Editing Brahmi script (section)

===Semitic hypothesis===
{{anchor|semitic}}
{| class="wikitable" style="float:right; margin-left: 10px; margin-right: 0px;"
|+ Bühler's aspirate derivations 
|-style="text-align:center"
|-
! IAST !! {{nowrap|–aspirate}} !! {{nowrap|+aspirate}} !! origin of aspirate according to Bühler
|-
| k/kh || [[File:Brahmi k.svg|15px]] || [[File:Brahmi kh.svg|15px]] || Semitic emphatic ([[qoph]]) 
|-	
| g/gh || [[File:Brahmi g.svg|15px]] || [[File:Brahmi gh.svg|15px]] || Semitic emphatic ([[heth]]) (hook addition in Bhattiprolu script)
|-
| c/ch || [[File:Brahmi c.svg|15px]] || [[File:Brahmi ch.svg|15px]] || curve addition
|-
| j/jh || [[File:Brahmi j.svg|15px]] || [[File:Brahmi jh.svg|15px]] || hook addition with some alteration
|-
| p/ph || [[File:Brahmi p.svg|15px]] || [[File:Brahmi ph.svg|15px]] || curve addition	
|-
| b/bh || [[File:Brahmi b.svg|15px]] || [[File:Brahmi bh.svg|15px]] || hook addition with some alteration	
|-	
| t/th || [[File:Brahmi t.svg|15px]] || [[File:Brahmi th.svg|15px]] || Semitic emphatic ([[teth]])
|-
| d/dh || [[File:Brahmi d.svg|15px]] || [[File:Brahmi dh.svg|15px]] || unaspirated glyph back formed
|-	
| ṭ/ṭh || [[File:Brahmi tt.svg|15px]] || [[File:Brahmi tth.svg|15px]] || unaspirated glyph back formed as if aspirated glyph with curve
|-
| ḍ/ḍh || [[File:Brahmi dd.svg|15px]] || [[File:Brahmi ddh.svg|15px]] || curve addition 
|}
Many scholars link the origin of Brahmi to Semitic script models, particularly Aramaic.{{sfn|Salomon|1996|p=378}} The explanation of how this might have happened, the particular Semitic script, and the chronology of the derivation have been the subject of much debate. Bühler followed [[Albrecht Weber]] in connecting it particularly to Phoenician, and proposed an early 8th century BCE date{{sfn|Bühler|1898|p=84–91}} for the borrowing. A link to the [[South Semitic scripts]], a less prominent branch of the Semitic script family, has occasionally been proposed, but has not gained much acceptance.{{Sfn|Salomon|1998|pp=23–24}} Finally, the Aramaic script being the prototype for Brahmi has been the more preferred hypothesis because of its geographic proximity to the Indian subcontinent, and its influence likely arising because Aramaic was the bureaucratic language of the Achaemenid empire. However, this hypothesis does not explain the mystery of why two very different scripts, Kharoṣṭhī and Brahmi, developed from the same Aramaic. A possible explanation might be that Ashoka created an imperial script for his edicts, but there is no evidence to support this conjecture.{{Sfn|Salomon|1998|p=28}}
{{clear}}
The chart below shows the close resemblance that Brahmi has with the first four letters of Semitic script, the first column representing the [[Phoenician alphabet]].

{| class="wikitable" id="letters_chart"
|-
! colspan="2" | Letter
! rowspan="2" | Name<ref>After {{cite book |first=Steven R. |last=Fischer |year=2001 |title=A History of Writing |publisher=Reaction Books |location=London |page=126}}</ref>
! rowspan="2" | [[Phoneme]]
! colspan="2" | Origin
! colspan="12" | Corresponding letter in
|-
! Image
! Text
! [[Egyptian hieroglyphs|Hieroglyphs]]
! [[Proto-Sinaitic]]
! [[Aramaic alphabet|Aramaic]]
! [[Hebrew alphabet|Hebrew]]
! [[Syriac alphabet|Syriac]]
! [[Greek alphabet|Greek]]
! Brahmi
|-
| {{Anchor|aleph}}[[File:Phoenician aleph.svg|20px|Aleph]]
| {{huge|{{lang|phn|{{script|Phnx|𐤀}}}}}}
| [[Aleph|ʾālep]]
| ʾ {{IPAblink|ʔ}}
| 𓃾
| [[File:Proto-semiticA-01.svg|20px]]
| {{script|Armi|𐡀}}
| [[Aleph|א]]
| [[Aleph|ܐ]]
| [[Α]]α
| 𑀅

