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(, ''pre-kudlít'': , ''virama-krus-kudlít'': , ''virama-pamudpod'': ; also formerly commonly incorrectly known as alibata) is a Philippine script. The
script Script may refer to: Writing systems * Script, a distinctive writing system, based on a repertoire of specific elements or symbols, or that repertoire * Script (styles of handwriting) ** Script typeface, a typeface with characteristics of ha ...
is an
abugida An abugida (, from Ge'ez: ), sometimes known as alphasyllabary, neosyllabary or pseudo-alphabet, is a segmental writing system in which consonant-vowel sequences are written as units; each unit is based on a consonant letter, and vowel no ...
belonging to the family of the
Brahmic scripts The Brahmic scripts, also known as Indic scripts, are a family of abugida writing systems. They are used throughout the Indian subcontinent, Southeast Asia and parts of East Asia. They are descended from the Brahmi script of ancient In ...
. Geographically, it was widely used in
Luzon Luzon (; ) is the largest and most populous island in the Philippines. Located in the northern portion of the Philippines archipelago, it is the economic and political center of the nation, being home to the country's capital city, Manila, as ...
and other parts of the
Philippines The Philippines (; fil, Pilipinas, links=no), officially the Republic of the Philippines ( fil, Republika ng Pilipinas, links=no), * bik, Republika kan Filipinas * ceb, Republika sa Pilipinas * cbk, República de Filipinas * hil, Republ ...
prior to and during the 16th and 17th centuries before being replaced by the
Latin alphabet The Latin alphabet or Roman alphabet is the collection of letters originally used by the ancient Romans to write the Latin language. Largely unaltered with the exception of extensions (such as diacritics), it used to write English and the ...
during the period of Spanish colonization. It was used in the
Tagalog language Tagalog (, ; ; '' Baybayin'': ) is an Austronesian language spoken as a first language by the ethnic Tagalog people, who make up a quarter of the population of the Philippines, and as a second language by the majority. Its standardized form, ...
and, to a lesser extent, Kapampangan-speaking areas; its use spread to the
Ilocanos The Ilocanos ( ilo, Tattao nga Iloko/), Ilokanos, or Iloko people are the third largest Filipino ethnolinguistic group and mostly reside within the Ilocos Region in the northwestern seaboard of Luzon, Philippines. The native language of the Ilo ...
in the early 17th century. In the 19th and 20th centuries, survived and evolved into multiple forms—the Tagbanwa script of
Palawan Palawan (), officially the Province of Palawan ( cyo, Probinsya i'ang Palawan; tl, Lalawigan ng Palawan), is an archipelagic province of the Philippines that is located in the region of Mimaropa. It is the largest province in the country in t ...
, and the Hanuno'o and Buhid scripts of
Mindoro Mindoro is the seventh largest and eighth-most populous island in the Philippines. With a total land area of 10,571 km2 ( 4,082 sq.mi ) and has a population of 1,408,454 as of 2020 census. It is located off the southwestern coast of Luz ...
—and was used to create the constructed modern Kulitan script of the Kapampangan and the Ibalnan script of the
Palawan people The Palawan tribal people, also known as the Palawano or the Palaw'an, are an indigenous ethnic group of the Palawan group of islands in the Philippines. Palawanos are more popularly known as Palawans, which is pronounced faster than the name of ...
. Under the
Unicode Standard Unicode, formally The Unicode Standard,The formal version reference is is an information technology standard for the consistent encoding, representation, and handling of text expressed in most of the world's writing systems. The standard, ...
and ISO 15924, the script is encoded as the Tagalog block. The Archives of the University of Santo Tomas in Manila, one of the largest archives in the Philippines, currently possesses the world's biggest collection of ancient writings in . The chambers which house the writings are part of a tentative nomination to
UNESCO The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is a List of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) aimed at promoting world peace and security through international coope ...
World Heritage List A World Heritage Site is a landmark or area with legal protection by an international convention administered by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). World Heritage Sites are designated by UNESCO for ...
that is still being deliberated on, along with the entire campus of the
University of Santo Tomas The University of Santo Tomas (also known as UST and officially as the Pontifical and Royal University of Santo Tomas, Manila) is a private, Catholic research university in Manila, Philippines. Founded on April 28, 1611, by Spanish friar Migue ...
. Despite being primarily a historic script, the script has seen some revival in the modern Philippines. It is often used in the insignia of government agencies and books are frequently published either partially or fully, in . Bills to require its use in certain cases and instruction in schools have been repeatedly considered by the
Congress of the Philippines The Congress of the Philippines ( fil, Kongreso ng Pilipinas, italic=unset) is the legislature of the national government of the Philippines. It is bicameral, composed of a lower body, the House of Representatives, although colloquially the ...
. For modern computers and typing, characters are in the
Unicode Unicode, formally The Unicode Standard,The formal version reference is is an information technology standard for the consistent encoding, representation, and handling of text expressed in most of the world's writing systems. The standard, ...
Basic Multilingual Plane (BMP) and were first proposed for encoding in 1998 by Michael Everson together with three other known indigenous scripts of the Philippines.


