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The Sinhala script (Sinhala: සිංහල අක්ෂර මාලාව, romanized: Siṁhala Akṣara Mālāva), also known as Sinhalese script, is a writing system used by the Sinhalese people and most Sri Lankans in Sri Lanka and elsewhere to write the Sinhala language as well as the liturgical languages Pali and Sanskrit. [3]
The Sinhala language, native to the island nation of Sri Lanka, is written in the Sinhala script—a beautifully curvilinear script that has its roots in ancient India but has evolved to have its own distinctive style and identity.
- History
- Types of Alphabets
- Structure
Sinhala script comes from Brahmi, and was imported from Northern India, around the 3rd century BCE. Sinhala script developed in a complex way: Part independently but also strongly influenced by South Indian scripts at various stages. It is clearly influenced by the early Grantha script. Pottery from the 6th century BCE has been found in Anuradhapur...
Sidath sangara alphabet
This alphabet was invented in the Dambadeniya period (1220–1345).This is the first specific Sinhala alphabet to be found in writing.
Śuddha set
This alphabet includes the letters usually used everyday. It is enough to write almost every word in Sinhala.
Miśra set
The Śuddha set was not enough to spell Pali and Sanskrit words correctly. So, new letters had to be used. This alphabet first appears in Abraham Mendis Gunasekara's Comprehensive Grammar of the Sinhalese Language, a grammar book published in 1891.
It uses consonants as its base unit. To make different sounds, small strokes of lines called 'pili' (in Sinhala) are written before, after, above or below the base consonant.
The Sinhala script is used for writing the Sinhala language, spoken by approximately 16 million people in Sri Lanka, සිංහල අක්ෂර මාලාව Sinhalese alphabet. The alphabet is a descendant of the ancient Indian Brahmi script and is closely related to the South Indian Grantha script and Kadamba alphabet.
- si
- abugida
- sinh
- 78 + 23
Jun 30, 2024 · One of the key visuals of the Sri Lankan identity is our Sinhala script in all its forms – from the flowing Sinhala script of the ola leaves of old to the modern Sinhala typefaces pioneered for the digital age.
Sinhalese is the language of the Sinhalese, the largest ethnic group of Sri Lanka. Sinhalese is classified as belonging to the Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-Iranian sub-group of the Indo-European group of languages.
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It is written using the Sinhala script, which is a Brahmic script closely related to the Grantha script of South India. [ 6] Sinhala is one of the official and national languages of Sri Lanka, alongside Tamil. Along with Pali, it played a major role in the development of Theravada Buddhist literature. [ 1]