|-
| {{Anchor|Beth|Bet}}[[File:Phoenician beth.svg|20px|Beth]]
| {{huge|{{lang|phn|{{script|Phnx|𐤁}}}}}}
| [[Bet (letter)|bēt]]
| b {{IPAblink|b}}
| 𓉐
| [[File:Proto-semiticB-01.svg|20px]]
| {{script|Armi|𐡁}}
| [[Bet (letter)|ב]]
| [[Bet (letter)|ܒ]]
| [[Beta (letter)|Β]]β
| 𑀩
 
|-
| {{Anchor|Gimel}}[[File:Phoenician gimel.svg|20px|Gimel]]
| {{huge|{{lang|phn|{{script|Phnx|𐤂}}}}}}
| [[gimel|gīml]]
| g {{IPAblink|ɡ}}
| 𓌙
| [[File:Proto-semiticG-01.svg|20px]]
| {{script|Armi|𐡂}}
| [[Gimel|ג]]
| [[Gimel|ܓ]]
| [[Γ]]γ
| 𑀕
 
|-
| {{Anchor|Daleth|Dalet}}[[File:Phoenician daleth.svg|20px|Daleth]]
| {{huge|{{lang|phn|{{script|Phnx|𐤃}}}}}}
| [[Dalet|dālet]]
| d {{IPAblink|d}}
| 𓇯
| [[File:Proto-semiticD-01.svg|20px]] [[File:Proto-semiticD-02.svg|20px]]
| {{script|Armi|𐡃}}
| [[Dalet|ד]]
| [[Dalet|ܕ]]
| [[Δ]]δ
| 𑀥
|}

====Bühler's hypothesis====
According to the Semitic hypothesis as laid out by Bühler in 1898, the oldest Brahmi inscriptions were derived from a Phoenician prototype.{{sfn|Bühler|1898|p=59,68,71,75}}{{refn|group=note|Aramaic is written from right to left, as are several early examples of Brahmi.{{sfn|Salomon|1996}}{{page needed|date=March 2017}} For example, Brahmi and Aramaic ''g'' (𑀕 and 𐡂) and Brahmi and Aramaic ''t'' (𑀢 and 𐡕) are nearly identical, as are several other pairs. Bühler also perceived a pattern of derivation in which certain characters were turned upside down, as with ''pe'' 𐡐 and 𑀧 ''pa'', which he attributed to a stylistic preference against top-heavy characters.}} Salomon states Bühler's arguments are "weak historical, geographical, and chronological justifications for a Phoenician prototype". Discoveries made since Bühler's proposal, such as of six Mauryan inscriptions in Aramaic, suggest Bühler's proposal about Phoenician as weak. It is more likely that Aramaic, which was virtually certainly the prototype for Kharoṣṭhī, also may have been the basis for Brahmi. However, it is unclear why the ancient Indians would have developed two very different scripts.{{sfn|Salomon|1998|p=28}}

