Brāhmī Type abugida Spoken languages Early Prakrit languages Time period perhaps 6th, and certainly 3rd, century BCE, to c. 3rd century CE Child systems Gupta, Pallava, and numerous others in the Brahmic family of scripts. Sister systems Kharoshthi Unicode range U+11000–U+1107F ISO 15924 Brah Note: This page may contain IPA phonetic symbols. Brāhmī is the modern name given to the oldest members of the Brahmic family of scripts.citation needed The best known inscriptions in Brāhmī are the rock-cut edicts of Ashoka in north-central India, dated to the 3rd century BCE. These are traditionally considered the earliest known examples of Brāhmī writing, though recent discoveries suggest that it may be somewhat older. The script was deciphered in 1837 by James Prinsep, an archaeologist, philologist, and official of the British East India Company.1 Like its contemporary in what is now Afghanistan and Pakistan, Kharoṣṭhī, Brāhmī was an abugida. It was innovative in its presentation, with the alphabet arranged in a grid (varga) according to phonetic principles.2 Brāhmī was ancestral to most of the scripts of South Asia, Southeast Asia, some Central Asian scripts like Tibetan and Khotanese, and possibly influenced Korean Hangul (which was developed in 1444 CE). The alphabetic order Brāhmī was adopted as the modern order of Japanese kana, though the letters themselves are unrelated.3 Brāhmī script on stone Kanheri Caves Contents 1 Origins 1.1 Aramaic hypothesis 1.2 Pre-Ashokan epigraphy 2 Ashokan inscriptions 3 Early regional variants 4 Characteristics 4.1 Punctuation[11] 5 Descendants 6 Etymology and legend of Brahmi 7 See also 8 References 9 Further reading 10 External links Origins Main article: Early Indian epigraphy History of the alphabet Proto-Sinaitic alphabet 19 c. BCE Ugaritic 15 c. BCE Proto-Canaanite 14 c. BCE Phoenician 12 c. BCE Paleo-Hebrew 10 c. BCE Samaritan 6 c. BCE Aramaic 8 c. BCE Kharoṣṭhī 6 c. BCE Brāhmī & Indic 6 c. BCE Bhattiprolu Script Telugu Script Brahmic abugidas Devanagari 13 c. CE Hebrew 3 c. BCE Thaana 4 c. BCE Pahlavi 3 c. BCE Avestan 4 c. CE Palmyrene 2 c. BCE Syriac 2 c. BCE Sogdian 2 c. BCE Orkhon (Old Turkic) 6 c. CE Old Hungarian ca. 650 Old Uyghur Mongolian 1204 hh Nabataean 2 c. BCE Arabic 4 c. CE Mandaic 2 c. CE Greek 8 c. BCE Etruscan 8 c. BCE Latin 7 c. BCE Runic 2 c. CE Coptic 3 c. CE Gothic 3 c. CE Armenian 405 Georgian 3 c. BCE Glagolitic 862 Cyrillic ca. 940 Paleohispanic 7 c. BCE Epigraphic South Arabian 9 c. BCE Ge’ez 5–6 c. BCE Meroitic 3 c. BCE Ogham 4 c. CE Hangul 1443 Zhuyin (Bopomofo) 1913 Complete writing systems genealogy This box: view · talk · A fragment of Ashoka's 6th pillar edict.

