The Tanchangya script, also known as ''Ka-Pat'', is an

abugida An abugida (; from Geʽez: , )sometimes also called alphasyllabary, neosyllabary, or pseudo-alphabetis a segmental Writing systems#Segmental writing system, writing system in which consonant–vowel sequences are written as units; each unit ...

used to write the Tanchangya language. It is in the southern

Brahmic family of scripts The Brahmic scripts, also known as Indic scripts, are a family of abugida writing systems. They are used throughout South Asia, Southeast Asia and parts of East Asia. They are descended from the Brahmi script of ancient India and are used b ...

. Due to its script family, it has similarities to the

Burmese alphabet The Burmese alphabet (, MLCTS: ''mranma akkha.ya'', ) is an abugida used for writing Burmese, based on the Mon–Burmese script. It is ultimately adapted from a Brahmic script, either the Kadamba or Pallava alphabet of South India. The ...

, and

Mon alphabet The Mon alphabet (;, ;, ) is a Brahmic abugida used for writing the Mon language. It is an example of the Mon-Burmese script, which derives from the Pallava Grantha script of southern India. History The earliest Mon inscriptions, all undate ...

Origin

The script seems to be derived from ancient

Brahmic scripts The Brahmic scripts, also known as Indic scripts, are a family of abugida writing systems. They are used throughout South Asia, Southeast Asia and parts of East Asia. They are descended from the Brahmi script of ancient India and are used b ...

, which inherited the vowel sound within the consonants. If not an independent derivation, it should have derived from Burmese or Mon. It is believed that they had used the Brahmic scripts in the earlier stages, which were known by the term Thek or Sakya in northern Myanmar. The Tanchangya script was introduced recently in 2012 by adopting a manuscript in Rakhine State as stated by Rupak Debnath.Rupak-Debnath (2008): 167 Though both Chakma and Tanchangya have been using the present Chakma script for a long time, it is still unconfirmed who the alphabet originally belonged to and who introduced it. John M. Clifton in his ‘’Dialects, Orthography and Society ‘’opined that ‘the Tanchangya community decided to base their alphabet on the Chakma to show they were related to the Chakma. However, they systematically changed the alphabet to show that they were different from the Chakma they were not simply a part of the larger Chakma community.’ Work Papers of the Summer Institute of Linguistics
(1988). Moreover, in order not to cause misunderstanding between the two communities, Tanchangya has introduced these alphabets which are yet to develop into Unicode font. For the time being, it is just created as True Font.

Characteristics

It is written from left to right, similar to Brahmi scripts, unlike the Kharosti, which were used to write from right to left. Tanchangya Vowel

Vowels

There are five independent vowels such as A (a:), I(i), v(ʊ), E(e), and O a(oʊ). The other five vowels are dependent namely, Aa(ɔ), AA(ʌ), Ii(i:), and Uu(u:).

Consonants

There are thirty-one consonants letter found in the Tanchangya script. They are classified into group consonants and miscellaneous consonants.

Notes

References

* * {{list of writing systems Brahmic scripts