video link:

Intro

This time let’s continue talking about the ancient script in East Asia.

Origin

This script is Old Turkic Script. This script is very ancient but today this script has become a history script and no people are using it. Basically the old Turkic script was used in the 8th century to the 10th century. So based on the time period, we also can find that this was a script that was more than 1000 years old. Meanwhile, because of such a long history, we are not able to learn about a very precise development route.

Typically, there are several theories. First, starting with Vilhelm Thomsen in 1893, who was a Danish linguist and Turkologist, suggest that the Old Turkic script is derived from descendants of the Aramaic alphabet in particular via the Pahlavi and Sogdian alphabets of Persia, or possibly via Kharosthi used to write Sanskrit.

Then according to the shape of an old Turkic script, some scholars argue that this should be developed from Tamgas, which was a kind of livestock brand used by Eurasian nomads. But because of not enough proof, this theory has been widely rejected.

Third, a more solid theory is that this writing system is derived from Aramaic via the Sogdian alphabet and Syriac alphabet.

For the time of origin, the Chinese history documents showed us that the Turks hadn’t a written language by the 6th century and the 7th century. At the same time, the old Turkic inscriptions and manuscripts also were not earlier than the 7th century.

Alphabet & Direction

The reading direction of Old Turkic script is the same as the Arabic writing system and Hebrew alphabet, they are read from right to left. Typically Old Turkic has 2 symbols, a colon-like symbol that is sometimes used as a word separator and the other one is a red ring-like symbol that has the same function as the colon-like symbol and sometimes can replace the colon-like symbol.

Just like other scripts, the Old Turkic script was included in unicode in October 2009. Compared with other scripts, Old Turkic is more special. Because it’s a synharmonic language. Briefly, it means that it has 3 main categories of letters, the front vowel letters, the back vowel letters and other letters. When it transforms into Latin script, usually use superscript numerals ¹ and ² to mark consonant signs used with back and front vowels, respectively. Then the special letter can be in the special category because these letters don’t need to distinguish front or back vowels.

Who Used it?

Speaking of which, the old Turkic script was used to write the Old Turkic language. So who speaks this language and Who uses it? the answer is the people who lived in

Second Turkic Khaganate, which was a khaganate in Central and Eastern Asia. Then, Uyghur Khaganate (𐱃𐰆𐰴𐰕:𐰆𐰍𐰕:𐰉𐰆𐰑𐰣 Toquz Oɣuz budun) succeeded Second Turkic Khaganate (𐱅𐰇𐰼𐰜:𐰃𐰠 Türük el) and the old turkic script also was succeeded so this writing system could write Old Uyghur as well.

In fact, the Old turkic probably was very widely used in central Asia or in Eurasian Steppe more than 1000 years ago. It might even have arrived in the farthest west of Eurasian Steppe. Because the European Old Hungarian script has a very similar shape to the old Turkic. Usually it can be a Child system of Old Turkic.

But finally with the empire falled and separated into more different countries, plus during the time more and more Turkic countries accepted Islam, the old Turkic script was replaced by Arabic script and other new script. So this is today’s video/article and thank you for watching. Hope you can like this video/article. Have a good day. See you next time. Bye!

old turkic script converter

https://lingojam.com/ModernOrkhonYeniseiTurkicAlphabet

https://lingojam.com/LatintoOldTurkic

https://anythingtranslate.com/translators/old-turkic-runic-script-translator/

old turkic font:

https://fonts.google.com/noto/specimen/Noto+Sans+Old+Turkic

old turkic unicode:

https://www.unicode.org/charts/PDF/U10C00.pdf

reference:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_Turkic_script

https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E7%AA%81%E5%8E%A5%E5%AD%97%E6%AF%8D

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_Turkic