়
The nuqta (
Hindi–Urdu
Hindustani (; Devanagari: ,
*
*
*
* ; Perso-Arabic: , , ) is the ''lingua franca'' of Northern and Central India and Pakistan. Hindustani is a pluricentric language with two standard registers, known as Hindi and Urdu. Thus, the langua ...
: //, fa, , noqte; from ar, نقطة, nuqṭa, dot; sometimes also spelled nukta) is a
diacritic
A diacritic (also diacritical mark, diacritical point, diacritical sign, or accent) is a glyph added to a letter or to a basic glyph. The term derives from the Ancient Greek (, "distinguishing"), from (, "to distinguish"). The word ''diacrit ...
mark that was introduced in
Devanagari
Devanagari ( ; , , Sanskrit pronunciation: ), also called Nagari (),Kathleen Kuiper (2010), The Culture of India, New York: The Rosen Publishing Group, , page 83 is a left-to-right abugida (a type of segmental writing system), based on the ...
and some other
Indic scripts
The Brahmic scripts, also known as Indic scripts, are a family of abugida writing systems. They are used throughout the Indian subcontinent, Southeast Asia and parts of East Asia. They are descended from the Brahmi script of ancient India ...
to represent sounds not present in the original scripts. It takes the form of a
dot placed below a
character
Character or Characters may refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media Literature
* ''Character'' (novel), a 1936 Dutch novel by Ferdinand Bordewijk
* ''Characters'' (Theophrastus), a classical Greek set of character sketches attributed to The ...
. This idea is inspired from the
Arabic script
The Arabic script is the writing system used for Arabic and several other languages of Asia and Africa. It is the second-most widely used writing system in the world by number of countries using it or a script directly derived from it, and th ...
; for example, there are some letters in Urdu that share the same basic shape but differ in the placement of dots(s) or nuqta(s) in the
Perso-Arabic script
The Persian alphabet ( fa, الفبای فارسی, Alefbâye Fârsi) is a writing system that is a version of the Arabic script used for the Persian language spoken in Iran ( Western Persian) and Afghanistan ( Dari Persian) since the 7th ce ...
: the letter ع ''ain'', with the addition of a nuqta on top, becomes the letter غ g͟hain.
Use in Devanagari
Perso-Arabic consonants
Examples from Devanagari (the script used to write Hindi): hi, क़, qa, translit-std=ISO, label=none; hi, ख़, k͟ha, translit-std=ISO, label=none; hi, ग़, ġa, translit-std=ISO, label=none; hi, ज़, za, translit-std=ISO, label=none; hi, झ़, zha, translit-std=ISO, label=none; hi, ड़, ṛa, translit-std=ISO, label=none; hi, ढ़, ṛha, translit-std=ISO, label=none; and hi, फ़, fa, translit-std=ISO, label=none. Respectively, these letters modify hi, क, ka, translit-std=ISO, label=none; hi, ख, kha, translit-std=ISO, label=none; hi, ग, ga, translit-std=ISO, label=none; hi, ज, ja, translit-std=ISO, label=none; hi, झ, jha, translit-std=ISO, label=none; hi, ड, ḍa, translit-std=ISO, label=none; hi, ढ, ḍha, translit-std=ISO, label=none; and hi, फ, pha, translit-std=ISO, label=none. The term () is itself an example of the use of the nuqta. Other examples include hi,
क़िला ( ur, ), qilā, fortress, translit-std=ISO, label=none; and hi, आग़ा ख़ान ( ur, ),
Āġā K͟hān, translit-std=ISO, label=none: a combination of a Perso-Arabic (''āġā'') and a Turko-Mongolic (''k͟hān'') honorific, now the title of the leader of the
Nizari Ismaili
The Nizaris ( ar, النزاريون, al-Nizāriyyūn, fa, نزاریان, Nezāriyān) are the largest segment of the Ismaili Muslims, who are the second-largest branch of Shia Islam after the Twelvers. Nizari teachings emphasize independent ...
sect. Examples of more common words are hi, बड़ा, baṛā, big, translit-std=ISO, label=none; hi, पढ़ना, paṛhnā, to read, translit-std=ISO, label=none; hi, पेड़, pēṛ, tree, translit-std=ISO, label=none; hi, अंग्रेज़ी, Aṅgrēzī, English, translit-std=ISO, label=none; and hi, करोड़, karōṛ,
crore
A crore (; abbreviated cr) denotes ten million (10,000,000 or 107 in scientific notation) and is equal to 100 lakh in the Indian numbering system. It is written as 1,00,00,000 with the local 2,2,3 style of digit group separators (one lakh is eq ...
, translit-std=ISO, label=none.
The nuqta, and the phonological distinction it represents, is sometimes ignored in practice; e.g., being simply spelled as . In the text ''Dialect Accent Features for Establishing Speaker Identity'', Manisha Kulshreshtha and Ramkumar Mathur write, "A few sounds, borrowed from the other languages like Persian and Arabic, are written with a dot (bindu or nuktā). Many people who speak Hindi as a second language, especially those who come from rural backgrounds and do not speak conventional Hindi (also called ''Khariboli''), or speak in one of its dialects, pronounce these sounds as their nearest equivalents." For example, these rural speakers will assimilate the sound
ɣ (Devanagari: ग़; Urdu: ) as
ɡ (Devanagari: ग; Urdu: ).