Terminology

The term means "to write" or "to spell (syllabize)" in
Tagalog Tagalog may refer to: Language * Tagalog language, a language spoken in the Philippines ** Old Tagalog, an archaic form of the language ** Batangas Tagalog, a dialect of the language * Tagalog script, the writing system historically used for Taga ...
. The entry for "ABC's" (i.e., the alphabet) in San Buenaventura's ''Vocabulary of the Tagalog language'' (1613) was translated as ("", ). The word is also occasionally used to refer to the other indigenous writing systems of the Philippines, such as the Buhid, Hanunó'o,
Tagbanwa The Tagbanwa people ( Tagbanwa: ) are one of the oldest ethnic groups in the Philippines, and can be mainly found in the central and northern Palawan. Research has shown that the Tagbanwa are possible descendants of the Tabon Man, thus making th ...
, and Kulitan scripts, among others. Cultural organizations such as Sanghabi and the Heritage Conservation Society recommend that the collection of distinct scripts used by various indigenous groups in the Philippines, including ', ''iniskaya'', ''kirim jawi'', and ''batang-arab'' be called ''
suyat Suyat ('' Baybayin:'' , '' Hanunó'o:'' , '' Buhid:'' , ''Tagbanwa:'' , '' Modern Kulitan:'' '' Jawi (Arabic):'' ) is the modern collective name of the indigenous scripts of various ethnolinguistic groups in the Philippines prior to Spanish c ...
'', which is a neutral collective noun for referring to any pre-Hispanic Philippine script. is occasionally referred to as ''alibata'', a neologism coined by Paul Rodríguez Verzosa in 1914, after the first three letters of the
Arabic script The Arabic script is the writing system used for Arabic and several other languages of Asia and Africa. It is the second-most widely used writing system in the world by number of countries using it or a script directly derived from it, and th ...
(, , ; the ''f'' in ''ʾalif'' having been dropped for euphony's sake), presumably under the erroneous assumption that was derived from it. Most modern scholars reject the use of the word ''alibata'' as incorrect. In modern times, has been called ''badlit, kudlít-kabadlit'' by the Visayans, ''kurditan'', ''kur-itan'' by the
Ilocanos The Ilocanos ( ilo, Tattao nga Iloko/), Ilokanos, or Iloko people are the third largest Filipino ethnolinguistic group and mostly reside within the Ilocos Region in the northwestern seaboard of Luzon, Philippines. The native language of the Ilo ...
, and ''basahan'' by the Bicolanos.


Origins

The origins of are disputed and multiple theories exist as to its origin.


Influence of Greater India

Historically
Southeast Asia Southeast Asia, also spelled South East Asia and South-East Asia, and also known as Southeastern Asia, South-eastern Asia or SEA, is the geographical south-eastern region of Asia, consisting of the regions that are situated south of mainland ...
was under the influence of
Ancient India According to consensus in modern genetics, anatomically modern humans first arrived on the Indian subcontinent from Africa between 73,000 and 55,000 years ago. Quote: "Y-Chromosome and Mt-DNA data support the colonization of South Asia by ...
, where numerous Indianized principalities and empires flourished for several centuries in
Thailand Thailand ( ), historically known as Siam () and officially the Kingdom of Thailand, is a country in Southeast Asia, located at the centre of the Indochinese Peninsula, spanning , with a population of almost 70 million. The country is b ...
,
Indonesia Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania between the Indian and Pacific oceans. It consists of over 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, Java, Sulawesi, and parts of Borneo and New Gui ...
,
Malaysia Malaysia ( ; ) is a country in Southeast Asia. The federal constitutional monarchy consists of thirteen states and three federal territories, separated by the South China Sea into two regions: Peninsular Malaysia and Borneo's East Mal ...
,
Singapore Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, bor ...
, Philippines,
Cambodia Cambodia (; also Kampuchea ; km, កម្ពុជា, UNGEGN: ), officially the Kingdom of Cambodia, is a country located in the southern portion of the Indochinese Peninsula in Southeast Asia, spanning an area of , bordered by Thailand ...
and
Vietnam Vietnam or Viet Nam ( vi, Việt Nam, ), officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam,., group="n" is a country in Southeast Asia, at the eastern edge of mainland Southeast Asia, with an area of and population of 96 million, making ...
. The influence of Indian culture into these areas was given the term '' Indianization''. French archaeologist George Coedes defined it as the expansion of an organized culture that was framed upon Indian originations of royalty,
Hinduism Hinduism () is an Indian religion or '' dharma'', a religious and universal order or way of life by which followers abide. As a religion, it is the world's third-largest, with over 1.2–1.35 billion followers, or 15–16% of the global p ...
and
Buddhism Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religion or philosophical tradition based on teachings attributed to the Buddha. It originated in northern India as a -movement in the 5th century BCE, and ...
and the
Sanskrit language Sanskrit (; attributively , ; nominally , , ) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in South Asia after its predecessor languages had diffused there from the northwest in the late ...
. This can be seen in the Indianization of Southeast Asia, Hinduism in Southeast Asia and the spread of Buddhism in Southeast Asia.
Indian honorifics Indian honorifics are honorific titles or appendices to names used in the Indian subcontinent, covering formal and informal social, commercial, and religious relationships. These may take the form of prefixes, suffixes or replacements. Native hon ...
also influenced the Malay, Thai, Filipino and Indonesian honorifics. Examples of these include
raja ''Raja'' (; from , IAST ') is a royal title used for South Asian monarchs. The title is equivalent to king or princely ruler in South Asia and Southeast Asia. The title has a long history in South Asia and Southeast Asia, being attested ...
, rani, maharlika, and
datu ''Datu'' is a title which denotes the rulers (variously described in historical accounts as chiefs, sovereign princes, and monarchs) of numerous indigenous peoples throughout the Philippine archipelago. The title is still used today, especial ...
, which were transmitted from Indian culture to Philippines via Malays and the
Srivijaya empire Srivijaya ( id, Sriwijaya) was a Buddhist thalassocratic empire based on the island of Sumatra (in modern-day Indonesia), which influenced much of Southeast Asia. Srivijaya was an important centre for the expansion of Buddhism from the 7th t ...
. Indian Hindu colonists played a key role as professionals, traders, priests and warriors. Inscriptions have proved that the earliest Indian colonists who settled in
Champa Champa ( Cham: ꨌꩌꨛꨩ; km, ចាម្ប៉ា; vi, Chiêm Thành or ) were a collection of independent Cham polities that extended across the coast of what is contemporary central and southern Vietnam from approximately the 2nd ...
and the Malay archipelago, came from the
Pallava dynasty The Pallava dynasty existed from 275 CE to 897 CE, ruling a significant portion of the Deccan, also known as Tondaimandalam. The dynasty rose to prominence after the downfall of the Satavahana dynasty, with whom they had formerly served as f ...
, as they brought with them their Pallava script. The earliest inscriptions in
Java Java (; id, Jawa, ; jv, ꦗꦮ; su, ) is one of the Greater Sunda Islands in Indonesia. It is bordered by the Indian Ocean to the south and the Java Sea to the north. With a population of 151.6 million people, Java is the world's mo ...
exactly match the Pallava script. In the first stage of adoption of
Indian script The Brahmic scripts, also known as Indic scripts, are a family of abugida writing systems. They are used throughout the Indian subcontinent, Southeast Asia and parts of East Asia. They are descended from the Brahmi script of ancient India ...
s, inscriptions were made locally in Indian languages. In the second stage, the scripts were used to write the local Southeast Asian languages. In the third stage, local varieties of the scripts were developed. By the 8th century, the scripts had diverged and separated into regional scripts.
Isaac Taylor Isaac Taylor (17 August 1787 – 28 June 1865) was an English philosophical and historical writer, artist, and inventor. Life He was the eldest surviving son of Isaac Taylor of Ongar. He was born at Lavenham, Suffolk, on 17 August 1787, and m ...
sought to show that was introduced into the Philippines from the Coast of Bengal sometime before the 8th century. In attempting to show such a relationship, Taylor presented graphic representations of Kistna and
Assam Assam (; ) is a state in northeastern India, south of the eastern Himalayas along the Brahmaputra and Barak River valleys. Assam covers an area of . The state is bordered by Bhutan and Arunachal Pradesh to the north; Nagaland and Manipur ...
letters like g, k, ng, t, m, h, and u, which resemble the same letters in . Fletcher Gardner argued that the Philippine scripts have "very great similarity" with the
Brahmi script Brahmi (; ; ISO: ''Brāhmī'') is a writing system of ancient South Asia. "Until the late nineteenth century, the script of the Aśokan (non-Kharosthi) inscriptions and its immediate derivatives was referred to by various names such as 'lath' ...
, which was supported by T. H. Pardo de Tavera. According to Christopher Miller, evidence seems strong for to be ultimately of
Gujarati Gujarati may refer to: * something of, from, or related to Gujarat, a state of India * Gujarati people, the major ethnic group of Gujarat * Gujarati language, the Indo-Aryan language spoken by them * Gujarati languages, the Western Indo-Aryan sub- ...
origin; however, Philippine and Gujarati languages have final consonants, so it is unlikely that their indication would have been dropped had been based directly on a Gujarati model.