{| class="wikitable" style="float:right; margin-left: 10px; margin-right: 0px;"
 |+ Comparison of North Semitic and Brahmi scripts{{sfn|Salomon|1998|p=25}}{{refn|group=note|Bühler notes that other authors derive [[File:Brahmi ch.svg|15px]] (cha) from qoph. "M.L." indicates that the letter was used as a ''[[mater lectionis]]'' in some phase of Phoenician or Aramaic. The ''matres lectionis'' functioned as occasional vowel markers to indicate medial and final vowels in the otherwise consonant-only script. Aleph 𐤀 and particularly ʿayin 𐤏 only developed this function in later phases of Phoenician and related scripts, though 𐤀 also sometimes functioned to mark an initial [[Prothesis (linguistics)|prosthetic (or prothetic)]] vowel from a very early period.<ref>{{cite book|last1= Andersen|first1=F. I.|last2=Freedman|first2=D. N.|title=Studies in Hebrew and Aramaic Orthography|date=1992|publisher=Eisenbrauns|location=Winona Lake, [[Indiana|IN]] |pages=79–90|chapter=Aleph as a vowel in Old Aramaic}}</ref>}}
 |-style="text-align:center"
 ![[Phoenician alphabet|Phoenician]] !! [[Aramaic alphabet|Aramaic]] !! Value !! style="background: #ffaa66;" | Brahmi !! style="background: #ffaa66;" |Value
 |-style="text-align:center"
 |[[File:Phoenician aleph.svg|15px|Aleph]] || [[Image:Aleph.svg|15px]] || * || [[File:Brahmi a.svg|15px]] || a
 |-style="text-align:center"
 |[[File:Phoenician beth.svg|15px|Beth]] || [[Image:Beth.svg|15px]] || b {{IPAblink|b}} || [[File:Brahmi b.svg|15px]] ||ba 
 |-style="text-align:center"
 |[[File:Phoenician gimel.svg|15px|Gimel]] || [[Image:Gimel.svg|15px]] || g {{IPAblink|ɡ}} || [[File:Brahmi g.svg|15px]] || ga
 |-style="text-align:center"
 |[[File:Phoenician daleth.svg|15px|Daleth]]||[[File:daleth.svg|15px]] || d {{IPAblink|d}} || [[File:Brahmi dh.svg|15px]] || dha
 |-style="text-align:center"
 |[[Image:Phoenician he.svg|15px|He]] || [[Image:he0.svg|15px|He]] || h {{IPAblink|h}}, M.L. || [[File:Brahmi h.svg|15px]] || ha
 |-style="text-align:center"
 |[[File:Phoenician waw.svg|15px|Waw]] || [[File:waw.svg|15px|Waw]] || w {{IPAblink|w}}, M.L. || [[File:Brahmi v.svg|15px]] || va 
 |-style="text-align:center"
 |[[Image:Phoenician zayin.svg|15px|Zayin]] || [[Image:zayin.svg|15px|Zayin]] ||  z {{IPAblink|z}} || [[File:Brahmi j.svg|15px]] || ja
 |-style="text-align:center"
 |[[Image:Phoenician heth.svg|15px|Heth]] || [[Image:heth.svg|15px|Heth]] || ḥ {{IPAblink|ħ}}  || [[File:Brahmi gh.svg|15px]] || gha
 |-style="text-align:center"
 |[[File:Phoenician teth.svg|15px|Teth]] ||[[File:teth.svg|15px|Teth]] || ṭ {{IPAblink|tˤ}} || [[File:Brahmi th.svg|15px]] || tha
 |-style="text-align:center"
 |[[Image:Phoenician yodh.svg|15px|Yodh]] || [[Image:yod.svg|15px|Yodh]] || y {{IPAblink|j}}, M.L. || [[File:Brahmi y.svg|15px]] || ya
 |-style="text-align:center"
 |[[File:Phoenician kaph.svg|15px|Kaph]] || [[File:kaph.svg|15px|Kaph]] || k {{IPAblink|k}} || [[File:Brahmi k.svg|15px]] || ka
 |-style="text-align:center"
 |[[Image:Phoenician lamedh.svg|15px|Lamedh]] ||[[Image:lamed.svg|15px|Lamedh]]|| l {{IPAblink|l}} || [[File:Brahmi l.svg|15px]] || la 
 |-style="text-align:center"
