Indian Epigraphy c14.2

c14.2

With the spread of Indian culture over various countries of Asia, the Indian languages and scripts were introduced into many regions especially of Central and South-East Asia. Epigraphic and literary records in Sanskrit, Prakrit and the regional languages, written in Kharoṣṭhī, Brāhmī and the derivatives of the latter have been found in Central Asia which was regarded as forming a part of the ancient Uttarāpatha division of Bhāratavarṣa. The current alphabets of most of the South-East Asian countries are derivatives of Brāhmī. The earliest inscriptions of these regions, with the exception of Burma and Ceylon, are in Sanskrit. While Prakrit and Pali inscriptions are more numerous in Ceylon, Sanskrit and Pali were both used in early Burmese epigraphs.