old Indo-Aryan language from the Indian Subcontinent, the classical literary language of the Hindus of India[1], a liturgical language of Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism, and one of the 23 official languages of India. ... The Ahom alphabet is a type of alphabet called an abugida that was used to write the Ahom language, an extinct Tai language spoken by the Ahom people who ruled the Brahmaputra valley in the Indian state of Assam between the 13th and the 18th centuries. ... 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. ... 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. ... The Toba are an ethnic group in Argentina, Bolivia and Paraguay. ... Batak is a collective term used to identify a number of ethnic groups found in the highlands of North Sumatra Indonesia. ... Baybayin (sometimes called Alibata) is a pre-Hispanic Tagalog writing system that originated from the Javanese script Kavi. ... Ilokano (variants: Ilocano, Iluko, Iloco, and Iloko) is the third most-spoken language of the Republic of the Philippines. ... This article or section does not adequately cite its references or sources. ... The Pangasinan language (Pangasinan: salitan Pangasinan; Spanish: idioma pangasinense) belongs to the Malayo-Polynesian languages branch of the Austronesian languages family. ... Tagalog (pronunciation: ) is one of the major languages of the Republic of the Philippines. ... The Bikol languages is a group of four languages that are spoken in the Bicol Region of the Philippines. ... The Visayan languages of the Philippines, along with Tagalog and Bikol, are part of the Central Philippine language family. ... Languages in the Philippines number more than 170 and almost all of them belong to the Western Malayo-Polynesian languages. ... The Bengali script (Bengali: বাংলà¦&frac