The Laṇḍā scripts, from the term ''laṇḍā'' meaning "without a tail", is a Punjabi word used to refer to writing systems used in Punjab and nearby parts of

North India North India is a loosely defined region consisting of the northern part of India. The dominant geographical features of North India are the Indo-Gangetic Plain and the Himalayas, which demarcate the region from the Tibetan Plateau and Central ...

. In Sindhi, it was known as 'Waniko' or 'Baniyañ'. It is distinct from the Lahnda language varieties, which used to be called Western Punjabi. Laṇḍā is a script that evolved from the Śāradā during the 10th century. It was widely used in the northern and north-western part of India in the area comprising

Punjab Punjab (; Punjabi: پنجاب ; ਪੰਜਾਬ ; ; also romanised as ''Panjāb'' or ''Panj-Āb'') is a geopolitical, cultural, and historical region in South Asia, specifically in the northern part of the Indian subcontinent, comprising a ...

, Sindh, Kashmir and some parts of

Balochistan Balochistan ( ; bal, بلۏچستان; also romanised as Baluchistan and Baluchestan) is a historical region in Western and South Asia, located in the Iranian plateau's far southeast and bordering the Indian Plate and the Arabian Sea coastline. ...

and

Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (; ps, خېبر پښتونخوا; Urdu, Hindko: خیبر پختونخوا) commonly abbreviated as KP or KPK, is one of the Administrative units of Pakistan, four provinces of Pakistan. Located in the Geography of Pakistan, ...

. It was used to write Punjabi, Hindustani, Sindhi, Saraiki, Balochi,

Kashmiri Kashmiri may refer to: * People or things related to the Kashmir Valley or the broader region of Kashmir * Kashmiris, an ethnic group native to the Kashmir Valley * Kashmiri language, their language People with the name * Kashmiri Saikia Baruah ...

Pashto Pashto (,; , ) is an Eastern Iranian language in the Indo-European language family. It is known in historical Persian literature as Afghani (). Spoken as a native language mostly by ethnic Pashtuns, it is one of the two official langua ...

, and various Punjabi dialects like

Pahari-Pothwari The Indo-Aryan language spoken on the Pothohar Plateau in the far north of Pakistani Punjab, as well as in most of Pakistan's Azad Kashmir and in western areas of India's Jammu and Kashmir, is known by a variety of names, the most common of wh ...

Variants

There are at least ten ancient scripts that were classified as Laṇḍā scripts. They were often used as the mercantile scripts of the

Punjab region Punjab (; Punjabi: پنجاب ; ਪੰਜਾਬ ; ; also romanised as ''Panjāb'' or ''Panj-Āb'') is a geopolitical, cultural, and historical region in South Asia, specifically in the northern part of the Indian subcontinent, comprising a ...

. 5 of them have enough information to be supported in Unicode. #

Gurmukhī Gurmukhī ( pa, ਗੁਰਮੁਖੀ, , Shahmukhi: ) is an abugida developed from the Laṇḍā scripts, standardized and used by the second Sikh guru, Guru Angad (1504–1552). It is used by Punjabi Sikhs to write the language, commonly r ...

is used for Punjabi and sometimes for Sindhi. It evolved from Laṇḍā and is the only major Landa script in modern day usage.Pandey, Anshuman. (2010). L2/10-011
''A Roadmap for Scripts of the Landa Family''
/ref> # Khojkī, an ecclesiastical script of the Isma'ili Khoja community, is within the Sindhi branch of the Landa family of scripts.Pandey, Anshuman. (2011). L2/11-02
''Final Proposal to Encode the Khojki Script''
/ref> # Khudabadi, formerly used for Sindhi, is a Laṇḍā-based script.Pandey, Anshuman. (2011). L2/11-02
''Final Proposal to Encode the Khudawadi Script''
/ref> # Mahājanī, a script previously used for the Punjabi and Mārwāṛī, is related to Laṇḍā.Pandey, Anshuman. (2011). L2/11-27
''Proposal to Encode the Mahajani Script''
/ref> # Multani, former writing system of Saraiki, is a Laṇḍā-based script.Pandey, Anshuman. (2012). L2/12-31
''Proposal to Encode the Multani Script''
/ref>

Variants

References

Further reading