Indian Palaeography from about B.C. 350 to about A.D. 1300 c6.s5.2

c6.s5.2

**[17]** According to the preceding discussion, the great majority of the Brāhma letters agree with the oldest types of the North-Semitic signs, which are found in the archaic Phoenician inscriptions and on the stone of Mesa, incised about B. C. 890. But two characters, *ha* and *ta*, are derived from Mesopotamian forms of *He* and *Taw*, which belong to the middle of the eighth century B. C., and two, *sa*-*ṣa* and *śa*, resemble Aramaic signs of the sixth century B. C. As the literary and epigraphic evidence leaves no doubt that the Hindus were not unlettered during the period B. C. 600—500, and as the other signs of the Aramaic alphabet of this period, such as *Beth*, *Daleth*, *Waw*, &c., are too far advanced to be considered as the prototypes of the corresponding Brāhma letters, it becomes necessary to regard the seemingly modern forms of *sa*, *ṣa* and *śa* as the results of an Indian development, analogous to that of the corresponding Aramaic characters. This assumption, of course, remains tenable only as long as the two Aramaic letters are not shown to be more ancient by new epigraphic discoveries, which event, to judge from the results of the Sinjirli finds, does not seem to be impossible. But, for the present, they must be left out of consideration in fixing the *terminus a quo* for the importation of the Semitic alphabet into India; and this *terminus* falls between the time of the incision of Mesa's inscription and of those on the Assyrian weights, from about B. C. 890 to about B. C. 750, probably a little more towards the lower than towards the upper limit, or, roughly reckoning, about B. C. 800. And various circumstances make it probable that this was actually the time when the Semitic letters became known to the Hindus.