South Sulawesi scripts

David Diringer David Diringer (16 June 1900 – 13 February 1975) was a British linguist, palaeographer and writer. He was the author of several well-known books about writing systems. Biography Diringer was born to Jacob Munzer and Mirl Diringer on 16 June ...
, accepting the view that the scripts of the
Malay archipelago The Malay Archipelago ( Indonesian/ Malay: , tgl, Kapuluang Malay) is the archipelago between mainland Indochina and Australia. It has also been called the " Malay world," " Nusantara", "East Indies", Indo-Australian Archipelago, Spices Arc ...
originate in India, writes that the
South Sulawesi South Sulawesi ( id, Sulawesi Selatan) is a province in the southern peninsula of Sulawesi. The Selayar Islands archipelago to the south of Sulawesi is also part of the province. The capital is Makassar. The province is bordered by Central Sul ...
scripts derive from the Kawi script, probably through the medium of the Batak script of
Sumatra Sumatra is one of the Sunda Islands of western Indonesia. It is the largest island that is fully within Indonesian territory, as well as the sixth-largest island in the world at 473,481 km2 (182,812 mi.2), not including adjacent i ...
. The Philippine scripts, according to Diringer, were possibly brought to the Philippines through the Buginese characters in
Sulawesi Sulawesi (), also known as Celebes (), is an island in Indonesia. One of the four Greater Sunda Islands, and the world's eleventh-largest island, it is situated east of Borneo, west of the Maluku Islands, and south of Mindanao and the Sulu ...
. According to Scott, 's immediate ancestor was very likely a South Sulawesi script, probably Old Makassar or a close ancestor. This is because of the lack of final consonants or vowel canceller markers in . South Sulawesi languages have a restricted inventory of syllable-final consonants and do not represent them in the
Bugis The Bugis people (pronounced ), also known as Buginese, are an ethnicity—the most numerous of the three major linguistic and ethnic groups of South Sulawesi (the others being Makassar and Toraja), in the south-western province of Sulawesi ...
and
Makassar Makassar (, mak, ᨆᨀᨔᨑ, Mangkasara’, ) is the capital of the Indonesian province of South Sulawesi. It is the largest city in the region of Eastern Indonesia and the country's fifth-largest urban center after Jakarta, Surabaya, Meda ...
scripts. The most likely explanation for the absence of final consonant markers in is therefore that its direct ancestor was a South Sulawesi script. Sulawesi lies directly to the south of the Philippines and there is evidence of trade routes between the two. must therefore have been developed in the Philippines in the fifteenth century CE as the Bugis-Makassar script was developed in South Sulawesi no earlier than 1400 CE.


