# Devanagri: ancient and modern alphabet



## Nasif ali

Any Member
If some one know the old devanagari script or some one can tell me the difference betwen the old devanagari script and the modern devanagari script. I am trying to read some old manuscript written in Devanagari script and I understand 75 % but some of the alphabets looks different to me . If some one can help me I will really be appreciated.
Thanks
Nasif ali


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## panjabigator

Saalam Aleikum!  Welcome to our Wordreference!  I am happy to see finally another Desi and another South Asian language represented on this forum!  Hurray!  Please add your Sindhi language tidbits to whatever you can!  

Now, addressing your question, I am unaware of any older or more antiquated form of Devanagri.  There is however something called the Kaithi script, which was a sort of short hand used by merchants during the Mughal days.  I believe that Maithili, spoken in Bihar, actually uses this script today.  

I did a google image search and here is what I found.


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## Nasif ali

Dear Sir.
I am glad to hear a desi voice from Pakistan or India. It dosen't a matter. I am really happy to see the reply so quickly. I am from Pakistan, Hyderabad Sindh. Sindhi language is the oldest language of the south asia. Most of our literature written during 1600 century A.D in Devanagari script and also in Arabic Script. In 1978 in India Mr. Hero Thakar found an old manuscript written in devanagari script he read that MANUSCRIPT and found 118 doha of qazi qazan written in sindhi. Recently I was just trying to learn devanagari script, so I might read some old manuscript and found some sindhi poetry. This is the only reason I am learning devanagari script.
I have some pages of similar kind of manuscript of the same devanagari script. I read most of it but some of letters I could not recognize. One is JH and the other is ou or alaf mad aa. I can speak urdu read urdu and write urdu very well. This is our national language so we should know about urdu. 
I hope we can talk to very soon.
Sicerely
Nasif Ali


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## Lugubert

Some Devanagari varieties, expecially those originating in Rajasthan and even more in Kashmir, so far make difficult reading for me. The effort needed to master them shouldn't be too enormous.

The Kaithi and similar scripts may be the precursors or at least relatives of today's Gujarati script. Put some effort into those, and I'll suppose you will find that you'll read lots of varieties without much problems.

The different (at least three) varieties of 'jh' should be no problem. Just learn to recognize them, and pick your favourite for writing that your font accepts.

Tell me what's your problem about the alif madda. It should be a minor thing compared to the no-brainer when discarding an `ayn and compensating by a vowel lengthening when leaving the Perso-Arabic script for Devanagari. And I don't see any ou problem.


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## panjabigator

What exactly was the alif mad problem?

Aapko hum sab Sindhi sikhaanii padegii.  Yaad rakhiega!

Khuda hafiz.


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## Monkamah

I am researching the signature on what I believe to be a piece of 17th century Mughal art and can't find anything matching the characters. There are three characters stacked in a column followed by what resembles a mathmatical "divided by" sign. Top character looks like a 5 w/ a connected "v" and a little circle then the divided by sign; second looks like a 5 w/ an "x" attached and a little circle followed by the sign; the third looks like an amophic human with a "swoop" at the end, little circle and the sign. Anyone got a clue? Thanks so much for your help.


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## Lugubert

Perhaps a wild guess, but what about 

1) aum, ॐ, the very most holy of all Indian (or at least Hindu) syllables
2) could be uM/ung, उं, possibly a holy syllable as well
3) huM हुं? Likewise.


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## Monkamah

Thank you so very much...I"m getting closer! 
Ju


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## huhmzah

Hey Monkamah!
The letters you've posted don't look like Hindi to me (unless someone wanted to write them reaaaaaaaally abstractly in which case Lugubert's readings seem fairly close  ). At first glance though, the letters seemed like Tibetan to me. Here's what they look like:
http://www.omniglot.com/writing/tibetan.htm

AND Nasif Ali ji! Apko humari janib se khush-amedéd -- main bhi Pakistan se ta'luq rakhta hun -- agarche mera khandan Punjab/Kashmir se hai, mujhe Sindhi sikhne ka hamesha se bahut shauq raha hai aur umeed hai ke jab aap ko fursat mili to aap hum ko thori bahut Sindhi sikhaen ge


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## Monkamah

Well, you might have something.  The only letter that I am able to get close to anything is the "5"-looling symbol but I am curious about the circle-over line-over circle symbol at the end of each word or phrase.  I'm afraid I don't know squat about how the asian languages are written so my question now is each symbol a specific word, a complilation of symbols joined together to make a word and is it possible for the "ta" something, something...  I appreciate you help tremendously.  Thank you so much.


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## Monkamah

Huhmzah, as for the second paragraph of your reply, I can only imagine!  
M


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## huhmzah

Monkamah said:


> Well, you might have something. The only letter that I am able to get close to anything is the "5"-looling symbol but I am curious about the circle-over line-over circle symbol at the end of each word or phrase. I'm afraid I don't know squat about how the asian languages are written so my question now is each symbol a specific word, a complilation of symbols joined together to make a word and is it possible for the "ta" something, something... I appreciate you help tremendously. Thank you so much.


