Editing Brahmi script (section)

==Texts==
[[File:Child learning Brahmi Alphabets, Shunga era 2nd Century BCE, National Mseum, New Delhi.jpg|thumb|250px|A northern example of Brahmi epigraphy: ancient terracotta sculpture from [[Srughna|Sugh]] ''"Child learning [[Brahmi]]"'', showing the first letters of the Brahmi alphabet, 2nd century BCE.<ref>{{cite book|last=Chhabra|first=B. Ch.|title=Sugh Terracotta with Brahmi Barakhadi: appears in the Bulletin National Museum No. 2|date=1970|publisher=National Museum|location=New Delhi|url=https://archive.org/details/NationalMuseumBulletinNo.2/page/n1}}</ref>]]

The Brahmi script is mentioned in the ancient Indian texts of the three major [[Indian religions|Dharmic religions]]: [[Hinduism]], [[Jainism]], and [[Buddhism]], as well as their [[Chinese literature|Chinese translations]].<ref name="georgbuhler6">{{cite book|author=Georg Bühler|title=On the Origin of the Indian Brahma Alphabet|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=kfIVUd7BCbAC&pg=PR14|year=1898|publisher=K.J. Trübner|pages=6, 14–15, 23, 29|access-date=2016-10-18|archive-date=2020-07-27|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200727132503/https://books.google.com/books?id=kfIVUd7BCbAC&pg=PR14|url-status=live}}, Quote: "(...) a passage of the ''Lalitavistara'' which describes the first visit of Prince Siddhartha, the future Buddha, to the writing school..." (page 6); "In the account of Prince Siddhartha's first visit to the writing school, extracted by Professor Terrien de la Couperie from the Chinese translation of the Lalitavistara of 308 CE, there occurs besides the mention of the sixty-four alphabets, known also from the printed Sanskrit text, the utterance of the Master Visvamitra[.]"</ref><ref name="salomon8">{{harvnb|Salomon|1998|pages=8–10 with footnotes}}</ref> For example, the 10th chapter of the ''[[Lalitavistara Sūtra]]'' (c. 200–300 CE),<ref>{{cite journal |url=http://ccbs.ntu.edu.tw/FULLTEXT/JR-ENG/wadd.htm |title=The So-Called "Mahapadana" Suttanta and the Date of the Pali Canon |author=L. A. Waddell |journal=The Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland |date=1914 |volume=46 |issue=3 |pages=661–680 |doi=10.1017/S0035869X00047055 |s2cid=162074807 |accessdate=2022-02-12 |archive-date=2010-12-06 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101206023525/http://ccbs.ntu.edu.tw/FULLTEXT/JR-ENG/wadd.htm |url-status=live}}</ref> titled the ''Lipisala samdarshana parivarta,'' lists 64 ''[[Lipi (script)|lipi]]'' (scripts), with the Brahmi script starting the list. The ''Lalitavistara Sūtra'' states that young Siddhartha, the future [[Gautama Buddha]] (~500 BCE), mastered philology, Brahmi and other scripts from the [[Brahmin]] Lipikāra and Deva Vidyāsiṃha at a school.<ref name="georgbuhler6" /><ref name="nado95">{{cite journal|last1=Nado|first1=Lopon|title=The Development of Language in Bhutan|journal=The Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies|date=1982|volume=5|issue=2|page=95|quote=Under different teachers, such as the Brahmin Lipikara and Deva Vidyasinha, he mastered Indian philology and scripts. According to Lalitavistara, there were as many as sixty-four scripts in India.}}</ref>

A list of eighteen ancient scripts is found in the [[Jain literature|early Jaina texts]], such as the ''[[Pannavana Sutta|Paṇṇavaṇā Sūtra]]'' (2nd century BCE) and the ''[[Samavayanga Sutra|Samavāyāṅga Sūtra]]'' (3rd century BCE).<ref name="jaotsungi">{{cite journal|last1=Tsung-i|first1=Jao|title=Chinese Sources on Brāhmī and Kharoṣṭhī|journal=Annals of the Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute|date=1964|volume=45|issue=1/4|pages=39–47|jstor=41682442}}</ref>{{sfn|Salomon|1998|p=9}} These Jain script lists include Brahmi at number 1 and Kharoṣṭhi at number 4, but also Javanaliya (probably [[Koine Greek|Greek]]) and others not found in the Buddhist lists.{{sfn|Salomon|1998|p=9}}