Carian script
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Carian | ||
|---|---|---|
| Type | Alphabet | |
| Spoken languages | Carian language | |
| Time period | 7th to 1st centuries BCE | |
| Parent systems | Greek alphabet Carian |
|
| Child systems | None | |
| Sister systems | Lycian script | |
| ISO 15924 | Cari | |
| Note: This page may contain IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. | ||
The Carian script was used to write the Carian language. The script consists of some 45 signs and is thought to be alphabetic. Carian inscriptions have been found in both Caria proper (south-west Anatolia) and in the Nile delta, where Carian mercenaries fought for the Egyptian pharaohs.
Many signs of the Carian alphabet resemble Greek characters, but their phonetic value is generally very different:
| Sign | Carian sound | Greek sound |
|---|---|---|
| Γ | b | g |
| Δ | l | d |
| E | ù | e |
| F | r | w |
| I | λ a liquid, l/r |
i |
| Λ | b | l |
| N | m | n |
| C | d | s |
| Φ | ñ | ph |
| Ψ | n | ps |
So far, the phonetic value of 27 out of the 45 signs is considered secure.
[edit] Carian in Unicode
The Carian script is included in version 5.1 of the Unicode standard. It is encoded in Plane 1 (Supplementary Multilingual Plane), range U+102A0 - U+102DF.
[edit] References
- Adiego, I.J., The Carian Language (Leiden: Brill, 2006).
- Davies, Anna Morpurgo, "Decipherment" in International Encyclopedia of Linguistics, William J. Frawley, ed., 2nd ed. (Oxford, 2003) I:421.
- Michael Everson, "Proposal to encode the Carian script in the SMP of the UCS", ISO/IEC JTC1/SC2/WG2 N3020R, 2006-01-12. full text. Contains many useful illustrations and tables.
- Schürr, Diether, "Zur Bestimmung der Lautwerte des karischen Alphabets 1971-1991", Kadmos 31:127-156 (1992) .
- Swiggers & Jenniges, in: P.T. Daniels & W. Bright (eds.), The World's Writing Systems (New York/Oxford, 1996), pp. 285-286.
