On the Origin of the Indian Brahma Alphabet c7.s1.36

c7.s1.36

No 22. The oldest form of the Brāhma *ta*, which Professor Weber has recognised already as a modification of the Semitic *Taw*, seems to be that (Col. V, a) consisting of a long slightly inclined downstroke with a short straight bar slanting off to the right. Next comes the sign, given in Col. V, b, with the bar slanting off to the left, and this is due to the change in the direction of the writing. The *ta* consisting of a vertical stroke with an angle at the foot, Col. V, c, which is frequent in the southern and western versions of the Edicts and also on the Sohgaurā Plate, is probably [69] due to the formalism of the Hindus, their desire to set the letter up straight and to make it perfectly regular in appearance. The forms with a round limb to the right or left of the vertical (see above p. 41) of course are cursive. The oldest among these five forms for *ta* closely resembles the *Taw* from the earliest Sinjirli inscription (Col. III, b), which belongs to the beginning of the eighth century B. C., and still more that of Col. III, a, which occurs on an Assyrian weight of the reign of Salmanassar¹ and has therefore been engraved before 725 B. C. As it thus appears that Semitic forms, consisting of a long inclined downstroke with a crossbar very slightly protruding on the left or with a simple bar on the right, have been developed in very early times, it is not improbable, that one of them occurred in the alphabet which the Hindus borrowed. But the possibility that the Indian sign is an independent development from the straight Phoenician cross (Col. I), is not altogether excluded. For the cross could not remain in the Brāhma alphabet, because it would have been undistinguishable from *ka*.