Kawi script

The Kawi script originated in
Java Java (; id, Jawa, ; jv, ꦗꦮ; su, ) is one of the Greater Sunda Islands in Indonesia. It is bordered by the Indian Ocean to the south and the Java Sea to the north. With a population of 151.6 million people, Java is the world's mo ...
, descending from the Pallava script, and was used across much of Maritime Southeast Asia. The Laguna Copperplate Inscription is the earliest known written document found in the Philippines. It is a legal document with the inscribed date of Saka era 822, corresponding to 21 April 900 AD. It was written in the Kawi script in a variety of Old Malay containing numerous loanwords from Sanskrit and a few non-Malay vocabulary elements whose origin is ambiguous between Old Javanese and Old Tagalog. A second example of Kawi script can be seen on the Butuan Ivory Seal, found in the 1970s and dated between the 9th and 12th century. It is an ancient seal made of ivory that was found in an archaeological site in Butuan. The seal has been declared as a national cultural treasure. The seal is inscribed with the word ''Butwan'' in stylized Kawi. The ivory seal is now housed at the National Museum of the Philippines. One hypothesis therefore reasons that, since Kawi is the earliest attestation of writing in the Philippines, then may have descended from Kawi.


Cham script

could have been introduced to the Philippines by maritime connections with the Champa Kingdom. Geoff Wade has argued that the characters "ga", "nga", "pa", "ma", "ya" and "sa" display characteristics that can be best explained by linking them to the
Cham script The Cham script is a Brahmic abugida used to write Cham, an Austronesian language spoken by some 245,000 Chams in Vietnam and Cambodia. It is written horizontally left to right, just like other Brahmic abugidas. History The Cham script is ...
, rather than other Indic abugidas. seems to be more related to southeast Asian scripts than to Kawi script. Wade argues that the Laguna Copperplate Inscription is not definitive proof for a Kawi origin of , as the inscription displays final consonants, which does not.


History

From the material that is available, it is clear that was used in Luzon, Palawan, Mindoro, Pangasinan, Ilocos, Panay, Leyte and Iloilo, but there is no proof supporting that reached Mindanao. It seems clear that the Luzon and Palawan varieties started to develop in different ways in the 1500s, before the Spaniards conquered what we know today as the Philippines. This puts Luzon and Palawan as the oldest regions where was and is used. It is also notable that the script used in Pampanga had already developed special shapes for four letters by the early 1600s, different from the ones used elsewhere. There were three somewhat distinct varieties of in the late 1500s and 1600s, though they could not be described as three different scripts any more than the different styles of Latin script across medieval or modern Europe with their slightly different sets of letters and spelling systems.


Early history

An earthenware burial jar, called the "Calatagan Pot," found in
Batangas Batangas, officially the Province of Batangas ( tl, Lalawigan ng Batangas ), is a province in the Philippines located in the Calabarzon region on Luzon. Its capital is the city of Batangas, and is bordered by the provinces of Cavite and L ...
is inscribed with characters strikingly similar to , and is claimed to have been inscribed ca. 1300 AD. However, its authenticity has not yet been proven. Although one of Ferdinand Magellan's shipmates, Antonio Pigafetta, wrote that the people of the Visayas were not literate in 1521, the had already arrived there by 1567 when
Miguel López de Legazpi Miguel López de Legazpi (12 June 1502 – 20 August 1572), also known as '' El Adelantado'' and ''El Viejo'' (The Elder), was a Spaniard who, from the age of 26, lived and built a career in Mexico (then the Viceroyalty of New Spain) and, ...
reported from
Cebu Cebu (; ceb, Sugbo), officially the Province of Cebu ( ceb, Lalawigan sa Sugbo; tl, Lalawigan ng Cebu; hil, Kapuroan sang Sugbo), is a province of the Philippines located in the Central Visayas region, and consists of a main island and 16 ...
that, "They he Visayanshave their letters and characters like those of the Malays, from whom they learned them; they write them on bamboo bark and palm leaves with a pointed tool, but never is any ancient writing found among them nor word of their origin and arrival in these islands, their customs and rites being preserved by traditions handed down from father to son without any other record." A century later, in 1668, Francisco Alcina wrote: "The characters of these natives isayans or, better said, those that have been in use for a few years in these parts, an art which was communicated to them from the Tagalogs, and the latter learned it from the Borneans who came from the great island of Borneo to
Manila Manila ( , ; fil, Maynila, ), officially the City of Manila ( fil, Lungsod ng Maynila, ), is the capital of the Philippines, and its second-most populous city. It is highly urbanized and, as of 2019, was the world's most densely populated ...
, with whom they have considerable traffic... From these Borneans the Tagalogs learned their characters, and from them the Visayans, so they call them Moro characters or letters because the Moros taught them... he Visayanslearned he Moros'letters, which many use today, and the women much more than the men, which they write and read more readily than the latter." Francisco de Santa Inés explained in 1676 why writing was more common among women, as "they do not have any other way to while away the time, for it is not customary for little girls to go to school as boys do, they make better use of their characters than men, and they use them in things of devotion, and in other things that are not of devotion." The earliest printed book in a Philippine language, featuring both Tagalog in and transliterated into the Latin script, is the 1593 ''Doctrina Christiana en Lengua Española y Tagala''. The Tagalog text was based mainly on a manuscript written by Fr. Juan de Placencia. Friars Domingo de Nieva and Juan de San Pedro Martyr supervised the preparation and printing of the book, which was carried out by an unnamed Chinese artisan. This is the earliest example of that exists today and it is the only example from the 1500s. There is also a series of legal documents containing , preserved in Spanish and Philippine archives that span more than a century: the three oldest, all in the Archivo General de Indias in Seville, are from 1591 and 1599. was noted by the Spanish priest Pedro Chirino in 1604 and
Antonio de Morga Antonio de Morga Sánchez Garay (29 November 1559 – 21 July 1636) was a Spanish soldier, lawyer and a high-ranking colonial official for 43 years, in the Philippines (1594 to 1604), New Spain and Peru, where he was president of the Real Aud ...
in 1609 to be known by most Filipinos, and was generally used for personal writings and poetry, among others. However, according to William Henry Scott, there were some datus from the 1590s who could not sign affidavits or oaths, and witnesses who could not sign land deeds in the 1620s. In 1620, '' Libro a naisurátan amin ti bagás ti Doctrina Cristiana'' was written by Fr. Francisco Lopez, an ''Ilocano Doctrina'' the first Ilocano baybayin, based on the catechism written by Cardinal Belarmine. This is an important moment in the history of , because the krus-kudlít was introduced for the first time, which allowed writing final consonants. He commented the following on his decision: "The reason for putting the text of the Doctrina in Tagalog type... has been to begin the correction of the said Tagalog script, which, as it is, is so defective and confused (because of not having any method until now for expressing final consonants - I mean, those without vowels) that the most learned reader has to stop and ponder over many words to decide on the pronunciation which the writer intended." This krus-kudlít, or virama kudlít, did not catch on among users, however. Native experts were consulted about the new invention and were asked to adopt it and use it in all their writings. After praising the invention and showing gratitude for it, they decided that it could not be accepted into their writing because "It went against the intrinsic properties and nature that God had given their writing and that to use it was tantamount to destroy with one blow all the Syntax, Prosody and Orthography of their Tagalog language." In 1703, was reported to still be in use in the ''Comintan'' (
Batangas Batangas, officially the Province of Batangas ( tl, Lalawigan ng Batangas ), is a province in the Philippines located in the Calabarzon region on Luzon. Its capital is the city of Batangas, and is bordered by the provinces of Cavite and L ...
and Laguna) and other areas of the Philippines. Among the earliest literature on the orthography of Visayan languages were those of Jesuit priest Ezguerra with his in 1747 and of Mentrida with his in 1818 which primarily discussed
grammatical structure In linguistics, the grammar of a natural language is its set of structural constraints on speakers' or writers' composition of clauses, phrases, and words. The term can also refer to the study of such constraints, a field that includes domai ...
. Based on the differing sources spanning centuries, the documented
syllabaries In the linguistic study of written languages, a syllabary is a set of written symbols that represent the syllables or (more frequently) moras which make up words. A symbol in a syllabary, called a syllabogram, typically represents an (optiona ...
also differed in form. The Ticao stone inscription, also known as the Monreal stone or Rizal stone, is a limestone tablet that contains characters. Found by pupils of Rizal Elementary School on Ticao Island in Monreal town, Masbate, which had scraped the mud off their shoes and
slippers Slippers are light footwear that are easy to put on and off and are intended to be worn indoors, particularly at home. They provide comfort and protection for the feet when walking indoors. History The recorded history of slippers can be traced ...
on two irregular shaped
limestone Limestone ( calcium carbonate ) is a type of carbonate sedimentary rock which is the main source of the material lime. It is composed mostly of the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different crystal forms of . Limestone forms w ...
tablets before entering their classroom, they are now housed at a section of the National Museum of the Philippines, which weighs 30 kilos, is 11 centimeters thick, 54 cm long and 44 cm wide while the other is 6 cm thick, 20 cm long and 18 cm wide.


