Kannada script · Lablypedia

The Kannada script (ಅಕ್ಷರಮಾಲೆ akṣaramāle or ವರ್ಣಮಾಲೆ varṇamāle) is a phonemic abugida of forty-nine letters. The character set is almost identical to that of other Brahmic scripts or often known as Brahmi Lipi. Consonantal letters imply an inherent vowel. Letters representing consonants are combined to form digraphs (ಒತ್ತಕ್ಷರ ottakṣara) when there is no intervening vowel. Otherwise, each letter corresponds to a syllable.

The letters are classified into three categories: ಸ್ವರ svara (vowels), ವ್ಯಂಜನ vyañjana (consonants), and ಯೋಗವಾಹಕ yōgavāhaka (semiconsonants).

The Kannada words for a letter of the script are ಅಕ್ಷರ akshara, ಅಕ್ಕರ akkara, and ವರ್ಣ varṇa. Each letter has its own form (ಆಕಾರ ākāra) and sound (ಶಬ್ದ śabda), providing the visible and audible representations, respectively. Kannada is written from left to right.

History

Kannada script or the early Kadamba script evolved from the Ashokan Brahmi script, which later evolved into Kannada-Telugu script, during the period of Chalukyas and later Chalukyas of Vengi. The Kannada and Telugu scripts then separated by around 1300 C.E.

The 11th-century Persian scholar and polymath Al-Biruni calls the Kannada script as Karnata alphabets used in Karnatadesa.

Over the centuries some changes have been made to the Kannada script. These changes consist of:

Modification of existing glyphs: In the early Kannada script, no orthographic distinction was made between the short mid ಎ, ಒ and long mid ಏ, ಓ. However, distinct signs were employed to denote the special consonants viz. the trill ಱ the retroflex lateral ಳ and the retroflex rhotic ೞ, by the 5th century.

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Vowels

There are thirteen vowel letters (ಸ್ವರ svara) in modern Kannada. The Kannada script is an abugida, where when a vowel follows a consonant, it is written with a diacritic rather than as a separate letter. There are also three obsolete vowels, corresponding to vowels in Sanskrit.

Written Kannada is composed of akshara or kagunita, corresponding to syllables. The letters for consonants combine with diacritics for vowels. The consonant letter without any diacritic, such as ಕ ka, has the inherent vowel a ಅ. A consonant without a vowel is marked with a 'killer' stroke, such as ಕ್ k. This silencing diacritic and process is known as ಹಲಂತ halanta, whereas the resulting letter is called an ಅರ್ಧಾಕ್ಷರ ardhākshara (lit. 'half letter').

Kannada has a phonemic vowel length distinction, so like many other Brahmic scripts, the writing system has two sets of diacritics, one for short vowels and one for long vowels. Short vowels are referred to as ಹ್ರಸ್ವ hrasva, while long vowels are referred to as ದೀರ್ಘ dīrgha.

Yōgavāha

There are two yōgavāha (part-vowel, part consonant) letters, known as ardhavisarga, used in modern Kannada and two others used in Sanskrit transcription.

Consonant letters

Two categories of consonant letters (ವ್ಯಂಜನ vyan̄jana) are defined in Kannada: the structured consonants and the unstructured consonants.

Structured consonants

The structured consonants are classified according to their place of articulation, that is, where the tongue touches the palate.

Unstructured consonants

The unstructured consonants are consonants that do not fall into any of the above structures:

Obsolete Kannada letters

Kannada literary works employed the letters ಱ (transliterated 'ṟ' or 'rh') and ೞ (transliterated 'ḻ', 'lh' or 'zh'), whose manner of articulation most plausibly could be akin to those in present-day Malayalam and Tamil. The letters dropped out of use in the 12th and 18th centuries, respectively. Later Kannada works replaced 'rh' and 'lh' with ರ (ra) and ಳ (la) respectively.

It is still used to write the Badaga language and a vowel + virama + ḻ is used to transcribe its retroflex vowels.

Another letter (or unclassified vyanjana (consonant)) that has become extinct is 'nh' or 'inn'. Likewise, this has its equivalent in Telugu, where it is called Nakaara pollu. The usage of this consonant was observed until the 1980s in Kannada works from the mostly coastal areas of Karnataka (especially the Dakshina Kannada district). Now, hardly any mainstream works use this consonant. This letter has been replaced by ನ್ (consonant n).

Consonant conjuncts

The Kannada script is rich in conjunct consonant clusters, with most consonants having a standard subjoined form and few true ligature clusters. A table of consonant conjuncts follows although the forms of individual conjuncts may differ according to the font.

Of special note is the sequence concerning the letter ರ (ra). Unlike other letters, the conjunct form called arkaavotthu ಅರ್ಕಾವೊತ್ತು is written second even if it is pronounced first in the sequence.

For example, the /rnaː/ in the word Karnāṭaka (ಕರ್ನಾಟಕ) is written ರ್ನಾ rather than ರ‍್ನಾ.

The nasal consonants ಙ (ṅa), ಞ (ña), ಣ (ṇa), ನ (na), and ಮ (ma) are usually written as an anusvara ಂ when preceding another consonant rather than a consonant conjunct.

For example, the /ŋg/ in the word Beṅgaḷūru (ಬೆಂಗಳೂರು) is usually written ಂಗ rather than ಙ್ಗ (ಬೆಙ್ಗಳೂರು).

Complete list of consonant conjuncts

Full list of consonant + vowel combinations

The formations shown boldface above are seldom used.

Numerals

The decimal numerals in the script are:

Transliteration

Several transliteration schemes/tools are used to type Kannada characters using a standard keyboard. These include Baraha (based on ITRANS), Pada Software and several internet tools like Google transliteration, Quillpad (predictive transliterator). Nudi, the Government of Karnataka's standard for Kannada Input, is a phonetic layout loosely based on transliteration.

In popular culture

Due to its resemblance to an eye and an eyebrow, the Kannada letter ಠ ṭha is used in the "look of disapproval" (displayed as "ಠ_ಠ"), a popular emoticon used to convey disapproval or contempt. Similarly, the akshara ರೃ rr̥a has been used in emoticons to represent a monocle, while ಥ tha has been used to represent a tearing eye.

Unicode

Kannada script was added to the Unicode Standard in October 1991 with the release of version 1.0.

The Unicode block for Kannada is U+0C80–U+0CFF: