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(Redirected from Kharosthi)
The ' script', also known as the 'Gāndhārī script', is an ancient abugida (an alphasyllabary, based on consonants with graphical variations to express their associated vowels) used by the Gandhara culture of historic northwest Indian subcontinent to write the Gāndhārī and Sanskrit languages. It was in use from the middle of the 3rd century BCE until it died out in its homeland around the 3rd century CE. It was also in use in Kushan, Sogdiana (see Issyk kurgan) and along the Silk Road where there is some evidence it may have survived until the 7th century in the remote way stations of Khotan and Niya. is encoded in the Unicode range U+10A00—U+10A5F, from version 4.1.0.
The script was deciphered by James Prinsep (1799–1840), using the bilingual coins of the Indo-Greeks (Obverse in Greek, reverse in Pāli, using the script). This in turn led to the reading of the Edicts of Ashoka, some of which, from the northwest of the Indian subcontinent, were written in the script.
Scholars are not in agreement as to whether the script evolved gradually, or was the deliberate work of a single inventor. An analysis of the script forms shows a clear dependency on the Aramaic alphabet but with extensive modifications to support the sounds found in Indic languages. One model is that the Aramaic script arrived with the Achaemenid conquest of the region in 500 BCE and evolved over the next 200+ years to reach its final form by the 3rd century BCE where it appears in some of the Edicts of Ashoka found in northwestern part of the Indian subcontinent. However, no intermediate forms have yet been found to confirm this evolutionary model, and rock and coin inscriptions from the 3rd century BCE onward show a unified and standard form.
The study of the script was recently invigorated by the discovery of the Gandharan Buddhist Texts, a set of birch-bark manuscripts written in , discovered near the Afghani city of Hadda just west of the Khyber Pass. The manuscripts were donated to the British Library in 1994. The entire set of manuscripts are dated to the 1st century CE, making them the oldest Buddhist manuscripts yet discovered.
★ History of Pakistan
★ History of Afghanistan
★ Brahmi
★ 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)
★ Harry Falk, ''Schrift im alten Indien: Ein Forschungsbericht mit Anmerkungen'', Gunter Narr Verlag, 1993 (in German)
★ Gérard Fussman's, ''Les premiers systèmes d'écriture en Inde'', in Annuaire du Collège de France 1988-1989 (in French)
★ List of all known (Gandhārī) inscriptions.
★ information on the alphabet by Omniglot
★ A Preliminary Study of Manuscript Paleography by Andrew Glass, University of Washington (2000)
★ On The Origin Of The Early Indian Scripts: A Review Article by Richard Salomon, University of Washington (via archive.org)
★ Proposal to encode in Unicode (includes good background info)
The ' script', also known as the 'Gāndhārī script', is an ancient abugida (an alphasyllabary, based on consonants with graphical variations to express their associated vowels) used by the Gandhara culture of historic northwest Indian subcontinent to write the Gāndhārī and Sanskrit languages. It was in use from the middle of the 3rd century BCE until it died out in its homeland around the 3rd century CE. It was also in use in Kushan, Sogdiana (see Issyk kurgan) and along the Silk Road where there is some evidence it may have survived until the 7th century in the remote way stations of Khotan and Niya. is encoded in the Unicode range U+10A00—U+10A5F, from version 4.1.0.
| Contents |
| Decipherment |
| History |
| See also |
| References |
| External links |
Decipherment
The script was deciphered by James Prinsep (1799–1840), using the bilingual coins of the Indo-Greeks (Obverse in Greek, reverse in Pāli, using the script). This in turn led to the reading of the Edicts of Ashoka, some of which, from the northwest of the Indian subcontinent, were written in the script.
History
Paper strip with writing in . 2-5th century CE, Yingpan, Eastern Tarim Basin, Xinjiang Museum.
Scholars are not in agreement as to whether the script evolved gradually, or was the deliberate work of a single inventor. An analysis of the script forms shows a clear dependency on the Aramaic alphabet but with extensive modifications to support the sounds found in Indic languages. One model is that the Aramaic script arrived with the Achaemenid conquest of the region in 500 BCE and evolved over the next 200+ years to reach its final form by the 3rd century BCE where it appears in some of the Edicts of Ashoka found in northwestern part of the Indian subcontinent. However, no intermediate forms have yet been found to confirm this evolutionary model, and rock and coin inscriptions from the 3rd century BCE onward show a unified and standard form.
The study of the script was recently invigorated by the discovery of the Gandharan Buddhist Texts, a set of birch-bark manuscripts written in , discovered near the Afghani city of Hadda just west of the Khyber Pass. The manuscripts were donated to the British Library in 1994. The entire set of manuscripts are dated to the 1st century CE, making them the oldest Buddhist manuscripts yet discovered.
See also
★ History of Pakistan
★ History of Afghanistan
★ Brahmi
References
★ 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)
★ Harry Falk, ''Schrift im alten Indien: Ein Forschungsbericht mit Anmerkungen'', Gunter Narr Verlag, 1993 (in German)
★ Gérard Fussman's, ''Les premiers systèmes d'écriture en Inde'', in Annuaire du Collège de France 1988-1989 (in French)
External links
★ List of all known (Gandhārī) inscriptions.
★ information on the alphabet by Omniglot
★ A Preliminary Study of Manuscript Paleography by Andrew Glass, University of Washington (2000)
★ On The Origin Of The Early Indian Scripts: A Review Article by Richard Salomon, University of Washington (via archive.org)
★ Proposal to encode in Unicode (includes good background info)
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