Decline

The confusion over vowels (i/e and o/u) and final consonants, missing letters for Spanish sounds and the prestige of
Spanish culture The culture of ''Spain'' is based on a variety of historical influences, primarily based on the culture of ancient Rome, Spain being a prominent part of the Greco-Roman world for centuries, the very name of Spain comes from the name that the ...
and writing may have contributed to the demise of over time, as eventually fell out of use in much of the Philippines. Learning the Latin alphabet also helped Filipinos to make socioeconomic progress under Spanish rule, as they could rise to relatively prestigious positions such as clerks, scribes and secretaries. By 1745, wrote in his '' Arte de la lengua tagala'' that "The Indian ilipinowho knows how to read [] is now rare, and rarer still is one who knows how to write []. They now all read and write in our Castilian letters [Latin alphabet]." Between 1751 and 1754, [ uan José Delgado wrote that "the ativemen devoted themselves to the use of our atinwriting". The complete absence of pre-Hispanic specimens of usage of the script has led to a common misconception that fanatical Spanish priests must have burned or destroyed massive amounts of native documents. One of the scholars who proposed this theory is the anthropologist and historian
H. Otley Beyer Henry Otley Beyer (July 13, 1883 – December 31, 1966) was an American anthropologist, who spent most of his adult life in the Philippines teaching Philippine indigenous culture. A.V.H. Hartendorp called Beyer the "Dean of Philippine ethnolo ...
who wrote in " The Philippines before Magellan" (1921) that, "one Spanish priest in Southern Luzon boasted of having destroyed more than three hundred scrolls written in the native character". Historians have searched for the source of Beyer's claim, but no one has verified the name of the said priest. There is no direct documentary evidence of substantial destruction of native pre-Hispanic documents by Spanish missionaries, and modern scholars such as Paul Morrow and Hector Santos have accordingly rejected Beyer's suggestions. In particular, Santos suggested that only the occasional short documents of incantations, curses and spells that were deemed evil were possibly burned by the Spanish friars, and that the early missionaries only carried out the destruction of Christian manuscripts that were not acceptable to the Church. Santos rejected the idea that ancient pre-Hispanic manuscripts were systematically burned. Morrow also noted that there are no recorded instances of ancient Filipinos writing on scrolls, and that the most likely reason why no pre-Hispanic documents survived is because they wrote on perishable materials such as leaves and bamboo. He also added that it is also arguable that Spanish friars actually helped to preserve by documenting and continuing its use even after it had been abandoned by most Filipinos. The scholar Isaac Donoso claims that the documents written in the native language and in the native script (particularly ) played a significant role in the judicial and legal life of the colony and noted that many colonial-era documents written in are still present in some repositories, including the library of the University of Santo Tomas.: "What is important to us is the relevant activity during these centuries to study, write and even print in Baybayin. And this task is not strange in other regions of the Spanish Empire. In fact indigenous documents placed a significant role in the judicial and legal life of the colonies. Documents in other language than Spanish were legally considered, and Pedro de Castro says that "I have seen in the archives of Lipa and Batangas many documents with these characters". Nowadays we can find Baybayin documents in some repositories, including the oldest library in the country, the University of Santo Tomás." He also noted that the early Spanish missionaries did not suppress the usage of the script but instead may have even promoted it as a measure to stop
Islamization Islamization, Islamicization, or Islamification ( ar, أسلمة, translit=aslamāh), refers to the process through which a society shifts towards the religion of Islam and becomes largely Muslim. Societal Islamization has historically occurr ...
, since the Tagalog language was moving from to Jawi, the Arabized script of Islamized Southeast Asian societies. While there were recorded at least two records of burning of Tagalog booklets of magic formulae during the early Spanish colonial period, scholar Jean Paul-Potet (2017) also commented that these booklets were written in Latin characters and not in the native script. There are also no reports of Tagalog written scriptures, as they kept their theological knowledge unwritten and in oral form while reserving the use of the script for secular purposes and talismans.


