Alphabet Key To History Of Mankind

Author(s): David Diringer
Publisher: Hutchinsons Scientific and Technical Publications

Page 359

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THE ALPHABET
It was an angular script; the vertical strokes ended with wedges or "nailheads"; this script was therefore termed "nail-headed." Buehler called it "acute-angled alphabet" or Siddhamatrka. A peculiar feature of this character is that the letters slope from right to left. Two main types are known: the monumental, preserved in inscriptions, such as the BodhGaya inscription from Mahanaman (A.D. 588-9) and the Prasasti from Lakhamandal, end of the sixth century A.D.; and the cursive hand, preserved in some manuscripts on palm-leaves, such as those from Horiuzji, probably belonging to the same century.
Little is known about its development; the documents extant are very scarce, it was the period of the invasion of the Huns and of the devastating menace to Hindu civilization.
There is a blank in the history of northern India until the accession, in 606. of Harsha-vardhana, who succeeded in uniting for a short time a great portion of northern India when Pulikesin II, the greatest of the Chalukya kings conquered much of southern India.
However, during the seventh century, the Siddhamatrka character continued to develop. A variety, characterized by a more marked twist of the lower ends of the strokes, was termed by Prinsep, Fleet and other scholars, "the Kutila variety of the Magadha alphabet of the seventh century." Kielhorn, Buehler, and others, consider this term erroneous. At any rate, these so-called Kutila inscriptions of North India from the seventh century onwards (Fig. 153. col. 7) already represent the ancient form of the Nagari character.
Deva-nagari Script
The most important Indian script, the Nagari or Deva-nagari (Fig. 153, col. 12) developed from a variety of the Gupta character through the Siddhamatrka. The original meaning of the term Nagari is uncertain. According to some scholars it occurs first, as the name of a script, in the Lalita Vistara (see above), Naga-lipi, or "writing of the Nagas"; according to Dr. L. D. Barnett, however, there is no connection between Nagalipi and Deva-nagari. Another local explanation is "writing of the Nagara" or the Gujarat Brahmans. Nowadays, Nagari is usually referred to as Nagara, and explained as "writing used in cities" or "town-script."
The earliest Nagari inscriptions belong to the seventh and eighth century A.D. Signatures are found on inscriptions belonging to the first half of the seventh century, whilst the earliest extant documents written throughout in Nagari belong to the middle and the end of the eighth century A.D.
The Nagari letters were long-drawn and tailed, and had long horizontal strokes on the top, the latter feature being most characteristic of this