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Re: Grantha

From:BP Jonsson <bpj@...>
Date:Friday, January 7, 2000, 21:23
At 19:33 -0800 6.1.2000, Barry Garcia wrote:
> >I've been developing a more plausible script for Saalangal, based off of >the Grantha script of southern India. This script is the ancestor of the >Tamil, Kannada, and Sinhal scripts. I've been simplifying the letter >forms down from the rather extravagant letter forms of Grantha. > >I found one site with an image of the script (Found at: >http://sdlcfsn.cs.iitm.ernet.in/tidbits.html ) , but it only had the >tranlisteration in Devanagari (so, i went to a site with the Devanagari >letters and their Latin equivalents). Then I came across a problem, I >found I could not find the sound for 'ng' (palatal n) anywhere. Anyway, I >was hoping someone out on the list may have another example of the script, >or could give me some plausible ideas on how to create ng from the >existing characters.
They probably just used anusvaara, the sign for a preceding nasal -- a small circle over the character --, most of the time, since that's just about the only context where an /N/ will occur compulsorily in Sanskrit. The character will have been identical to the Tamil/Malayalam ones, tho. (Writing out a preconsonantal nasal in full was *very* unusual in Sanskrit manuscripts, almost bad spelling, until western scholars came along and upset things.) /BP B.Philip Jonsson <mailto: bpj@...> <mailto: melroch@...> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~__ Anant' avanaute quettalmar! \ \ __ ____ ____ _____________ ___ __ __ __ / / \ \/___ \\__ \ /___ _____/\ \\__ \\ \ \ \\ \ / / / / / / / \ / /Melroch\ \_/ // / / // / / / / /___/ /_ / /\ \ / /Melarocco\_ // /__/ // /__/ / /_________//_/ \_\/ /Eowine__ / / \___/\_\\___/\_\ I neer Pityancalimeo\ \_____/ /ar/ /_atar Mercasso naan ~~~~~~~~~Cuinondil~~~\_______/~~~\__/~~~Noolendur~~~~~~ || Lenda lenda pellalenda pellatellenda cuivie aiya! || "A coincidence, as we say in Middle-Earth" (JRR Tolkien)