 
The division-sign seeming symbol I think is a period (full-stop) in Tibetan -- these are tibetan's five punctuation signs: 
http://chris.fynn.googlepages.com/45-tibetan-punctuation.jpg/45-tibetan-punctuation-full.jpg


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## Monkamah

You're good!  Now, can you give me any hint as to what it says?


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## huhmzah

Hmm -- i don't know Tibetan  But if I were to guess the first one looks like the letter "o" to me -- the second one looks like an "a" and the third one seems to be the letter "h" with the "i" vowel on it. 

http://tibet.dharmakara.net/img/TibetanABC1.gif


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## Monkamah

Huhmzah, 

I am trying to attach a photo of the painting on which this elusive language is on the back but I can't seem to shrink the file size small enough to satisfy the requirements of this forum. My Indian friend told me the thinks it's Mughal. If you have any ideas where to post this pic I'll be happy to.

Thanks...M


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## huhmzah

How about emailing it to me at huhmzah@gmail.com -- I'll have a look at it 

Now I'm not sure what your friend meant by "Mughal" -- he might've meant its a "miniature" which is an art-style very very popular during the Mughal era, but wasn't particular to only the Mughals. Moreover, Mughal manuscripts and paintings often have writing on them, but the writing's always in Persian / Urdu or Chaghtai Turkish, so that would discount it as Mughal as well.


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## Monkamah

Okay, then we are back to Tibetan.  I'm with you on that.  Still trying to figure out how to put a pic on here of something.  I had one response that thought it might have been Bengali but I can't find anything to back that up.  The Tibetan alphabet is the closest I've seen.  Good call!  Now, If I can get just a liiiitttle bit closer...   The painting is roughly 16"x28" and is on fabric, I'm guessing rough silk, with an amazing amount of gold paint embellishing the garments, rugs, etc.   Everyone is wearing a light blue turban, even the women.


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## Monkamah

Your gmail awaits...


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## huhmzah

Hey! Alright first my disclaimer: I've only taken one course on Islamic Manuscripts and Art so I'm faaaaar from an expert in this, my guesses are as good as anyone elses  -- that being said, these are my impressions of the painting you sent me:

(a) Going simply on the way the clothes and the faces are depicted this painting seems to be of central asian / turkic origins and not Indian. Indian paintings in this style from an older era always have a very particular "look" to them when it comes to technique -- especially more recent manuscripts (1600s onwards). It doesn't seem like a mughal-era painting to me either. The way the clothes are painted, both the style depicted and the way they are painted, doesn't seem like a mughal-era painting.

(b) There are two other contradictions that I find in the painting -- perhaps you could tell me where and how you acquired it, if you know what scene is being depicted, if you know what the purpose of the painting is -- that might give us more clarity:

(1) The first contradiction is that the architecture depicted seems more typical of Indian manuscripts :-o The most obvious thing is the "chhatri" which is the sloping feature on the roof. The way the characters are placed is also more typical of Indian painting, especially the way some characters are holding up their hand -- in Indo-Islamic depictions of Mughal emperors and empresses / people of significance, the characters often held their hands up in that fashion holding a rose or another flower (I don't see anyone holding a flower either though, one of the character seems to be holding up a plant of some sort though).

(2) The second contradiction is in the clothes -- Turbans in a scene like this usually mark identity, and its rare to see all the turbans being the same style and same color (unless an 'army' of nameless/identityless people is being depicted). If anything, the main character who is seated would be marked in some way by the color/style of his turban and his clothes, but he isn't -- so the depiction seems oddly "egalitarian" . The other thing that kind of jumps out at me is that its rare to see Islamic art of this nature where characters have bare legs. ( BTW: the beardless characters are actually depictions of young men and not women :-D -- they tend to always look a bit feminine like this.)

It's a beautiful painting -- but my (non-expert) hunch is that this painting belongs to this century and is done by someone imitating various styles to give the overall "look" of an authentic Islamic manuscript. As for the tibetan on the back, I have no clue  This certainly doesn't come off as a tibetan painting at all, but I'm fairly certain the script on the back is Tibetan.


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## Monkamah

It belongs to a friend of mine and was originally purchased by her deceased brother in the San Francisco bay area a number of years ago.  The brother had exquisite taste in art and collected a variety of antiquities, two and three dimensional, from across the globe.  She has several quality asian pieces but this one, for some reason, struck me like a lightening bolt.  I can't explain why.  As you know, the Bay area has been a jumping off point for asian immigrants for centuries.


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## huhmzah

Woops -- sorry for the incomplete post earlier -- clicked on send too fast.


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## Monkamah

Thought so...judging from the (1) with nothing there...


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## Monkamah

One thing I noticed was that a few of the turbans are tied differently than those of the older members of the court, most notibly in the younger members, formerly "the women",  perhaps as a mark of their difference in caste stature. The bare legs struck me...there must be some significance in the fact they they have no boots or leggings as it is just as easy to paint leggings as bare legs. The piece is not a particularly sophisticated piece although some of the detail in the garments, rugs & such are amazingly detailed. This coupled with the fact that no one seems to be able to figure out this language on the back is puzzling and exciting. It tends to indicate that it is certainly not a "metropolitan" piece but from a lesser, smaller, perhaps more remote area. But, where??


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