Modern descendants

The only surviving modern scripts that descended directly from the original script through natural development are the Tagbanwa script inherited from the Tagbanwa people by the
Palawan people The Palawan tribal people, also known as the Palawano or the Palaw'an, are an indigenous ethnic group of the Palawan group of islands in the Philippines. Palawanos are more popularly known as Palawans, which is pronounced faster than the name of ...
and named Ibalnan, the Buhid script and the Hanunóo script in
Mindoro Mindoro is the seventh largest and eighth-most populous island in the Philippines. With a total land area of 10,571 km2 ( 4,082 sq.mi ) and has a population of 1,408,454 as of 2020 census. It is located off the southwestern coast of Luz ...
. Old Kapampangan, the precolonial Indic script used to write Kapampangan, has been reformed in recent decades into the modern Kulitan script and now employs consonant stacking.


Characteristics

is an
abugida An abugida (, from Ge'ez: ), sometimes known as alphasyllabary, neosyllabary or pseudo-alphabet, is a segmental writing system in which consonant-vowel sequences are written as units; each unit is based on a consonant letter, and vowel no ...
(alphasyllabary), which means that it makes use of consonant-vowel combinations. Each character or ''titik'', written in its basic form, is a consonant ending with the vowel "A". To produce consonants ending with other vowel sounds, a mark called a ''kudlít'' is placed either above the character (to produce an "E" or "I" sound) or below the character (to produce an "O" or "U" sound). To write words beginning with a vowel, three characters are used, one each for ''A'', ''E/I'' and ''O/U''.


Characters

Note that the second to last row features the pamudpod
virama Virama ( ्) is a Sanskrit phonological concept to suppress the inherent vowel that otherwise occurs with every consonant letter, commonly used as a generic term for a codepoint in Unicode, representing either # halanta, hasanta or explicit vir� ...
" ᜕" (U+1715), which was introduced by Antoon Postma to the Hanunuo script. The last row of clusters with the krus-kudlít virama "+", were an addition to the original script, introduced by the Spanish priest Francisco Lopez in 1620. There is only one symbol or character for Da or Ra as they were allophones in many
languages of the Philippines There are some 120 to 187 languages spoken in the Philippines, depending on the method of classification. Almost all are Malayo-Polynesian languages native to the archipelago. A number of Spanish-influenced creole varieties generally called ...
, where Ra occurred in intervocalic positions and Da occurred elsewhere. The grammatical rule has survived in modern Filipino, so that when a d is between two vowels, it becomes an r, as in the words ''dangál'' (honour) and ''marangál'' (honourable), or ''dunong'' (knowledge) and ''marunong'' (knowledgeable), and even ''raw'' for ''daw'' (he said, she said, they said, it was said, allegedly, reportedly, supposedly) and ''rin'' for ''din'' (also, too) after vowels. However, script variants like Sambal, Basahan, and Ibalnan, to name a few, have separate symbols for Da and Ra. The same symbol is also used to represent the Pa and Fa (or Pha), Ba and Va, and Sa and Za which were also allophonic. A single character represented nga. The current version of the Filipino alphabet still retains "ng" as a digraph. Beside these phonetic considerations, the script is monocameral and does not use letter case for distinguishing proper names or initials of words starting sentences. File:Surat guhit (basahan).jpg, The ''surat guhit'' ( basahan) of the Bikol region. File:Abakada tagalog.png, The abakada in the Tagalog script. File:Ayasib2.jpg, Various ''badlit'' styles. File:Kulitan.svg, The word kulitan in Modern Kulitan. File:Buhid urukay.jpg, Buhid urukay, from Violeta B. Lopez's book ''The Mangyan of Mindoro''. File:Mayadpagyabi.jpg, ''Mayad pagyabi'' (good morning), written in Hanunuo script using the ''b17'' and ''b17x'' methods respectively. File:Ma symbol baybayin.jpg, Every variant has letters with stylistic variants, just as the tail of the letter can be written in different ways.