The traditional scholarly consensus, based on Albrecht Weber (1856) and Georg Bühler's On the origin of the Brahmi alphabet (1895), derives Brāhmī from the Imperial Aramaic script, as was clearly the case for the contemporary Kharosthi alphabet that arose in a part of northwest India under the control of the Achaemenid Empire. As of 1996, this was still considered the most likely scenario.4 However, the Aramaic hypothesis has never been conclusive, and continues to be debated, especially within India. Some scholars, such as F. Raymond Allchin, take Brāhmī as a purely indigenous development, perhaps with Bronze Age Indus script as its predecessor.citation needed Like Kharosthi, Brāhmī was used to write the early dialects of Prakrit. Its usage was mostly restricted to inscriptions on buildings and graves as well as liturgical texts. Sanskrit was not written until many centuries later. As a result, Brāhmī is not a perfect match for Sanskrit, and several Sanskrit sounds cannot be written in Brāhmīcitation needed. Jainism According to the Jain belief Sadvi(nun)Brahmi who was the Daughter of the first Tirthankar Lord Rishabdev also known as Lord Aadinatha composed the first ever text known to human kind thus it was Called Brahmi with due respect to her name.Many Sutras of Jain scriptures were found in Brahmi text. Aramaic hypothesis While it is likely that Brahmi has indigenous origins in India, a few researchers have (inconclusively) posited a link with Aramaic. A glance at the oldest Brāhmī inscriptions shows striking parallels with contemporary Aramaic for the phonemes that are equivalent between the two languages, especially if the letters are flipped to reflect the change in writing direction. (Aramaic is written from right to left, as was Brāhmī originally, whereas Brāhmī later came to be written from left to right.) For example, both Brāhmī and Aramaic g resemble Λ; both Brāhmī and Aramaic t resemble ʎ, etc. The Brahmi script does feature a number of extensions compared to the Aramaic alphabet. For example, Aramaic did not distinguish dental stops (such as d), from retroflex stops (such as ḍ); in Brāhmī the dental and retroflex series are graphically very similar, as if both had been derived from a single prototype. Aramaic did not have Brāhmī’s aspirated consonants (kʰ, tʰ), whereas Brāhmī did not have Aramaic's emphatic consonants (q, ṭ, ṣ - the dot diacritic here has a different meaning from that for retroflex stops in Brāhmī); and it appears that these emphatic letters were used for Brāhmī's aspirates: Aramaic q for Brāhmī kh, Aramaic ṭ (Θ) for Brāhmī th (ʘ). And just where Aramaic did not have a corresponding emphatic stop, p, Brāhmī seems to have doubled up for its aspirate: Brāhmī p and ph are graphically very similar, as if taken from the same source in Aramaic p. The first letters of the alphabets also match: Brāhmī a, which resembled a reversed κ, looks a lot like Aramaic alef, which resembled Hebrew א. The following table compares Brahmi with Phoenician and Aramaic. Possible derivation of Brahmi from the Phoenician script Greek Α Β Γ Δ Ε Υ Ζ Η Θ Ι Κ Λ Μ Ν Ξ Ο Π Ϻ Ϙ Ρ Σ Τ Phoenician Aramaic , Brahmi  ?  ?  ? Devanagari अ ब ग ध ढ व द ड थ ठ य क च ल म न ण श प फ स ख छ र ष त ट Tamil அ ப க த ட வ த ட த ட ய க ச ல ம ந ண ஶ் ப ப ஸ க ச ர ஷ த ட Kannada ಅ ಬ ಗ ಧ ಢ ವ ದ ಡ ಥ ಠ ಯ ಕ ಚ ಲ ಮ ನ ಣ ಶ ಪ ಫ ಸ ಖ ಛ ರ ಷ ತ ಟ IAST a ba ga dha ḍha va da? ḍa? tha ṭha ya ka ca la ma na ṇa śa* pa pha sa* kha cha ra ṣa* ta ṭa

* Both Phoenician/Aramaic and Brahmi had three voiceless sibilants, but because the alphabetical ordering was lost, the correspondences among them are not clear. Not accounted for are the Brahmi consonants bh, gh, h, j, jh, ny. Brahmi ng was a later development. Pre-Ashokan epigraphy Main article: Tamil Brahmi Some common variants of Brahmic letters The earliest potential contact of the Hindu Kush region with the Aramaic script took place in the 6th century BCE with the expansion of the Achaemenid Empire as far as the Indus valley under Darius the Great. It appears that no use of the Aramaic script or any other type of writing to represent an Indo-Aryan language occurred before the time of the emperor Ashoka in the 3rd century BCE. (One possibility why no earlier use was made of writing, despite the potential example of Aramaic, was the extremely advanced technology of "oral literature" and methods for memorization that already existed in India at the time.) Megasthenes, an ambassador to the Mauryan court in India a quarter century before Ashoka, noted explicitly that the Indians "have no