With a renewed
Hindi–Urdu
Hindustani (; Devanagari: ,
*
*
*
* ; Perso-Arabic: , , ) is the ''lingua franca'' of Northern and Central India and Pakistan. Hindustani is a pluricentric language with two standard registers, known as Hindi and Urdu. Thus, the langua ...
language contact, many
writers now publish their works
in Devanagari editions. Since the Perso-Arabic orthography is preserved in
Nastaʿlīq script
''Nastaliq'' (; fa, , ), also romanized as ''Nastaʿlīq'', is one of the main calligraphic hands used to write the Perso-Arabic script in the Persian and Urdu languages, often used also for Ottoman Turkish poetry, rarely for Arabic. ''Nas ...
Urdu orthography, these writers use the nuqta in Devanagari when transcribing these consonants. Sometimes, व़ is used to explicitly represent the /w/ consonant and to differentiate it from /v/ consonant व.
Dravidian consonants
Devanagari also includes coverage for the
Dravidian consonants hi, ऴ, ḻa, translit-std=ISO, label=none /ɻ/; hi, ऱ, ṟa, translit-std=ISO, label=none /r/ and hi, ऩ, ṉa, translit-std=ISO, label=none /n/. (Respectively, these letters modify hi, ळ, ḷa, translit-std=ISO, label=none /ɭ/; hi, र, ra, translit-std=ISO, label=none /ɾ/ and hi, न, na, translit-std=ISO, label=none /n̪/). An example is hi,
तमिऴ् /t̪amiɻ/ ( ta, தமிழ்),
tamiḻ, translit-std=ISO, label=none.
Dardic consonants
For example, the letters and are used in Devanagari to write the
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 ...
alveolar affricates and respectively.
Eastern Indo-Aryan letters
To represent the
Eastern Nagari
Eastern may refer to:
Transportation
*China Eastern Airlines, a current Chinese airline based in Shanghai
*Eastern Air, former name of Zambia Skyways
*Eastern Air Lines, a defunct American airline that operated from 1926 to 1991
*Eastern Air Li ...
letter representing /ɔ/, the consonant hi, य़, ẏa, translit-std=ISO, label=none is used in Devanagari.
In
Maithili, there are four non-syllabic vowels: i̯, u̯, e̯, o̯ written in Devanagari as य़, व़, य़ॆ, व़ॊ. But colloquially, these are written without nuqta.
Similar diacritics
Sindhi's and
Saraiki's
implosive
Implosive consonants are a group of stop consonants (and possibly also some affricates) with a mixed glottalic ingressive and pulmonic egressive airstream mechanism.''Phonetics for communication disorders.'' Martin J. Ball and Nicole Müller. Ro ...
s are accommodated in Devanagari with a line attached below—a diacritical bar:
,
,
,
.
In
Tamil script
The Tamil script ( , ) is an abugida script that is used by Tamils and Tamil speakers in India, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia and elsewhere to write the Tamil language. Certain minority languages such as Saurashtra, Badaga, ...
, the special character (, ) is used like nuqta to
represent non-native consonants.
In
Thaana
Thaana, Taana or Tāna ( ) is the present writing system of the Maldivian language spoken in the Maldives. Thaana has characteristics of both an abugida (diacritic, vowel-killer strokes) and a true alphabet (all vowels are written), ...
script of
Maldives
Maldives (, ; dv, ދިވެހިރާއްޖެ, translit=Dhivehi Raajje, ), officially the Republic of Maldives ( dv, ދިވެހިރާއްޖޭގެ ޖުމްހޫރިއްޔާ, translit=Dhivehi Raajjeyge Jumhooriyyaa, label=none, ), is an archipelag ...
, one or many nuqtas are added to their native consonants to represent Perso-Arabic consonants, and each phoneme is encoded as a whole in the Unicode block (instead of a separate codepoint for the diacritic).
See also
*
Hindustani phonology
Hindustani language, Hindustani is the ''lingua franca'' of northern India and Pakistan, and through its two standardized Register (sociolinguistics), registers, Hindi and Urdu, a co-official language of India and co-official and national langua ...
*
Hindi-Urdu transliteration
Hindustani (; Devanagari: ,
*
*
*
* ; Nastaliq, Perso-Arabic: , , ) is the ''lingua franca'' of North India, Northern and Deccan Plateau, Central India and Pakistan. Hindustani is a pluricentric language with two Standard language, stand ...
*
Hunterian transliteration
The Hunterian transliteration system is the "national system of romanization in India" and the one officially adopted by the Government of India. Hunterian transliteration was sometimes also called the ''Jonesian transliteration system'' because i ...
References
Works cited
Bibliography
*Vajpeyi, K. D. (Kishorī Dās Vājpayī; किशोरीदास वाजपेयी), ''Hindī shabdanushāsan'' हिन्दी शब्दनुशासन (1957, 1958, 1973, 1976, 1988).
External links
Nuqte ka funda , नुक़्ते का फ़ंडा , نقطے کا فنڈا(in
Hindi/Urdu)
An Introduction to Indic scriptsSCRIPT GRAMMAR FOR HINDI LANGUAGE
{{Navbox diacritical marks
Brahmic diacritics
Hindustani orthography