''Virama kudlít'' (''krus-kudlít'')

The original writing method was particularly difficult for the Spanish priests who were translating books into the vernaculars, because originally omitted the final consonant without a vowel. This could cause confusion for readers over which word or pronunciation a writer originally intended. For example, 'bundok' (mountain) would have been spelled as 'bu-du', with the final consonants of each syllable omitted. Because of this, Francisco López introduced his own kudlít in 1620, called a ''sabat'' or ''krus'', that cancelled the implicit ''a'' vowel sound and which allowed a final consonant to be written. The kudlít was in the form of a "+" sign, in reference to
Christianity Christianity is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth. It is the world's largest and most widespread religion with roughly 2.38 billion followers representing one-third of the global popula ...
. This cross-shaped kudlít functions exactly the same as the ''
virama Virama ( ्) is a Sanskrit phonological concept to suppress the inherent vowel that otherwise occurs with every consonant letter, commonly used as a generic term for a codepoint in Unicode, representing either # halanta, hasanta or explicit vir� ...
'' in many other
Brahmic scripts The Brahmic scripts, also known as Indic scripts, are a family of abugida writing systems. They are used throughout the Indian subcontinent, Southeast Asia and parts of East Asia. They are descended from the Brahmi script of ancient In ...
. In fact, Unicode calls this kudlít "tagalog sign virama". ()


''Virama pamudpod''

The pamudpod () is part of the Hanunuo script and functions as a
virama Virama ( ्) is a Sanskrit phonological concept to suppress the inherent vowel that otherwise occurs with every consonant letter, commonly used as a generic term for a codepoint in Unicode, representing either # halanta, hasanta or explicit vir� ...
. As of Unicode 14.0, a separate pamudpod for the Baybayin script () is encoded in the
Tagalog Tagalog may refer to: Language * Tagalog language, a language spoken in the Philippines ** Old Tagalog, an archaic form of the language ** Batangas Tagalog, a dialect of the language * Tagalog script, the writing system historically used for Taga ...
Unicode block.


Punctuation and spacing

originally used only one punctuation mark (), which was called ''Bantasán''. Today uses two punctuation marks, the Philippine single () punctuation, acting as a comma or verse splitter in poetry, and the double punctuation (), acting as a period or end of paragraph. These punctuation marks are similar to single and double danda signs in other Indic Abugidas and may be presented vertically like Indic dandas, or slanted like forward slashes. The signs are unified across Philippines scripts and were encoded by Unicode in the Hanunóo script block. Space separation of words was historically not used as words were written in a continuous flow, but is common today.


Collation

* In the ''
Doctrina Christiana The ''Doctrina Christiana'' ( eng, Christian Doctrine) was an early book on the catechism of the Catholic Church, written in 1593 by Fray Juan de Plasencia, and is believed to be one of the earliest printed books in the Philippines. Title S ...
'', the letters of were collated (without any connection with other similar script, except sorting vowels before consonants) as: *: A, U/O, I/E; Ha, Pa, Ka, Sa, La, Ta, Na, Ba, Ma, Ga, Da/Ra, Ya, NGa, Wa. * In Unicode the letters are collated in coherence with other Indic scripts, by phonetic proximity for consonants: *: A, I/E, U/O; Ka, Ga, Nga; Ta, Da/Ra, Na; Pa, Ba, Ma; Ya, Ra, La, Wa, Sa, Ha.Unicode Baybayin Tagalog variant
/ref>


Usage


Pre-colonial and colonial usage

historically was used in
Tagalog Tagalog may refer to: Language * Tagalog language, a language spoken in the Philippines ** Old Tagalog, an archaic form of the language ** Batangas Tagalog, a dialect of the language * Tagalog script, the writing system historically used for Taga ...
and to a lesser extent Kapampangan-speaking areas. Its use spread to the Ilocanos when the Spanish promoted its use with the printing of Bibles. was noted by the Spanish priest Pedro Chirino in 1604 and
Antonio de Morga Antonio de Morga Sánchez Garay (29 November 1559 – 21 July 1636) was a Spanish soldier, lawyer and a high-ranking colonial official for 43 years, in the Philippines (1594 to 1604), New Spain and Peru, where he was president of the Real Aud ...
in 1609 to be known by most Filipinos, stating that there is hardly a man and much less a woman, who does not read and write in the letters used in the " island of Manila". It was noted that they did not write books or keep records, but used for personal writings like small notes and messages, poetry and signing documents. Traditionally, was written upon palm leaves with styli or upon
bamboo Bamboos are a diverse group of evergreen perennial flowering plants making up the subfamily Bambusoideae of the grass family Poaceae. Giant bamboos are the largest members of the grass family. The origin of the word "bamboo" is uncertain, ...
with knives, the writing tools were called ''panulat''. The curved shape of the letter forms of is a direct result of this heritage; straight lines would have torn the leaves. Once the letters were carved into the bamboo, it was wiped with ash to make the characters stand out more. An anonymous source from 1590 states: During the era of Spanish colonization, most began being written with ink on paper using a sharpened quill, or printed in books (using the woodcut technique) to facilitate the spread of Christianity. In some parts of the country like
Mindoro Mindoro is the seventh largest and eighth-most populous island in the Philippines. With a total land area of 10,571 km2 ( 4,082 sq.mi ) and has a population of 1,408,454 as of 2020 census. It is located off the southwestern coast of Luz ...
the traditional writing technique has been retained. Filipinos began keeping paper records of their property and financial transactions, and would write down lessons they were taught in church, all in . The scholar Isaac Donoso claims that the documents written in the native language and in played a significant role in the judicial and legal life of the colony. The
University of Santo Tomas Baybayin Documents The University of Santo Tomas Baybayin Documents or UST Baybayin Documents are two 17th century land deeds written in Baybayin script. Due to their historical significance, the documents were declared as a National Cultural Treasure by the Nati ...
cover two legal real estate transactions in 1613, written in , (labelled as ''Document A ''dated 15 February 1613) and 1625 (labelled as Document B dated 4 December 1625)


