View source for Tocharian script

{{short description|Script used to write the Tocharian languages}}
{{Infobox Writing system
 |name=Tocharian script
 |type=[[Abugida]]
 |languages=[[Tocharian languages]]
 |time=8th century
 |fam1=[[Egyptian hieroglyphs|Egyptian]]
 |fam2=[[Proto-Sinaitic]]
 |fam3=[[Phoenician alphabet|Phoenician]]
 |fam4=[[Aramaic alphabet|Aramaic]]
 |fam5=[[Brahmi script|Brahmi]]
 |sisters=[[Gupta script|Gupta]], [[Tamil-Brahmi]], [[Bhattiprolu script|Bhattiprolu]], [[Sinhala script|Sinhala]]
 |children=
 |sample=
{{multiple image|border=infobox|perrow=1/2/2|total_width=250
| align    = center
| direction =horizontal
| image1   = Kizil standing Buddha. Tocharian inscription "This Buddha was painted by the hand of Sanketava".jpg
| footer_align = center
| footer=[[Kizil Caves]] standing [[Buddha]]. Often attributed in the past to the 7th century AD,<ref>{{cite book |last1=Härtel |first1=Herbert |last2=Yaldiz |first2=Marianne |last3=Kunst (Germany) |first3=Museum für Indische |last4=N.Y.) |first4=Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York |title=Along the Ancient Silk Routes: Central Asian Art from the West Berlin State Museums : an Exhibition Lent by the Museum Für Indische Kunst, Staatliche Museen Preussischer Kulturbesitz, Berlin, Federal Republic of Germany |date=1982 |publisher=Metropolitan Museum of Art |isbn=978-0-87099-300-8 |page=107 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=BLuaphht8XwC&pg=PA107 |language=en}}</ref> but now [[carbon dated]] to AD 245-340.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Waugh (Historian, University of Washington) |first1=Daniel C. |title=MIA Berlin: Turfan Collection: Kizil |url=https://depts.washington.edu/silkroad/museums/mia/kizil.html |website=depts.washington.edu}}</ref> [[Tocharian B]] inscription reading:<br />[[File:Se pañäkte saṅketavattse ṣarsa papaiykau.jpg|240px]]<br />''Se pañäkte saṅketavattse ṣarsa papaiykau''<br />"This Buddha was painted by the hand of Sanketava".<ref>{{cite book |last1=Härtel |first1=Herbert |last2=Yaldiz |first2=Marianne |last3=Kunst (Germany) |first3=Museum für Indische |last4=N.Y.) |first4=Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York |title=Along the Ancient Silk Routes: Central Asian Art from the West Berlin State Museums : an Exhibition Lent by the Museum Für Indische Kunst, Staatliche Museen Preussischer Kulturbesitz, Berlin, Federal Republic of Germany |year=1982 |publisher=Metropolitan Museum of Art |isbn=978-0-87099-300-8 |page=107 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=BLuaphht8XwC&pg=PA107 |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Le Coq |first1=Albert von |title=Die Buddhistische Spätantike in Mittelasien : vol.5 |page=10 |url=http://dsr.nii.ac.jp/toyobunko/LFB-2/V-5/page-hr/0014.html.en}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=A dictionary of Tocharian B |url=https://www.win.tue.nl/~aeb/natlang/ie/tochB.html |website=www.win.tue.nl}}</ref><ref>In Ashokan Brahmi: <big>𑀲𑁂𑀧𑀜𑀓𑁆𑀢𑁂 𑀲𑀡𑁆𑀓𑁂𑀢𑀯𑀝𑁆𑀲𑁂 𑀱𑀭𑁆𑀲 𑀧𑀧𑁃𑀬𑁆𑀓𑁅</big></ref>
}}
 |imagesize=275px
 |note=
 |footnotes=
 }}
{{brahmic}}
[[File:Tocharian.JPG|thumb|250px|Sample of Tocharian script on a tablet.]]
The '''Tocharian script''',<ref name="DD">{{cite book |last1=Diringer |first1=David |title=Alphabet A Key To The History Of Mankind |date=1948 |pages=347–348 |url=https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.57042/page/n349/mode/2up}}</ref> also known as '''Central Asian slanting Gupta script''' or '''North Turkestan Brāhmī''',<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/brahmi-indian-script|title=BRĀHMĪ – Encyclopaedia Iranica|website=www.iranicaonline.org|access-date=2019-03-28}}</ref>  is an [[abugida]] which uses a system of diacritical marks to associate vowels with consonant symbols. Part of the [[Brahmic scripts]], it is a version of the [[Ancient India|Indian]] [[Brahmi script]]. It is used to write the Central Asian Indo-European [[Tocharian languages]], mostly from the 8th century (with a few earlier ones, probably as early as AD 300)<ref>Earliest paintings from [[Kizil Caves]] with Tocharian inscriptions, now [[carbon dated]] to AD 245-340, see {{cite web |last1=Waugh (Historian, University of Washington) |first1=Daniel C. |title=MIA Berlin: Turfan Collection: Kizil |url=https://depts.washington.edu/silkroad/museums/mia/kizil.html |website=depts.washington.edu}}</ref> that were written on palm leaves, wooden tablets and Chinese [[paper]], preserved by the extremely dry climate of the [[Tarim Basin]]. Samples of the language have been discovered at sites in [[Kucha]] and [[Karasahr]], including many mural inscriptions. Mistakenly identifying the speakers of this language with the ''[[Tokharistan|Tokharoi]]'' people of [[Tokharistan]] (the [[Bactria]] of the Greeks), early authors called these languages "Tocharian". This naming has remained, although the names ''Agnean'' and ''Kuchean'' have been proposed as a replacement.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Namba Walter |first1=Mariko |title=Tokharian Buddhism in Kucha: Buddhism of Indo-European Centum Speakers in Chinese Turkestan before the 10th Century C.E. |journal=Sino-Platonic Papers |date=October 1998 |volume=85 |page=2-4 |url=http://www.sino-platonic.org/complete/spp085_tokharian_buddhism_kucha.pdf}}</ref><ref name="DD"/>

Tocharian A and B are not [[mutually intelligible]]. Properly speaking, based on the tentative interpretation of ''twqry'' as related to ''Tokharoi'', only Tocharian A may be referred to as ''Tocharian'', while Tocharian B could be called ''Kuchean'' (its native name may have been ''kuśiññe''), but since their grammars are usually treated together in scholarly works, the terms A and B have proven useful. A common Proto-Tocharian language must precede the attested languages by several centuries, probably dating to the 1st millennium BC. Given the small geographical range of and the lack of secular texts in Tocharian A, it might alternatively have been a [[liturgical language]], the relationship between the two being similar to that between [[Classical Chinese]] and [[Standard Mandarin|Mandarin]]. However, the lack of a secular corpus in Tocharian A is by no means definite, due to the fragmentary preservation of Tocharian texts in general.

==History==
The Tocharian script is derived from the [[Brāhmī script|Brahmi]] alphabetic syllabary ([[abugida]]) and is referred to as ''slanting Brahmi''. It soon became apparent that a large proportion of the manuscripts were translations of known [[Buddhism|Buddhist]] works in [[Sanskrit]] and some of them were even bilingual, facilitating decipherment of the new language. Besides the Buddhist and [[Manichaeism|Manichaean]] religious texts, there were also monastery correspondence and accounts, commercial documents, caravan permits, and medical and magical texts, and one love poem. Many [[Tocharians]] embraced Manichaean duality or Buddhism.

In 1998, Chinese linguist [[Ji Xianlin]] published a translation and analysis of fragments of a Tocharian [[Maitreyasamiti-Nataka]] discovered in 1974 in [[Yanqi Hui Autonomous County|Yanqi]].<ref>"[http://www.salon.com/tech/htww/2008/01/29/fragments_of_the_tocharian/index.html Fragments of the Tocharian]", Andrew Leonard, ''How the World Works'', [[Salon.com]], January 29, 2008</ref><ref>"[https://www.jstor.org/stable/3107526 Review of 'Fragments of the Tocharian A Maitreyasamiti-Nataka of the Xinjiang Museum, China. In Collaboration with Werner Winter and Georges-Jean Pinault by Ji Xianlin']", J. C. Wright, ''[[Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies]]'', [[University of London]], Vol. 62, No. 2 (1999), pp. 367–370</ref><ref>"[https://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/3110149044 Fragments of the Tocharian a Maitreyasamiti-Nataka of the Zinjiang Museum, China]", Ji Xianlin, Werner Winter, Georges-Jean Pinault, ''Trends in Linguistics, Studies and Monographs''</ref>

The Tocharian script probably died out after 840, when the [[Uyghur people|Uyghurs]] were expelled from Mongolia by the [[Kyrgyz people|Kyrgyz]], retreating to the Tarim Basin. This theory is supported by the discovery of translations of Tocharian texts into Uyghur. During Uyghur rule, the peoples assimilated by the Turkic speaking Uyghurs now in Xinjiang.

