Alphabet Letters
Brahmi Cha 𑀙
Brahmi Letters
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Origin Mature Brahmi is securely attested in the edicts of Ashoka in the middle of the third century BCE, and the script could be read again only after James Prinsep worked out its values in 1837
Cha is the aspirated partner of ca, a voiceless palatal released with a following breath. It fills the second place in the palatal class, in the same order that governs every one of the five groups. The palatal series is well represented in the Middle Indo-Aryan of the inscriptions, because many Old Indo-Aryan clusters fell together into palatal sounds as the languages changed, and the letter is common in the Prakrit of the edicts. It is read with the inherent short a, and where it meets a following consonant with no vowel between, the two are written as a single conjunct. Aspiration in this script is written, never inferred, so a reader of Brahmi is told the difference between the two palatals rather than left to work it out from the context.
Facts
Disputed
Origin PeriodMany epigraphists derive Brahmi from a Semitic prototype, most often Aramaic, adapted in the centuries before the Mauryan empire 2Tradition: Indian epigraphy Brahmi's ancestry is disputed among epigraphists. Richard Salomon's Indian Epigraphy (Oxford University Press, 1998) surveys two live positions on the origin of the script attested in the Ashokan inscriptions: one derives Brahmi from a Semitic prototype, most often Aramaic, adapted in the centuries before the Mauryan empire; the other holds that it developed inside India itself. The dispute turns on the corpus, since Brahmi is securely attested only from Ashoka's edicts in the middle of the third century BCE onward, first read again by James Prinsep in 1837, and no earlier specimen on either side is securely dated. Both camps compare Brahmi's letterforms against Aramaic and other Semitic scripts using the same paleographic method, and without an intermediate dated example bridging the gap between any proposed ancestor and the Mauryan era script, neither derivation has been shown to fit the evidence better than the other. Origin PeriodOthers argue for a development inside India, and with no securely dated specimen earlier than the edicts the question stays open 2Tradition: Indian epigraphy Brahmi's ancestry is disputed among epigraphists. Richard Salomon's Indian Epigraphy (Oxford University Press, 1998) surveys two live positions on the origin of the script attested in the Ashokan inscriptions: one derives Brahmi from a Semitic prototype, most often Aramaic, adapted in the centuries before the Mauryan empire; the other holds that it developed inside India itself. The dispute turns on the corpus, since Brahmi is securely attested only from Ashoka's edicts in the middle of the third century BCE onward, first read again by James Prinsep in 1837, and no earlier specimen on either side is securely dated. Both camps compare Brahmi's letterforms against Aramaic and other Semitic scripts using the same paleographic method, and without an intermediate dated example bridging the gap between any proposed ancestor and the Mauryan era script, neither derivation has been shown to fit the evidence better than the other. Attributions
Associated SoundVoiceless aspirated palatal, the aspirated partner of ca 2Tradition: Indian epigraphy Origins
Origin PeriodMature Brahmi is securely attested in the edicts of Ashoka in the middle of the third century BCE, and the script could be read again only after James Prinsep worked out its values in 1837 2Tradition: Indian epigraphy Place of OriginThe Indian subcontinent. The Ashokan edicts carry the script from the Gangetic plain across the Deccan to the far south, while the northwest of the same empire wrote in Kharosthi instead 2Tradition: Indian epigraphy Origin of the NameThe letter has no traditional name of its own. It is called by its own sound plus the inherent short a, and the form used here is the name the Unicode Standard gives the character 3Tradition: Modern scholarly naming of the Brahmi letters Sense of the Namethe voiceless aspirated palatal; seventh consonant of the Brahmi order 3Tradition: Modern scholarly naming of the Brahmi letters Identity
Script TypeAn abugida: every consonant sign carries an inherent short a, which a vowel mark alters and the virama cancels, so the unit written is the syllable rather than the single sound 1Tradition: Comparative writing systems PositionSeventh consonant of the Brahmi order and second member of the palatal class 2Tradition: Indian epigraphy How the Letter JoinsConsonants that meet with no vowel between them are written as a conjunct, the second stacked beneath or ligatured to the first, rather than as two separate signs 1Tradition: Comparative writing systems Attestation
Meaning in the Attesting SourceThe letter belongs to the received Brahmi order, and the corresponding sign in the scripts descended from Brahmi across South and Southeast Asia goes back to it 2Tradition: Indian epigraphy Transmission
Manuscript TraditionAttested from the Asokan rock and pillar edicts of the third century BCE, the earliest substantial Brahmi corpus. 2 Learn More
Aspiration Written, Never Inferred
A reader of Brahmi is told whether a palatal is aspirated rather than left to work it out. That sounds unremarkable until it is set beside the scripts of western Asia, most of which left a great deal more to the reader, and beside the Brahmi treatment of other features, which is a good deal less generous. The script does not mark the difference between an intervocalic retroflex stop and the flap it weakens to; it does not distinguish a doubled consonant from a single one in every period; and it leaves the reader to supply a good deal of the vowel quantity in worn inscriptions. Aspiration it always writes, because the language turns on it.