knowledge of written letters". However this contradicts with the dating of Vedas. There are some claims dating fragments of Brāhmī epigraphy found in Sri Lanka and Tamil Nadu, as far back as the 6th to 5th centuries BCE, taken as evidence for the early spread of Buddhism.5 But evidence of pre-Mauryan Brahmi inscriptions remains inconclusive, restricted to pottery fragments with possible individual glyphs. The earliest complete inscriptions remain the 3rd century BCE Ashokan ones. Many early remains show regional variation thought to have developed after a period of unity across India during the Ashokan period. Recent claims for earlier dates include fragments of pottery from the trading town of Anuradhapura in Sri Lanka, which have been dated to between the 6th and the early 4th centuries BCE;5 Bhattiprolu;6 and on pieces of pottery in Adichanallur, Tamil Nadu, which have been radio-carbon dated to the 6th century BCE.7 Ashokan inscriptions Connections between Phoenician (4th column) and Brahmi (5th column). Note that 6th- to 4th-century BCE Aramaic (not shown) is in many cases intermediate in form between the two. Brāhmī is clearly attested from the 3rd century BCE during the reign of Ashoka, who used the script for imperial edicts. It has commonly been supposed that the script was developed at around this time, both from the paucity of earlier dated examples, the alleged unreliability of those earlier dates, and from the geometric regularity of the script, which some have taken to be evidence that it had been recently invented.8 Early regional variants

The earliest Ashokan inscriptions are found across India—apart from the northwest—and are highly uniform. By the third century BCE, regional variants had developed, due to differences in writing materials and to the structure of the languages being written. For example, Tamil-Brahmi had a divergent system of vowel notation. The earliest definite evidence of Brahmi script in South India comes from Bhattiprolu in Andhra Pradesh910. The Bhattiprolu script was written on an urn containing Buddhist relics, apparently in Prakrit and old Telugu. Twenty-three letters have been identified. The letters ga and sa are similar to Mauryan Brahmi, while bha and da resemble those of modern Telugu script. Characteristics The Brāhmī symbol for /ka/, modified to represent different vowels Variants of Brahmi over time Brāhmī is usually written from left to right, as in the case of its descendants. However, a coin of the 4th century BCE has been found inscribed with Brāhmī running from right to left, as in Aramaic. Brāhmī is an abugida, meaning that each letter represents a consonant, while vowels are written with obligatory diacritics. When no vowel is written, the vowel /a/ is understood. Special conjunct consonants are used to write consonant clusters such as /pr/ or /rv/. In modern Devanagari conjunct consonant are written left to right to join them as one composite character whereas in Brāhmī characters are joined vertically downwards. Vowels following a consonant are written by diacritics, but initial vowels have dedicated letters. There are three vowels in Brāhmī, /a, i, u/; long vowels are derived from the letters for short vowels. However, there are only five vowel diacritics, as short /a/ is understood if no vowel is written. Punctuation11 This section may require cleanup to meet Wikipedia's quality standards. Please improve this section if you can. The talk page may contain suggestions. (December 2008) Brāhmī The Brahmic script and its descendants Northern Brahmic Kusan Tocharian Meitei Mayek Gupta Śāradā Landa Old Kashmiri Gurmukhī Khojki Takri Dogri Chameali Siddhaṃ Tibetan ’Phagspa Hangul (hypothetical) Lepcha Limbu Nāgarī Devanāgarī Modi Nandināgarī Gujarati Anga Script Proto-Bengali Kaithi Sylheti Nagari Eastern Nagari Assamese Bengali Mithilakshar Oriya Nepal Bhujimol Prachalit Nepal Ranjana Soyombo

