Aksara Brahmi 5 - 婆罗米文

Brāhmī Alphabet The Brāhmī alphabet is the ancestor of most of the 40 or so modern Indian alphabets, and of a number of other alphabets, such as Khmer and Tibetan. It is thought to have been modelled on the Aramaic or Phoenician alphabets, and appeared in India sometime before 500 BC. Another theory is that Brāhmī developed from the Indus or Harappa script, which was used in the Indus valley until about 2,000 BC. The earliest known inscriptions in the Brāhmī alphabet are those of King Asoka (c.270-232 BC), third monarch of the Mauryan dynasty. Brāhmī was used to write a variety of languages, including Sanskrit and Prakrit. Notable features Type of writing system: abugida - each letter represents a consonant with an inherent vowel. Other vowels were indicated using a variety of diacritics and separate letters. Letters are grouped according to the way they are pronounced. Many letters have more than one form. Direction of writing: left to right in horizontal lines Consonants Vowels and vowel diacritics Sample text Asokan Edict - Delhi Inscription Transliteration devānaṁpiye piyadasi lājā hevaṁ āhā ye atikaṁtaṁ aṁtalaṁ lājāne husa hevaṁ ichisu kathaṁ jane dhaṁmavaḍhiyā vāḍheya nocujane anulupāyā dhaṁmavaḍhiyā vaḍhithā etaṁ devānaṁpiye piyadasi lājā hevaṁ āhā esame huthā atākaṁtaṁ ca aṁtalaṁ hevaṁ ichisu lājāne katha jane Translation Thus spoke king Devanampiya Piyadasi: "Kings of the olden time have gone to heaven under these very desires. How then among mankind may religion (or growth in grace) be increased? Yea, through the conversion of the humbly-born shall religion increase" Source: http://www.virtualvinodh.com/brahmi-lipitva/144-asokan-edict-delhi Some modern descendants of Brāhmī Bengali, Devanāgarī, Gujarāti, Gurmukhi, Kannada, Khmer, Malayalam, Oriya, Sinhala, Tamil, Telugu, Tibetan Links Information about Brāhmī http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Br%C4%81hm%C4%AB_script http://www.virtualvinodh.com/brahmi-lipitva http://www.ancientscripts.com/brahmi.html http://www.nibbanam.com/Brahmi/brahmi.htm Free Brāhmī fonts http://sites.google.com/site/brahmiscript/ http://www.fedora.redhat.com/wiki/Brahmi_fonts The Edicts of King Asoka http://www.cs.colostate.edu/~malaiya/ashoka.html ALPHABETUM - a Unicode font specifically designed for ancient scripts, including classical & medieval Latin, ancient Greek, Etruscan, Oscan, Umbrian, Faliscan, Messapic, Picene, Iberian, Celtiberian, Gothic, Runic, Old & Middle English, Hebrew, Sanskrit, Old Nordic, Ogham, Kharosthi, Glagolitic, Old Cyrillic, Phoenician, Avestan, Ugaritic, Linear B, Anatolian scripts, Coptic, Cypriot, Brahmi, Old Persian cuneiform: http://guindo.pntic.mec.es/~jmag0042/alphabet.html Writing system used to write Sanskrit Brāhmi, Devanāgari, Grantha, Kharoṣṭhi, Śāradā, Siddham, Thai, Tibetan Syllabic alphabets / abugidas Ahom, Balinese, Batak, Bengali, Brahmi, Buhid, Burmese, Chakma, Cham, Dehong Dai, Devanagari, Dhives Akuru, Ethiopic, Evēla Akuru, Gondi, Grantha, Gujarati, Gupta, Gurmukhi (Punjabi), Hanuno'o, Hmong, Javanese, Kannada, Kharosthi, Khmer, Lanna, Lao, Lepcha, Limbu, Lontara/Makasar, Malayalam, Manpuri, Modi, New Tai Lue, Oriya, Pallava, Phags-pa, Ranjana, Redjang, Shan, Sharda, Siddham, Sindhi, Sinhala, Sorang Sompeng, Sourashtra, Soyombo, Sundanese, Syloti Nagri, Tagalog, Tagbanwa, Takri, Tamil, Telugu, Thai, Tibetan, Tocharian, Varang Kshiti http://www.omniglot.com/writing/brahmi.htm