abjad From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Aramaic alphabet was originally adapted from the Phoenician alphabet about the 8th century BC.[1] It was first used to write the Aramaic language.[1] It was also used to write several other languages and alphabets including the Hebrew square script.[2] It was also developed into the Nabataean, Syriac and Mongolian writing systems, among others.[1] The modern Arabic alphabet is also descended from the Aramaic alphabet.[2]
The Aramaic alphabet contains 22 characters used mainly to indicate consonants.[3] However, some symbols can be used to indicate long vowels.[3] By comparison the later Hebrew and Arabic scripts use only consonants. Hebrew uses 22; Arabic 28.[2]
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