 |[[Image:Phoenician mem.svg|15px|Mem]] || [[Image:mem.svg|15px|Mem]] || m {{IPAblink|m}} || [[File:Brahmi m.svg|15px]] || ma 
 |-style="text-align:center"
 |[[Image:Phoenician nun.svg|15px|Nun]] ||[[Image:nun.svg|15px|Nun]] || n {{IPAblink|n}} || [[File:Brahmi n.svg|15px]] || na
 |-style="text-align:center"
 |[[Image:Phoenician samekh.svg|15px|Samekh]] ||[[Image:samekh.svg|15px|Samekh]] || s {{IPAblink|s}} || [[File:Brahmi ss.svg|15px]] || ṣa
 |-style="text-align:center"
 |[[Image:Phoenician ayin.svg|15px|Ayin]] ||[[Image:ayin.svg|15px|Ayin]] || ʿ {{IPAblink|ʕ}},  M.L. || [[File:Brahmi e.svg|15px]] || e
 |-style="text-align:center"
 |[[File:Phoenician pe.svg|15px|Pe]] ||[[File:pe0.svg|15px|Pe]] || p {{IPAblink|p}} || [[File:Brahmi p.svg|15px]] || pa
 |-style="text-align:center"
 |[[Image:Phoenician sade.svg|15px|Sadek]] ||[[Image:sade_1.svg|15px|Sadek]] || ṣ {{IPAblink|sˤ}} || [[File:Brahmi c.svg|15px]] || ca
 |-style="text-align:center"
 |-style="text-align:center"
 |[[Image:Phoenician qoph.svg|15px|Qoph]] ||[[Image:qoph.svg|15px|Qoph]] || q {{IPAblink|q}} || [[File:Brahmi kh.svg|15px]] || kha
 |-style="text-align:center"
 |[[Image:Phoenician res.svg|15px|Res]] ||[[Image:resh.svg|15px|Res]] || r {{IPAblink|r}} || [[File:Brahmi r.svg|15px]] || ra
 |-style="text-align:center"
 |[[File:Phoenician sin.svg|15px|Sin]] ||[[File:shin.svg|15px|Sin]] || š {{IPAblink|ʃ}} || [[File:Brahmi sh.svg|15px]] || śa
 |-style="text-align:center"
 |[[File:Phoenician taw.svg|15px|Taw]] ||[[File:taw.svg|15px|Taw]]|| t {{IPAblink|t}} || [[File:Brahmi t.svg|15px]] || ta
 |-style="text-align:center"
 |}
According to Bühler, Brahmi added symbols for certain sounds not found in Semitic languages, and either deleted or repurposed symbols for Aramaic sounds not found in Prakrit. For example, Aramaic lacks the [[retroflex consonant|phonetic retroflex feature]] that appears among Prakrit [[Dental consonant|dental]] stops, such as {{IAST|ḍ}}, and in Brahmi the symbols of the retroflex and non-retroflex consonants are graphically very similar, as if both had been derived from a single prototype. (See [[Tibetan alphabet#Consonants|Tibetan alphabet]] for a similar later development.) Aramaic did not have Brahmi's [[aspirated consonant]]s ({{IAST|kh}}, {{IAST|th}}, etc.), whereas Brahmi did not have Aramaic's [[emphatic consonant]]s (''{{transliteration|sem|q, ṭ, ṣ}}''), and it appears that these unneeded emphatic letters filled in for some of Brahmi's aspirates: Aramaic ''q'' for Brahmi ''kh,'' Aramaic ''ṭ'' (Θ) for Brahmi ''th'' ({{IPA|ʘ}}), etc. And just where Aramaic did not have a corresponding emphatic stop, ''p'', Brahmi seems to have doubled up for the corresponding aspirate: Brahmi ''p'' and ''ph'' are graphically very similar, as if taken from the same source in Aramaic ''p''. Bühler saw a systematic derivational principle for the other aspirates ''ch'', ''jh'', ''ph'', ''bh'', and ''dh'', which involved adding a curve or upward hook to the right side of the character (which has been speculated to derive from ''h'', [[File:Brahmi h.svg|15px]]), while ''d'' and ''ṭ'' (not to be confused with the Semitic emphatic {{transliteration|sem|ṭ}}) were derived by back formation from ''dh'' and ''ṭh''.{{sfn|Bühler|1898|p=76–77}}

