Devanagari
Writing script for many North Indian and Nepalese languages / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Devanāgarī or Devanagari (/ˌdeɪvəˈnɑːɡəri/ DAY-və-NAH-gə-ree; देवनागरी, IAST: Devanāgarī, Sanskrit pronunciation: [deːʋɐˈnaːɡɐriː]), also called Nāgarī (Sanskrit: नागरी, Nāgarī),[8] is a left-to-right abugida (a type of segmental writing system),[9] based on the ancient Brāhmī script,[10] used in the northern Indian subcontinent. It is one of the official scripts of the Indian Republic and Nepal. It was developed and in regular use by the 7th century CE.[8][11] The Devanāgarī script, composed of 47 primary characters, including 14 vowels and 33 consonants, is the fourth most widely adopted writing system in the world,[12] being used for over 120 languages.[13]
| Devanāgarī देवनागरी | |
|---|---|
 Devanāgarī script (vowels top three rows, consonants below) | |
| Script type | |
Time period | 7th century CE to present[1][2] |
| Direction | left-to-right  |
| Region | |
| Languages | Apabhramsha, Angika, Awadhi, Bajjika, Bhili, Bhojpuri, Boro, Braj, Chhattisgarhi, Dogri, Gujarātī, Garhwali, Haryanvi, Hindustani (Hindi), Kashmiri, Konkani, Kumaoni, Magahi, Maithili, Marathi, Marwari, Mundari, Nagpuri, Newari, Nepali, Pāli, Pahari, Prakrit, Rajasthani, Sanskrit, Santali, Saraiki, Sherpa, Sindhi, Surjapuri, and many more. |
| Related scripts | |
Parent systems | |
Sister systems | Nandināgarī Kaithi Gujarātī Moḍī |
| ISO 15924 | |
| ISO 15924 | Deva (315), Devanagari (Nagari) |
| Unicode | |
Unicode alias | Devanagari |
| U+0900–U+097F Devanagari, U+A8E0–U+A8FF Devanagari Extended, U+11B00–11B5F Devanagari Extended-A, U+1CD0–U+1CFF Vedic Extensions | |
| |
| This article contains phonetic transcriptions in the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA). For an introductory guide on IPA symbols, see Help:IPA. For the distinction between [ ], / / and ⟨ ⟩, see IPA § Brackets and transcription delimiters. | |
| Brahmic scripts |
|---|
| The Brahmic script and its descendants |
|
Southern Brahmic |
The orthography of this script reflects the pronunciation of the language.[13] Unlike the Latin alphabet, the script has no concept of letter case.[14] It is written from left to right, has a strong preference for symmetrical rounded shapes within squared outlines, and is recognisable by a horizontal line, known as a shirorekhā, that runs along the top of full letters.[9] In a cursory look, the Devanāgarī script appears different from other Indic scripts such as Bengali-Assamese, or Gurmukhi, but a closer examination reveals they are very similar except for angles and structural emphasis.[9]
Among the languages using it as a primary or secondary script are Marathi, Pāḷi, Sanskrit,[15] Hindi,[16] Boro, Nepali, Sherpa, Prakrit, Apabhramsha, Awadhi, Bhojpuri, Braj Bhasha,[17] Chhattisgarhi, Haryanvi, Magahi, Nagpuri, Rajasthani, Bhili, Dogri, Kashmiri, Maithili, Konkani, Sindhi, Nepal Bhasa, Mundari, Angika, Bajjika and Santali.[13] The Devanāgarī script is closely related to the Nandināgarī script commonly found in numerous ancient manuscripts of South India,[18][19] and it is distantly related to a number of southeast Asian scripts.[13]