Alphabet Letters
Brahmi Nna 𑀡
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
Nna is the retroflex nasal and the fifth member of the third class. In Sanskrit most of its occurrences are produced by a rule that converts the dental nasal to this sound after certain r-like or retroflex sounds earlier in the same word, a rule the grammarians state exactly. In the Prakrit of the edicts the retroflex nasal is common in its own right rather than only as the output of a rule. It is the nasal made with the tongue curled back, and the class closes with it as every other class closes with the nasal of its own place of articulation. The Dravidian languages have the sound independently of any such rule, which is one reason the letter is well attested in the southern use of the script.
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 retroflex nasal; fifteenth 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 PositionFifteenth consonant of the Brahmi order and the nasal that closes the retroflex 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 SoundRetroflex nasal. In Sanskrit most occurrences are produced by a rule converting the dental nasal after certain retroflex or r-like sounds in the same word 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
A Nasal Produced by a Rule
Most occurrences of the retroflex nasal in classical Sanskrit are not chosen by the speaker but produced by a rule. When certain retroflex or r-like sounds occur earlier in a word, a following dental nasal is converted to this retroflex one, even across intervening sounds, and the grammatical tradition states the conditions precisely, including which consonants block the change and which let it pass. The rule is one of the more remarkable pieces of the classical analysis, because it describes an effect operating at a distance rather than between neighbouring sounds, which is a kind of pattern most descriptions of language did not attempt for another two thousand years.
The consequence for a reader is that this letter carries information about what came before it. A retroflex nasal in a Sanskrit word implies a retroflex or an r earlier in the same word, and an editor reading a damaged inscription can sometimes use that to reconstruct a lost syllable. In the Prakrit of the edicts the picture is different and the sound occurs in its own right rather than only as the output of a rule, so the same letter means something rather less specific there.
The rule also has a limit that the tradition states carefully, and the limit is what makes it a rule rather than an observation. It operates within a word and not across the boundary between two, except in compounds, where the tradition specifies which kinds of compound count as one word for this purpose and which do not. Those specifications are among the more intricate parts of the classical grammar, and they are the reason the same two elements can show different nasals depending on how tightly they are joined.
Well Attested Where the Rule Does Not Apply
The Dravidian languages have a retroflex nasal independently, as a sound in ordinary words with no conditioning rule behind it, so the letter is common in the southern use of the script from early on. That is the general situation in the far south: the retroflex series that Indo-Aryan acquired partly from its neighbours is native equipment in Dravidian, and a script carrying the full class arrived in Tamil country already supplied with most of what the language needed.
What it did not supply were the three additional consonants that Tamil-Brahmi added at the end of the order, one of which is an alveolar nasal held apart from both the dental and the retroflex ones. Three nasals at three points of articulation is a distinction Indo-Aryan does not make anywhere, and the extra letter is one of the clearest signs that the southern use of the script is a fitting of a writing system to a language of a different family rather than a regional variant of the northern one. The retroflex nasal itself was received rather than added, and it keeps its inherited place as the fifth member of the third class.
For a reader of southern inscriptions the practical effect is that the letter appears where a Sanskrit reader would not expect it, in ordinary words with no retroflex or r earlier in them to have conditioned it. That is a useful signal about the language of a text: a retroflex nasal without a conditioning environment points away from Indo-Aryan. The standard handbooks list it among the features by which the language of a southern inscription is identified before its content is interpreted.
The same holds for the retroflex lateral, which the Dravidian languages use freely and which Indo-Aryan needs only in Vedic recitation and in a handful of dialects.
Cross-Tradition Connections
Derived from This
Devanagari Nna 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 αΉana continues the sign Brahmi Nna 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 Nna continues the sign Brahmi Nna 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
The nasal of the retroflex class. Both are voiced and both are made with the tip of the tongue curled back against the roof of the mouth, the nasal differing in that the closure is released through the nose.
The nasal of the retroflex class, and the letter that closes the group in the recited order before the table moves on to the next point of articulation.
The retroflex nasal of the inherited order, the second of the two nasals this Tamil letter has to be held apart from.
The nasal of the retroflex class, made at the same point as this stop, with the tip of the tongue curled back against the roof of the mouth and the breath let out through the nose. Every class in the table closes with its own nasal.
The nasal of the retroflex class, made at the same point as this stop, with the tip of the tongue curled back against the roof of the mouth. Every class in the table closes with its own nasal, standing after the stop that opens the class.
The nasal of the retroflex class. The five nasals were arrived at by asking where each was made rather than by hearing one sound with variants.
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.