Brahmi

Quick Facts
Type
Genealogy
Location
Time
Direction

Syllabic Alphabetic
Brahmi
South Asia
5th century BCE to 4th century CE
Variable (Horizontal)

The Brahmi script is one of the most important writing systems in the world by virtue of its time
depth and influence. It represents the earliest post-Indus corpus of texts, and some of the earliest
historical inscriptions found in India. Most importantly, it is the ancestor to hundreds of scripts
found in South, Southeast, and East Asia.
This elegant script appeared in India most certainly by the 5th century BCE, but the fact that it
had many local variants even in the early texts suggests that its origin lies further back in time.
There are several theories on to the origin of the Brahmi script. The first theory is that Brahmi
has a West Semitic origin. For instance, the symbol for a resembles Semitic letter 'alif. Similarly,
dha, tha, la, and ra all appear quite close to their Semitic counterparts. Another theory, from a
slightly different school of thought, proposes a Southern Semitic origin. Finally, the third theory
holds that the Brahmi script came from Indus Script. However, at least in my personal opinion,
the lack of any textual evidence between the end of the Harappan period at around 1900 BC and
the first Brahmi and Kharoshthi inscriptions at roughly 500 BC makes the Indus origin of
Brahmi highly unlikely. Yet on the other hand, the way Brahmi, and its relative Kharosthi, works
is quite different from Semitic scripts, and may point to either a stimulus-diffusion or even
indigenous origin. The situation is complex and confusing, and more research should be
conducted to either prove or disprove any of the theories.
Brahmi is a "syllabic alphabet", meaning that each sign can be either a simple consonant or a
syllable with the consonant and the inherent vowel /a/. Other syllabic alphabets outside of South
Asia include Old Persian and Merotic. However, unlike these two system, Brahmi (and all
subsequent Brahmi-derived scripts) indicates the same consonant with a different vowel by
drawing extra strokes, called matras, attached to the character. Ligatures are used to indicate
consonant clusters.
The following chart is the basic Brahmi script. There are many variations to the basic letter form,
but I have simplified it here so that the most canonical shape is presented.

And an example of strokes added to indicate different vowels following the consonants /k/ and
/l/.

The Brahmi script was the ancestor of all South Asian Writing Systems. In addition, many East
and Southeast Asian scripts, such as Burmese, Thai, Tibetan, and even Japanese to a very small
extent (vowel order), were also ultimately derived from the Brahmi script. Thus the Brahmi
script was the Indian equivalent of the Greek script that gave arise to a host of different systems.

You can take a look at the evolution of Indian scripts, or the evolution of Southeast Asian scripts.
Both of these pages are located at the very impressive site Languages and Scripts of India. You
can also take a look at Asoka's edict at Girnar, inscribed in the Brahmi script.