Takri alphabet

Last updated
Takri
𑚔𑚭𑚊𑚤𑚯 [1]
Type
Languages Dogri, Kangri, Sirmauri, Chamiyali, Mandeali
Time period
16 century CE to 19 century CE
Parent systems
Sister systems
 Gurmukhī
DirectionLeft-to-right
ISO 15924 Takr, 321
Unicode alias
Takri
U+11680–U+116CF
[a] The Semitic origin of the Brahmic scripts is not universally agreed upon.
This article contains IPA phonetic symbols. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Unicode characters. For an introductory guide on IPA symbols, see Help:IPA.

The Takri script (Devanagari: टाकरी; sometimes called Tankri) is an abugida writing system of the Brahmic family of scripts. It is closely related to, and derived from, the Sharada script formerly employed for Kashmiri. It is also related to the Gurmukhī script used to write Punjabi. Until the late 1940s, an adapted version of the script (called Dogri, Dogra or Dogra Akkhar) was the official script for writing Dogri in the state of Jammu and Kashmir, and for Kangri, Chambeali and Mandeali in Himachal Pradesh. There is also some record of the script's use in the history of Nepali (Khas-kura).

Devanagari writing script for many Indian and Nepalese languages

Devanagari, also called Nagari, is a left-to-right abugida (alphasyllabary), based on the ancient Brāhmī script, used in the Indian subcontinent. It was developed in ancient India from the 1st to the 4th century CE, and was in regular use by the 7th century CE. The Devanagari script, composed of 47 primary characters including 14 vowels and 33 consonants, is one of the most adopted writing systems in the world, being used for over 120 languages. The ancient Nagari script for Sanskrit had two additional consonantal characters.

Abugida writing system

An abugida, or alphasyllabary, is a segmental writing system in which consonant–vowel sequences are written as a unit: each unit is based on a consonant letter, and vowel notation is secondary. This contrasts with a full alphabet, in which vowels have status equal to consonants, and with an abjad, in which vowel marking is absent, partial, or optional. The terms also contrast them with a syllabary, in which the symbols cannot be split into separate consonants and vowels. Abugidas include the extensive Brahmic family of scripts of South and Southeast Asia, Semitic Ethiopic scripts, and Canadian Aboriginal syllabics.

Sharada script

The Śāradā, Sarada or Sharada script is an abugida writing system of the Brahmic family of scripts. The script was in widespread use between the 8th and 12th centuries in the northwestern parts of India, for writing Sanskrit and Kashmiri. The Gurmukhī script was developed from Śāradā. Originally more widespread, its use became later restricted to Kashmir, and it is now rarely used except by the Kashmiri Pandit community for ceremonial purposes.

Contents

Takri itself has historically been used to write a number of Dardic and Western and Central Pahari languages in the Western Himalaya, such as Gaddi or Gaddki (the language of the Gaddi ethnic group), Kashtwari (the dialect centered on the Kashtwar or Kishtwar region of Jammu and Kashmir) and Chamiyali (the language of the Chamba region of Himachal Pradesh). Takri used to be most prevalent script for business records and communication in various parts of Himachal Pradesh including the regions of Chintpurni, Una, Kangra, Bilaspur and Hamirpur. The aged businessmen can still be found using Takri in these areas, but the younger generation have now shifted to Devanagari and even English (Roman). This change can be traced to the early days of Indian independence (1950s−80s).

The Dardic languages are a sub-group of the Indo-Aryan languages natively spoken in northern Pakistan's Gilgit Baltistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, northern India's Jammu and Kashmir, and eastern Afghanistan. Kashmiri/Koshur is the most prominent Dardic language, with an established literary tradition and official recognition as one of the official languages of India.

Western Himalaya

Western Himalaya, refers to the western half of the Himalayan Mountain region, stretching from Badakhshan in northeastern Afghanistan/southern Tajikistan, through India to central Nepal.

Kishtwar City in Jammu and Kashmir, India

Kishtwar is a municipality in the Kishtwar District of the Jammu region in the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir.

Revival movement

Since Takri fell into disuse, [3] there have been sporadic attempts to revive the script in Himachal Pradesh. Recent efforts have been made to teach the script to Himachalis. [4]

Himachal Pradesh State in Northern India

Himachal Pradesh is a state in the northern part of India. Situated in the Western Himalayas, it is bordered by states of Jammu and Kashmir on the north, Punjab on the west, Haryana on the southwest, Uttarakhand on the southeast, and Tibet on the east. At its southernmost point, it also touches the state of Uttar Pradesh. The state's name was coined from the Sanskrit—Him means 'snow' and achal means 'land' or 'abode'—by acharya Diwakar Datt Sharma, one of the state's eminent Sanskrit scholars.

Unicode

Takri script was added to the Unicode Standard in January, 2012 with the release of version 6.1.

Unicode Character encoding standard

Unicode is a computing industry standard for the consistent encoding, representation, and handling of text expressed in most of the world's writing systems. The standard is maintained by the Unicode Consortium, and as of June 2018 the most recent version, Unicode 11.0, contains a repertoire of 137,439 characters covering 146 modern and historic scripts, as well as multiple symbol sets and emoji. The character repertoire of the Unicode Standard is synchronized with ISO/IEC 10646, and both are code-for-code identical.

Block

The Unicode block for Takri is U+11680–U+116CF:

Takri [1] [2]
Official Unicode Consortium code chart (PDF)
 0123456789ABCDEF
U+1168x𑚀𑚁𑚂𑚃𑚄𑚅𑚆𑚇𑚈𑚉𑚊𑚋𑚌𑚍𑚎𑚏
U+1169x𑚐𑚑𑚒𑚓𑚔𑚕𑚖𑚗𑚘𑚙𑚚𑚛𑚜𑚝𑚞𑚟
U+116Ax𑚠𑚡𑚢𑚣𑚤𑚥𑚦𑚧𑚨𑚩𑚪𑚫𑚬𑚭𑚮𑚯
U+116Bx𑚰𑚱𑚲𑚳𑚴𑚵𑚷𑚶
U+116Cx𑛀𑛁𑛂𑛃𑛄𑛅𑛆𑛇𑛈𑛉
Notes
1. ^ As of Unicode version 11.0
2. ^ Grey areas indicate non-assigned code points

Related Research Articles

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The Brahmic scripts are a family of abugida or alphasyllabary writing systems. They are used throughout the Indian subcontinent, Southeast Asia and parts of East Asia, including Japan in the form of Siddhaṃ. They are descended from the Brahmi script of ancient India, and are used by languages of several language families: Indo-European, Dravidian, Tibeto-Burman, Mongolic, Austroasiatic, Austronesian, and Tai. They were also the source of the dictionary order of Japanese kana.

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Nāgarī script

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Dogra is a Unicode block containing characters of the Dogra script historically used for writing the Dogri language in Jammu and Kashmir in the northern part of the Indian subcontinent. Dogra script is closely related to Takri.

References

  1. ↑ Pandey, Anshuman (2009-04-06). "Proposal to Encode the Takri Script in ISO/IEC 10646" (PDF).
  2. ↑ Pandey, Anshuman (2009-04-06). "Proposal to Encode the Takri Script in ISO/IEC 10646" (PDF).
  3. ↑ "Tankri once the language of royals, is now dying in Himachal Pradesh - Hindustan times". Archived from the original on 2017-02-02. Retrieved 2017-01-25.
  4. ↑ "Ancient scripts of Indian Mountains fights for survival - Zee News" . Retrieved 2017-01-09.

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