Alphabet Letters
Brahmi Gha 𑀖
Brahmi Letters
Citation Formats
General Reference
APA Style
BibTeX
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
Gha is the voiced aspirated velar, a breathy voiced stop of a kind that Sanskrit kept and that most of its Indo-European relatives lost. It is the fourth member of the velar class and completes the four stops before the nasal. The sound is not a g followed by an h but a single articulation released with breathy voice, and the phonetic tradition describes it that way rather than as a cluster of two. Brahmi writes it with a letter of its own, as it does each of the four stops in every class, which is one reason the consonant section of the order runs to thirty-four letters rather than to a smaller set with modifiers. Speakers of languages that lack the sound tend to hear it as a g and an h in sequence, which is exactly the analysis the phonetic tradition rejects.
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. 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 voiced aspirated velar; fourth consonant of the Brahmi order 3Tradition: Modern scholarly naming of the Brahmi letters Transmission
Manuscript TraditionAttested from the Asokan rock and pillar edicts of the third century BCE, the earliest substantial Brahmi corpus. 2 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 PositionFourth consonant of the Brahmi order and fourth member of the velar 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 Attributions
Associated SoundVoiced aspirated velar stop, breathy voiced, and a single articulation rather than a g followed by an h 2Tradition: Indian epigraphy 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 Learn More
The Series That Made Comparative Philology Possible
The voiced aspirates were the most consequential sounds in Sanskrit for the study of language in Europe. Most of the older Indo-European languages had lost the series, merging it into plain voiced stops or into fricatives, and Sanskrit had kept it. When European scholars began comparing Sanskrit with Greek, Latin and Germanic in the early nineteenth century, the four letters that write these sounds were among the clearest evidence that the resemblance among the languages was systematic rather than accidental, because they showed regular correspondences with quite different sounds in each of the others.
That is a use of the letter its Indian inventors never contemplated, and it is worth keeping the two things apart. To the phoneticians who built the table, the sound is simply the fourth cell of the velar class, voiced and aspirated, and its place is dictated by the arrangement rather than argued for. To a comparative philologist it is a survival. Both readings are correct and they answer different questions. The sound itself is a single articulation released with breathy voice, not a stop followed by a separate h, and the phonetic tradition is explicit on the point, which is why Brahmi writes it with one letter rather than with a cluster of two.
Rare in the Word, Fixed in the Order
Voiced aspirated velars are not common in the inherited vocabulary. A stretch of Sanskrit or Prakrit can run a long way without needing this letter, and inscriptions of moderate length frequently do not carry it at all, so it is among the signs of which a palaeographer has relatively few dated examples to work from. Its position in the order is nevertheless fixed and never varies: fourth in the velar class, after the voiced unaspirated stop and before the nasal that closes the group.
That is the general principle the Brahmi order runs on and it is worth naming plainly. Position is determined by the analysis, not by frequency, so the table has cells that the language fills heavily and cells it barely fills at all, and both are taught in the same sequence. A learner meets the letter as the fourth member of the first class long before meeting a word that uses it. Because the sequence was recited before it was written out as a list, and because recitation preserves an order regardless of what the order contains, the letter has been carried unchanged through two thousand years and into every script descended from Brahmi, including scripts used for languages with no voiced aspirates at all.
Cross-Tradition Connections
Derived from This
Devanagari Gha 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.
The Gurmukhi letter Ghagga continues the sign Brahmi Gha 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.
Ranjana Gha continues the sign Brahmi Gha 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.
Related To
Aspiration partners in the velar class. Both are voiced, and the second is released with the breathy voice that Sanskrit kept where most of its relatives lost it.
Opposite corners of the velar class, the first of the five groups of five. One is voiceless and unaspirated, the other voiced and aspirated, and the class holds all four combinations of the two features.
Voicing partners in the velar 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 velar class, and the letter that closes the group in the recited order before the table moves on to the next point of articulation.
Sources
Reader Challenges (0 open reader challenges)
No disputes yet. Spotted an error or a better source? Open the first one.
Sign in to dispute this or suggest a correction.
View At A Past Year
The atlas records no dated fact of its own for this entry, so there is no other year to choose.