Inscriptional Pahlavi is the earliest attested form of
Pahlavi scripts, and is evident in clay fragments that have been dated to the reign of
Mithridates I (''r.'' 171–138 BC). Other early evidence includes the Pahlavi inscriptions of
Parthian coins and
the rock inscriptions of
Sasanian emperors and other notables, such as
Kartir the
High Priest.
Letters
Inscriptional Pahlavi used 19 non-joining letters:
[.]
Numbers
Inscriptional Pahlavi had its own
numerals:
Numbers are written right-to-left. Numbers without corresponding numerals are additive. For example, 24 is written as (20 + 4).
Unicode
Inscriptional Pahlavi script was added to the
Unicode
Unicode or ''The Unicode Standard'' or TUS is a character encoding standard maintained by the Unicode Consortium designed to support the use of text in all of the world's writing systems that can be digitized. Version 16.0 defines 154,998 Char ...
Standard in October, 2009 with the release of version 5.2.
The Unicode block for Inscriptional Pahlavi is U+10B60–U+10B7F:
Gallery
Image:Taq-e Bostan - Pahlavi writing.jpg, 4th century text from Shapur III at Taq-e Bostan
File:Naqshe Rajab Darafsh Ordibehesht 93 (1).jpg, Kartir's inscription at Naqsh-e Rajab
File:Gold-Münze Ardaschir I Sassaniden.jpg, Coin of Ardashir I (r. 224–42)
File:Abnun fire pot - Aspez & Wahnam.jpg, One side of the
File:MIK - Sassaniden Pahlavi-Monogramm.jpg, 6th/7th century relief
Relief is a sculpture, sculptural method in which the sculpted pieces remain attached to a solid background of the same material. The term ''wikt:relief, relief'' is from the Latin verb , to raise (). To create a sculpture in relief is to give ...
with the monogram , which stands for ''abzūn farr'', meaning "May his '' farr'' increase!"
References
Abjad writing systems
Iranian inscriptions
Middle Persian
Obsolete writing systems
Persian scripts
{{Abjad-stub