Brahmi Script

[Saikat]

Hi,

I was trying to learn Brahmi script. There are quite  few charts in web showing the alphabets. However I am not able to find a chart detailing on consonant conjuncts (Na + Ta as in Samanta).

Also I will need consonants with the vowels (not sure how I can explain this). A partial list is given here.
.

Any help to a web resource/document will be appreciated.
Thank you,
Saikat

[THCoins]

Great you want to learn Brahmi script !
If you have knowledge of Devanagari that may be an advantage at some point, but a disadvantage at other moments.
First you should realize that there is not one Brahmi. There is a continuous evolution over time, in addition the script is different in different areas. However, don't despair, a few forum members did it before you, so help is available.

In general three main types can be distinguished:
- Early, Ashoka Brahmi. Used on ancient coins before 200 AD, fairly standardized. What you show is Ashoka Brahmi.
- Late Brahmi, this is commonly equated with Gupta Brahmi around 400-500 AD.
- Transitional Brahmi: Post Gupta, this is the most variable, upto ca 800 AD.

Every character in Brahmi is an Aksara, that is a consonant with an implicit vowel A, Like Ka.
Unlike in the western alphabet there may be different aksaras for one consonant depending how they sound. So there is a different aksara for a Da in it's western pronunciation and one for when it is spoken with tongue curled backwards.
To indicate a different vowel a vowel modificator or matra is added. You showed them for classical Brahmi. In later times different forms are used.
For initial vowels in a word there are separate aksaras.
To make a compound character like Nta, the shape of the last aksara usually is attatched to the lower right side of the first. There are some notable exceptions. Like when Ya is added to Sa to make Sya, not the ya shape is used but a big curl upwards.

To start simple many people suggest just to start with trying to transcribe well readable coins.
A nice help with this can for example be: "How to read the legends on coins of the Western Kshatrapas" by P. Tandon. You can find that on the internet.
Also the book by A. Fishman "the silver coinage of the western satraps in india" addresses the matter, but is expensive.

Other nice resources:
- Website central institute of language sciences : http://www.ciillibrary.org has a whole range of pages with evolution charts of different characters like here Ya
- Digital library of india : website for example you can download here for free the book "The Palaeography of Brahmi Script" by Verma, Thakur Prasad, which has lots of charts with character variants.

Hopes that gives you some of the info you needed ?
 

[Figleaf]

A nice help with this can for example be: "How to read the legends on coins of the Western Kshatrapas" by P. Tandon. You can find that on the internet.

You can download that text for free here.

Peter

[Saikat]

Hi,
My vernacular being Bengali, I feel, I will be facing less problem  in learning Brahmi. The paper  "How to read the legends on coins of the Western Kshatrapas" will be very helpful as my first attempt will be on the Western Khsatrapa coins. The overlays made Overlord will also be very helpful. 
Thank you ,
Saikat

[Quant.Geek]

Aside from the existing information, another way to get the constructs is to download Alphabetum font.  There is a demo version of the font that has all the constructs for Brahmi in it.  Just load it up and use BabelMap or Character Map to select the construct.  For Tamil Brahmi, see Adinatha font which has all the constructs for that.