==Script==

The Tocharian script is based on Brahmi, with each [[consonant]] having an inherent [[vowel]], which can be altered by adding a vowel mark or removed by a special nullifying mark, the [[virama]]. Like Brahmi, Tocharian uses stacking for conjunct consonants and has irregular conjunct forms of [[File:Tocharian letter ra.gif|30px]], ra.<ref>{{cite web|last=Gippert|first=Jost|title=Tocharian Brahmi Script|url=http://titus.fkidg1.uni-frankfurt.de/didact/idg/toch/tochbr.htm|publisher=TITUS Didactica|access-date=8 May 2013}}</ref> Unlike other Brahmi scripts, Tocharian has a second set of characters called ''Fremdzeichen'' that double up several of the standard consonants, but with an inherent "Ä" vowel.<ref>{{cite web|last=Wilson|first=Lee|title=Proposal to Encode the Tocharian Script (in the Unicode Standard / ISO 10646)|url=https://www.unicode.org/L2/L2015/15236-tocharian.pdf|access-date=2020-06-09}}</ref> The eleven Fremdzeichen are most often found as substitutes for the standard consonant+virama in conjuncts, but they can be found in any context other than with the explicit "Ä" vowel mark. Fremdzeichen as consonant+virama is not found in later Tocharian texts.

===Table of Tocharian letters===

{| class="wikitable"
|+Tocharian vowels
|-
!rowspan=2|Independent !! A !! Ā !! I !! Ī !! U !! Ū
|-
| [[File:Tocharian letter a.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter aa.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter i.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter ii.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter u.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter uu.gif|75px]]
|-
! R̥ !! R̥̄ !! E !! Ai !! O !! Au !! Ä
|-
| [[File:Tocharian letter r.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter rr.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter e.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter ai.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter o.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter au.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter ä.gif|75px]]
|-
!rowspan=2|Vowel diacritics<br />(here applied on [[File:Tocharian letter tha.gif|30px]]<br />as an example) !! Tha !! Thā !! Thi !! Thī !! Thu !! Thū
|-
| [[File:Tocharian letter tha.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter thaa.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter thi.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter thii.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter thu.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter thuu.gif|75px]]
|-
! Thr̥ !! Thr̥̄ !! The !! Thai !! Tho !! Thau !! Thä
|-
| [[File:Tocharian letter thr.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter thrr.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter the.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter thai.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter tho.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter thau.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter thä.gif|75px]]
|}

{| class="wikitable"
|+Tocharian consonants
|-
! [[Velar consonant|Velar]]s !! Ka !! Kha !! Ga !! Gha !! Ṅa
|-
|Standard || [[File:Tocharian letter ka.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter kha.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter ga.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter gha.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter nga.gif|75px]]
|-
|Fremdzeichen || [[File:Tocharian letter kà.gif|75px]] ||  ||  ||  || 
|-
![[Palatal]]s !! Ca !! Cha !! Ja !! Jha !! Ña
|-
| || [[File:Tocharian letter ca.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter cha.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter ja.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter jha.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter nya.gif|75px]]
|-
! [[Retroflex]]es !! Ṭa !! Ṭha !! Ḍa !! Ḍha !! Ṇa
|-
| || [[File:Tocharian letter tta.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter ttha.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter dda.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter ddha.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter nna.gif|75px]]
|-
! [[Dental consonant|Dentals]] !! Ta !! Tha !! Da !! Dha !! Na
|-
|Standard || [[File:Tocharian letter ta.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter tha.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter da.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter dha.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter na.gif|75px]]
|-
|Fremdzeichen || [[File:Tocharian letter tà.gif|75px]] ||  ||  ||  || [[File:Tocharian letter nà.gif|75px]]
|-
! [[Labial consonant|Labials]] !! Pa !! Pha !! Ba !! Bha !! Ma
|-
|Standard || [[File:Tocharian letter pa.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter pha.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter ba.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter bha.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter ma.gif|75px]]
|-
|Fremdzeichen || [[File:Tocharian letter pà.gif|75px]] ||  ||  ||  || [[File:Tocharian letter mà.gif|75px]]
|-
! [[Sonorant]]s !! Ya !! Ra !! La !! Va
|-
|Standard || [[File:Tocharian letter ya.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter ra.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter la.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter va.gif|75px]]
|-
|Fremdzeichen ||  || [[File:Tocharian letter rà.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter là.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter và.gif|75px]]
|-
! [[Sibilant]]s !! Śa !! Ṣa !! Sa !! Ha
|-
|Standard || [[File:Tocharian letter sha.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter ssa.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter sa.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter ha.gif|75px]]
|-
|Fremdzeichen || [[File:Tocharian letter shà.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter ssà.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter sà.gif|75px]] || 
|}