Where this letter meets a following consonant with no vowel between, the two are written as a single conjunct. Clusters involving the palatals are common in both Sanskrit and Prakrit, and the combined shapes they produce are among those that changed most as the script passed into its regional descendants, because a ligature has more room to drift than a single letter does. A palaeographer therefore treats conjuncts as a separate body of evidence from the simple letters, and a script can look conservative in its letters and radical in its ligatures at the same time.
A Letter the Language Kept Making More Of
The move from Old to Middle Indo-Aryan generated aspirated palatals in quantity. Inherited clusters of a stop with a sibilant, and clusters of several other shapes besides, resolved into this sound as the language simplified its consonant groups, so a word that shows a cluster in Sanskrit will very often show this single aspirated palatal in the Prakrit of the Ashokan edicts. The letter is accordingly frequent in the earliest surviving Brahmi, and more frequent there than in a classical Sanskrit text of the same length.
That difference between the two stages of the language is one of the things the Ashokan material is most valuable for. The edicts were cut across an empire that stretched from the northwest to the far south, in several different Middle Indo-Aryan dialects, and the dialects differ from one another in exactly such treatments: which clusters resolved to what, which vowels were kept apart, whether an inherited r appears as r or as l. Comparing the same edict as it was cut in different places is therefore a linguistic experiment the Mauryan chancery ran without meaning to, and it remains the earliest direct evidence for dialect variation anywhere in the subcontinent.
The letter is also a good illustration of why a transliterated text is not a substitute for the original. The two-letter roman spelling used for it suggests a cluster of a stop and a breath, and a reader who has only seen the transliteration will assemble the sound wrongly and will also miscount the syllables, which matters as soon as verse is involved. The Brahmi sign is one letter for one sound, and reading the script rather than a romanisation of it settles both questions at once.
Cross-Tradition Connections
Derived from This
The Gurmukhi letter Chhachha continues the sign Brahmi Cha writes in the same place of the inherited series. The descent is not direct: it runs through the Sharada script of the northwest and then the Landa hands of the Punjab, and it is stated from position in the order rather than from shape.
Devanagari Cha descends from the Brahmi sign of the same value, through the Gupta and Nagari hands of northern India. The two alphabets align letter for letter because both are laid out in the varnamala order, the arrangement the Sanskrit phoneticians fixed by place of articulation.
Ranjana Cha continues the sign Brahmi Cha writes in the same place of the inherited varnamala. The descent is not direct: it runs through the Gupta and Siddhamatrka stages of the northern Brahmi line and then the scripts of Nepal, and it is stated from position in the order rather than from shape.
Siddham continues the Brahmi order letter for letter. The descent runs through the late Brahmi of the Gupta period and the Siddhamatrka hand that grows out of it, so this is a lineage rather than a direct copy of the older shape.
Tibetan cha continues the Brahmi cha, keeping its value and its place in the inherited order. The descent of the Tibetan script from the Brahmi family is not disputed; which Indic script of that family served as the immediate model in the seventh century is, and this link names the ancestor the atlas holds rather than choosing among the candidates.
Related To
Aspiration partners in the palatal class. The two are the same voiceless stop, and only the breath that follows the release separates them.
Opposite corners of the palatal class, the second of the five groups of five. Between them the two carry one feature each from the pair the table is built on.
Voicing partners in the palatal class. Both are aspirated stops, and they differ only in voice, which is the second of the two features the table is built on.
The nasal of the palatal class. The five nasals were arrived at by asking where each was made rather than by hearing one sound with variants.
Cha answers to Brahmi Cha, the same aspirated palatal affricate.
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