Scripts
Old Uyghur Alphabet
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Origin from 700
The Old Uyghur alphabet is a cursive, originally vertically written script that developed from the Sogdian script, itself descended from Aramaic, in the late seventh or early eighth century, for writing the Old Uyghur Turkic language. After Genghis Khan's defeat of the Naiman in 1204 he captured an Uyghur scribe, Tata-tonga, and had him teach the Mongolian princes to write using this script, founding what became the traditional Mongolian script and, later, the Manchu alphabet.
Facts
Script TypeA cursive, joining consonantal script in the Aramaic tradition; described in the sources as an alphabet/abjad depending on convention. DirectionalityTraditionally written vertically, top to bottom, in columns running left to right, following the Sogdian vertical convention; horizontal left-to-right use emerged after the fourteenth century. 1 In Use Since (Year) Cross-Tradition Connections
Ancestor Of
Descends From
Aramaic Alphabet, Scripts Why this is disputed. The direct intermediate is the Sogdian script, cursive Aramaic-derived and not yet a live entity here (entity request filed alongside this batch); this edge records the real but indirect Aramaic ancestry until Sogdian is minted.
Sharpened from the prior associated-stance edge to Aramaic Alphabet now that the direct intermediate, Sogdian Script, exists (EntityRequest 453).
Sources
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