{| class="wikitable"
|+Other marks
|-
| [[Visarga]] || [[Anusvara]] || [[Virama]] (on [[File:Tocharian letter na.gif|30px|na]]) || [[Jihvamuliya]] || [[Upadhmaniya]]
|-
| [[File:Tocharian Visarga.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian Anusvaara.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian letter n'.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian Jihvamuuliya.gif|75px]] || [[File:Tocharian Upadhmaniiya.gif|75px]]
|}

===Evolution from Brahmi to Tocharian===
[[File:2nd-century CE Sanskrit, Kizil China, Spitzer Manuscript folio 383 fragment verso.jpg|thumb|2nd-century CE Sanskrit, [[Kizil Caves]]. First line: "... [pa]kasah tasmad asma(d)vipaksapratipaksas..." . Spitzer, Manuscript folio 383 fragment.]]
Manuscripts in Sanskrit, using Middle [[Brahmi script]] and the Kushan period, and carbon dated to the 2nd century CE, have been discovered in the [[Tarim Basin]], and particularly at Kizil. Some of the fragments, quite possibly the oldest Sanskrit manuscript of any type related to Buddhism and Hinduism discovered so far, were discovered in 1906 in the form of a pile of more than 1,000 palm leaf fragments in the Ming-oi, [[Kizil Caves]], during the third Turfan expedition headed by [[Albert Grünwedel]]. The calibrated age of the manuscript by Carbon-14 technique is 130 CE (80–230 CE), corresponding to the rule of the Kushan king [[Kanishka]]. 

The Tocharian script evolved from the [[Brahmi|Middle Brahmi]] script of the [[Kushan Empire]]:<ref>{{cite book |last1=Joshi |first1=R. Malatesha |last2=McBride |first2=Catherine |title=Handbook of Literacy in Akshara Orthography |date=11 June 2019 |publisher=Springer |isbn=978-3-030-05977-4 |page=27 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=n_ecDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA27 |language=en}}</ref>
{{Brahmi-Kushan Brahmi-Tocharian}}

==Unicode==
Tocharian script was proposed for inclusion in [[Unicode]] in 2015 but has not been approved.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://scriptsource.org/cms/scripts/page.php?item_id=entry_detail&uid=bedhbwsx6g|title=ScriptSource - Entry - Unicode Status (Tocharian)}}</ref>

==References==
<references/>

==External links==
* TITUS: Tocharian [http://titus.fkidg1.uni-frankfurt.de/didact/idg/toch/tochbr.htm alphabets], [http://titus.fkidg1.uni-frankfurt.de/database/titusinx/tochvb.asp conjugation tables], and  [http://titus.fkidg1.uni-frankfurt.de/texte/tocharic/tht.htm manuscripts] from the Berlin Turfan Collection
* [http://www.wordgumbo.com/ie/cmp/toch.htm A Tocharian-to-English dictionary with nearly 200 words] with accompanying [http://www.wordgumbo.com/ie/cmp/toch.htm article]
* [https://lrc.la.utexas.edu/eieol/tokol Tocharian Online] by Todd B. Krause and Jonathan Slocum, University of Texas at Austin
*[http://www.omniglot.com/writing/tocharian.htm ''Tocharian alphabet''] at Omniglot.com
* Online: {{cite web |title=A dictionary of Tocharian B |url=https://www.win.tue.nl/~aeb/natlang/ie/tochB.html |website=www.win.tue.nl}}, also in print: {{cite book |last1=Adams |first1=Douglas Q. |title=A Dictionary of Tocharian B |year=2013 |publisher=Rodopi |isbn=978-90-420-3671-0 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=EWziAAAAQBAJ&pg=PA420 |language=en}}
* [https://cetom.univie.ac.at/ ''CEToM: A Comprehensive Edition of Tocharian Manuscripts'']

{{list of writing systems}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Tocharian Script}}
[[Category:Tocharian languages]]
[[Category:Tocharians]]
[[Category:Obsolete writing systems]] <!-- for Tocharian --> <!-- for Tocharian -->
[[Category:Abugida writing systems]]