Southern Brahmic Tamil Brahmi Vatteluttu Kolezhuthu Tamil Pallava Grantha Malayalam Tulu Sinhala Dhives Akuru Saurashtra Khmer Lao Thai Cham Old Kawi Balinese Javanese Baybayin Batak Buhid Hanunó'o Tagbanwa Sundanese Lontara Rejang Mon Burmese Ojhopath Kalinga Bhattiprolu Script Kadamba Kannada Telugu Tai Le New Tai Lue Ahom This box: view · talk · Punctuation can be perceived as more of an exception than as a general rule in Asokan Brāhmī. For instance, distinct spaces in between the words appear frequently in the pillar edicts but not so much in others. ("Pillar edicts" refers to the texts that are inscribed on the stone pillars oftentimes with the intention of making them public.) The idea of writing each word separately was not consistently used. In early Brāhmī period, the existence of punctuation marks is not very well shown. Each letter has been written independently with some space between words and edicts occasionally. In the middle period, the system seems to be in progress. The use of a dash and a curved horizontal line is found. A flower mark seems to mark the end, and a circular mark appears to indicate the full stop. There seem to be varieties of full stop. In the late period, the system of interpunctuation marks gets more complicated. For instance, there are four different forms of vertically slanted double dashes that resemble "//" to mark the completion of the composition. Despite all the decorative signs that were available during the late period, the signs remained fairly simple in the inscriptions. One of the possible reasons may be that engraving is restricted while writing is not. Four basic forms of the punctuation marks can be cited as: dash or horizontal bar vertical bar dot circle Descendants Main article: Brahmic family of scripts Over the course of a millennium, Brāhmī developed into numerous regional scripts, commonly classified into a more rounded Southern India group and a more angular Northern India group. Over time, these regional scripts became associated with the local languages. Alphabets of the Southern group spread with Hinduism and Buddhism into Southeast Asia, while the Northern group spread into Tibet. Today descendants of Brāhmī are used throughout India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bhutan, Tibet, Burma, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, and in scattered enclaves in Indonesia, southern China, Vietnam, and the Philippines.citation needed As the script of Buddhist scripture, Brahmic alphabets are used for religious purposes throughout China, Korea, Japan, and Vietnam.

Gary Ledyard has suggested that the basic letters of hangul were taken from the Phagspa script of the Mongol Empire, itself a derivative of the Brahmic Tibetan alphabet. Canadian Aboriginal syllabics also show systematic similarity with principles and characters of Brāhmī. Etymology and legend of Brahmi The name Brahmi is said to have come from a Jain Legend. According to South Indian legend the Jain thirthankara (monk) Vrushabhadeva explained the script to his daughters, Brahmi and Soundhary. Therefore as a mark of this, the writing script is called Brahmi and the numerals are called Soundhary. See also Indian inscriptions Pre-Islamic scripts in Afghanistan References ^ More details about Buddhist monuments at Sanchi, Archaeological Survey of India, 1989. ^ Frits Staal, "The science of language", Chapter 16 in Gavin Flood, The Blackwell Companion to Hinduism, Blackwell Publishing, 2003, 599 pages ISBN 0631215352. "Like Mendelejev's Periodic system of elements, the varga system was the result of centuries of analysis. In the course of that development, the basic concepts of phonology were discovered and defined." p.352. ^ Daniels & Bright, The World's Writing Systems, Oxford University Press, 1996, ISBN 0-19-507993-0 ^ Richard Salomon, "Brahmi and Kharoshthi", in The World's Writing Systems ^ a b Salomon, Richard (1998), Indian Epigraphy: A Guide to the Study of Inscriptions in Sanskrit, Prakrit, and the Other Indo-Aryan Languages, Oxford: Oxford University Press, ISBN 0195099842  at pp 12-13 ^ Bhattiprolu: http://www.hindu.com/2007/12/20/stories/2007122054820600.htm ^ Subramanian, T.S., Skeletons, script found at ancient burial site in Tamil Nadu ^ Richard Salomon, "Brahmi and Kharoshthi", in Daniels and Bright, The World's Writing Systems ^ "The Bhattiprolu Inscriptions", G. Buhler, 1894, Epigraphica Indica, Vol.2 ^ Buddhist Inscriptions of Andhradesa, Dr. B.S.L Hanumantha Rao, 1998, Ananda Buddha Vihara Trust, Secunderabad ^ Ram Sharma, Brāhmī Script: Development in North-Western India and Central Asia, 2002 Further reading Kenneth R. Norman, The Development of Writing in India and its Effect upon the Pâli Canon, in Wiener Zeitschrift für die Kunde Südasiens (36), 1993 Oscar von Hinüber, Der Beginn der Schrift und frühe Schriftlichkeit in Indien, Franz Steiner Verlag, 1990 (in German) Gérard Fussman, Les premiers systèmes d'écriture en Inde, in Annuaire du Collège de France 1988-1989 (in French) Siran Deraniyagala, The prehistory of Sri Lanka; an ecological perspective (revised ed.), Archaeological Survey Department of Sri Lanka, 1992. 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