Modern usage

A number of legislative bills have been proposed periodically aiming to promote the writing system, among them is the "National Writing System Act" (House Bill 1022/Senate Bill 433). It is used in the most current New Generation Currency series of the Philippine peso issued in the last quarter of 2010. The word used on the bills was "Pilipino" (). It is also used in
Philippine passport A Philippine passport is both a travel document and a primary national identity document issued to citizens of the Philippines. It is issued by the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) and Philippine diplomatic missions abroad, with certain ex ...
s, specifically the latest e-passport edition issued 11 August 2009 onwards. The odd pages of pages 3–43 have "" (""/"Righteousness exalts a nation") in reference to
Proverbs A proverb (from la, proverbium) is a simple and insightful, traditional saying that expresses a perceived truth based on common sense or experience. Proverbs are often metaphorical and use formulaic language. A proverbial phrase or a proverbia ...
14:34. File:Philippine revolution flag magdiwang.svg, Flag of the Katipunan Magdiwang faction, with the letter ''ka''. File:National Historical Commission of the Philippines (NHCP).svg, Seal of the
National Historical Commission of the Philippines The National Historical Commission of the Philippines ( fil, Pambansang Komisyong Pangkasaysayan ng Pilipinas, abbreviated NHCP) is a government agency of the Philippines. Its mission is "the promotion of Philippine history and cultural herit ...
, with the two Baybayin ''ka'' and ''pa'' letters in the center. File:National Library of the Philippines (NLP).svg, Logo of the National Library of the Philippines. The Baybayin text reads as ''karunungan'' (''ka r(a)u n(a)u nga n(a)'', wisdom). File:National Museum of the Philippines.svg, Logo of the National Museum of the Philippines, with a Baybayin ''pa'' letter in the center, in a traditional rounded style. File:CulturalCenterPH.svg, Logo of the Cultural Center of the Philippines, with three rotated occurrences of the Baybayin ''ka'' letter. File:Gawad Lakandula.png, The insignia of the
Order of Lakandula The Order of Lakandula ( fil, Orden ni Lakandula) is one of the highest civilian orders of the Philippines, established on September 19, 2003. It is awarded for political and civic merit and in memory of King Lakandula’s dedication to the resp ...
contains an inscription with Baybayin characters represents the name ''
Lakandula Lakandula ( Baybayin: , Spanish orthography: ''Lacandola'') was the title of the last '' lakan'' or paramount ruler of pre-colonial Tondo when the Spaniards first conquered the lands of the Pasig River delta in the Philippines in the 1570s. T ...
'', read counterclockwise from the top. File:Panitik Silangan, September 1963.png, The front page of the publication "Panitik Silangan", mostly printed in Baybayin, September 1963.


Examples


The Lord's Prayer (''Ama Namin'')


Universal Declaration of Human Rights


Motto of the Philippines


National anthem

Below are the first two verses of the Philippine
national anthem A national anthem is a patriotic musical composition symbolizing and evoking eulogies of the history and traditions of a country or nation. The majority of national anthems are marches or hymns in style. American, Central Asian, and Europea ...
, ''
Lupang Hinirang "" ("Chosen Land"), originally titled in Spanish as "" ("Philippine National March"), and commonly and informally known by its incipit "" ("Beloved Country"), is the national anthem of the Philippines. Its music was composed in 1898 by Juliá ...
'', in Baybayin.


Example sentences


Unicode

was added to the
Unicode Unicode, formally The Unicode Standard,The formal version reference is is an information technology standard for the consistent encoding, representation, and handling of text expressed in most of the world's writing systems. The standard, ...
Standard in March, 2002 with the release of version 3.2.


Block

is included in Unicode under the name 'Tagalog'. Tagalog Unicode range: U+1700–U+171F


Keyboard


Gboard

The virtual keyboard app Gboard developed by
Google Google LLC () is an American Multinational corporation, multinational technology company focusing on Search Engine, search engine technology, online advertising, cloud computing, software, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, ar ...
for Android and iOS devices was updated on 1 August 2019 its list of supported languages. This includes all Unicode blocks. Included are "Buhid", "Hanunuo", ''baybayin'' as "Filipino (Baybayin)", and the Tagbanwa script as "Aborlan". The ''baybayin'' layout, "Filipino (Baybayin)", is designed such that when the user presses the character, vowel markers (''kudlít'') for e/i and o/u, as well as the ''virama'' (vowel sound cancellation) are selectable.


Philippines Unicode Keyboard Layout with

It is possible to type directly from one's keyboard without the need to use
web applications A web application (or web app) is application software that is accessed using a web browser. Web applications are delivered on the World Wide Web to users with an active network connection. History In earlier computing models like client-serv ...
which implement an input method. The Philippines Unicode Keyboard Layout includes different sets of layout for different keyboard users: QWERTY, Capewell-Dvorak, Capewell-QWERF 2006, Colemak, and Dvorak, all of which work in both Microsoft Windows and Linux. This keyboard layout with can be downloade
here


See also

* Buhid script * Filipino orthography * History of Indian influence on Southeast Asia * Hanuno'o script * Kawi script * Kulitan alphabet * Laguna Copperplate Inscription * Old Tagalog *
Suyat Suyat ('' Baybayin:'' , '' Hanunó'o:'' , '' Buhid:'' , ''Tagbanwa:'' , '' Modern Kulitan:'' '' Jawi (Arabic):'' ) is the modern collective name of the indigenous scripts of various ethnolinguistic groups in the Philippines prior to Spanish c ...
* Tagbanwa script * Basahan *See
multilingual support Multilingualism is the use of more than one language, either by an individual speaker or by a group of speakers. It is believed that multilingual speakers outnumber monolingual speakers in the world's population. More than half of all ...
for fonts supporting Hanunó'o


References


Works cited

* * * * * * * * * *


External links


House Bill 160, aka the ''National Script Act of 2011''Tagalog – Unicode character table
{{Symbols of the Philippines Brahmic scripts Philippine scripts Tagalog language Obsolete writing systems Filipino language