Hosta

This article contains Indic text. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks or boxes, misplaced vowels or missing conjuncts instead of Indic text.

The Kannada script (Kannada: ಕನ್ನಡ ಲಿಪಿ) is an alphasyllabary (sometimes called an abugida) of the Brahmic family,^[1] used primarily to write the Kannada language, one of the Dravidian languages of southern India and also Sanskrit in the past. The Telugu script is derived from Old Kannada, and resembles Kannada script. Kannada script evolved primarily from stone carving, hence most of the characters are round, curvy and symmetric with straight strokes/wedges. The Kannada script is second only to the Devanagari script in the number of languages using it in the Indian subcontinent. This script is also used to write the Telugu language (script derived form Old Kannada | Halegannada), Tulu Language, Banada Language, Konkani by the Konkani diaspora in coastal Karnataka.^[2] Similarly, Goykanadi, a variant of Halekannada and Kadamba lipi has been historically used to write Konkani in the state of Goa.^[3]

History

Kannada (Kanarese or Canarese) script is derived from the Old Kannada script.^[4] Old Kannada script^[5] which evolved around 10th century, is the continuation of the Kadamba script which in turn came during 4th century CE. Old Kannada was used for writing Kannada and Telugu languages, and therefore aptly called as Kannada-Telugu script. Modern scripts of Kannada and Telugu started to separate as early as the 13th century CE (During 1100 CE – 1400 CE).

The Kadamba script is said to have evolved from the Proto-Kannada script (during 4th century CE).^[6] The Kadamba script is also known as Pre-Old-Kannada script. The Proto-Kannada evolved from the ancient Brahmi script around 3rd century BCE.

Evolution

Halmidi Inscription Replica

Over the centuries some changes have been made to the Kannada script. These changes consist of:

1. Modification of existing glyphs: In the early Kannada [Telugu-Kannada] script, no orthographic distinction was made between the short mid [e, o] ಎ, ಒ and long mid [eː, oː] ಏ, ಓ. However, distinct signs were employed to denote the special consonants viz. the trill [r] ಱ the retroflex lateral [ɭ] ಳ and the retroflex palatal [ɺ] ೞ found only in South Indian languages, by 5th century.
2. Introduction of new characters: Kannada script includes characters like [ç] ಶ, [ʂ] ಷ, [rɨ] ಋ, [rɨː] ೠ, [lɨ] ఌ, [lɨː] ౡ, [eʲ] ಐ, [oʷ] ಔ, [am] ಅಂ, [ah] ಅಃ, and mahāprāṇa characters like [kʰ] ಖ, [ɡʱ] ಘ, [tʃʰ] ಛ, [dʒʱ] ಝ, [t̪ʰ] ಥ, [d̪ʱ] ಧ, [ʈʰ] ಠ, [ɖʱ] ಢ, [pʰ] ಫ, [bʱ] ಭ. The introduction was done so that Sanskrit and also loanwords into the Kannada language from the donor language Sanskrit) could be written using the Kannada script.

These changes have facilitated the use of the Kannada script for writing many of the literary Indic languages, including Sanskrit.

General

Kannada script has forty-nine characters in its alphasyllabary and is phonemic. The Kannada character set is almost identical to that of other Indian languages. The number of written symbols, however, is far more than the 49 characters in the alphasyllabary, because different characters can be combined to form compound characters (ottaksharas). Each written symbol in the Kannada script corresponds with one syllable, as opposed to one phoneme in languages like English. The Kannada writing system is an abugida, with consonants appearing with an inherent vowel.

The characters are classified into three categories: swaras (vowels), vyanjanas (consonants) and yogavaahas (part vowel, part consonants).

The name given for a pure, true letter is akshara, akkara or varna. Each letter has its own form (ākāra) and sound (shabda); providing the visible and audible representations, respectively. Kannada is written from left to right.^[7] Kannada alphabet (aksharamale or varnamale) now consists of 49 letters.^[8]

Each sound has its own distinct letter, and therefore every word is pronounced exactly as it is spelt; so the ear is a sufficient guide. After the exact sounds of the letters have been once gained, every word can be pronounced with perfect accuracy. The accent falls on the first syllable.^[7]

Vowels

There are thirteen vowels (swaras).

Brahmi script, Kanheri Caves

A Bilingual sign board in Kannada script

Note: ೠ (U+0CE1) was removed during 1990^[1].

Yogavaahaka's

The Yogavaahaka's (part-vowel, part consonant) include two letters:

1. The anusvara: ಂ (am)
2. The visarga: ಃ (ah)

Consonants

Two types of consonants are identified in Kannada: the structured consonants and the unstructured consonants. The structured consonants are classified according to where the tongue touches the palate of the mouth and are classified accordingly into five structured groups.

Structured consonants

These consonants are shown here with the IAST symbols and the unicode name following.

See place of articulation for more information on tongue positions.

Unstructured consonants

The unstructured consonants are consonants that do not fall into any of the above structures:

ಯ (ya), ರ (ra), ಱ (ṟ) (obsolete), ಲ (la), ವ (va), ಶ (IAST śa, Unicode sha), ಷ (IAST ṣa, Unicode ssa), ಸ (sa), ಹ (ha), ಳ (IAST ḷa, Unicode lla), ೞ (ll) (obsolete).

Numerals

The decimal numerals in the script are:

೦ (0), ೧ (1), ೨ (2), ೩ (3), ೪ (4), ೫ (5), ೬ (6), ೭ (7), ೮ (8), ೯ (9).

Kagunita

Written Kannada is composed of kagunita, corresponding to syllables. The signs for consonants may combine with the signs for vowels to form ligatures. Each kagunita corresponds to a syllable. In the table below the top row lists the vowels, and the leftmost column from row 2 down the consonants (actually represented by kagunita, namely that obtained by combining each consonant with the "neutral" vowel 'a'). The remaining cells contain the corresponding kagunita obtained by combining the consonant of that row with the vowel of that column.

Formation example:

Script similarities

Telugu script is closely related to the Kannada script because both scripts are derived from the Telugu-Kannada script.^[9] Scripts which are close to Kannada script other than Telugu script are Sinhala script^[10] (which included some elements from the Kadamba script^[11]), and old Peguan script (used in Burma).^[12]

Old-Kannada Text from Kavirajamarga:

See also

• Kannada
• Telugu script
• Tamil script
• Malayalam script
• Grantha script
• Kannada grammar
• Kannada literature
• Kannada poetry
• Karnataka
• Kannada script evolution
• Timeline of Karnataka
• ಠ_ಠ

References

External links

• The Unicode Book: Chapter 9PDF (634 KB) — South and Southeast Asian Scripts
• The Unicode Standard 5.0 — Kannada Code Chart PDF (111 KB)
• Kannada alphabet — From Omniglot
• Kannada lessons, alphabet worksheet — Kannada library