The attached table lists the correspondences between Brahmi and North Semitic scripts.{{sfn|Bühler|1898|p=82–83}}{{sfn|Salomon|1998|p=25}}

Bühler states that both Phoenician and Brahmi had three voiceless [[sibilant]]s, but because the alphabetical ordering was lost, the correspondences among them are not clear. Bühler was able to suggest Brahmi derivatives corresponding to all of the 22 North Semitic characters, though clearly, as Bühler himself recognized, some are more confident than others. He tended to place much weight on phonetic congruence as a guideline, for example connecting ''c'' [[File:Brahmi c.svg|15px]] to [[tsade]] 𐤑 rather than [[kaph]] 𐤊, as preferred by many of his predecessors.

One of the key problems with a Phoenician derivation is the lack of evidence for historical contact with Phoenicians in the relevant period.{{sfn|Salomon|1998|p=28}} Bühler explained this by proposing that the initial borrowing of Brahmi characters dates back considerably earlier than the earliest known evidence, as far back as 800&nbsp;BCE, contemporary with the Phoenician glyph forms that he mainly compared. Bühler cited a near-modern practice of writing Brahmic scripts informally without vowel diacritics as a possible continuation of this earlier abjad-like stage in development.{{sfn|Bühler|1898|p=84–91}}

The weakest forms of the Semitic hypothesis are similar to Gnanadesikan's [[trans-cultural diffusion]] view of the development of Brahmi and Kharoṣṭhī, in which the idea of alphabetic sound representation was learned from the Aramaic-speaking Persians, but much of the writing system was a novel development tailored to the phonology of Prakrit.<ref>{{Cite book |first=Amalia E. |last=Gnanadesikan |title=The Writing Revolution: Cuneiform to the Internet |publisher=John Wiley and Sons Ltd. |year=2009 |pages=173–174}}</ref>

Further evidence cited in favor of Persian influence has been the Hultzsch proposal in 1925 that the Prakrit/Sanskrit word for writing itself, ''lipi'' is similar to the Old Persian word ''dipi'', suggesting a probable borrowing.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Hultzsch|first1=E.|title=Corpus Inscriptionum Indicarum |volume=1: Inscriptions of Asoka|date=1925|publisher=Clarendon Press|location=Oxford |page=xlii|url=https://archive.org/stream/InscriptionsOfAsoka.NewEditionByE.Hultzsch/HultzschCorpusAsokaSearchable#page/n44/mode/1up|access-date=8 April 2015}}</ref><ref name="Scharfe 2002" /> A few of the Ashoka edicts from the region nearest the Persian empire use ''dipi'' as the Prakrit word for writing, which appears as ''lipi'' elsewhere, and this geographic distribution has long been taken, at least back to Bühler's time, as an indication that the standard ''lipi'' form is a later alteration that appeared as it diffused away from the Persian sphere of influence. Persian ''dipi'' itself is thought to be an [[Elamite language|Elamite]] loanword.<ref>{{cite journal|last1=Tavernier|first1=Jan|title=The Case of Elamite Tep-/Tip- and Akkadian Tuppu|journal=Iran|date=2007|volume=45|pages=57–69|url=https://archive.org/stream/Tavernier2007THECASEOFELAMITETEPTIPANDAKKADIANTUPPU/Tavernier%202007%20THE%20CASE%20OF%20ELAMITE%20TEP-TIP-%20AND%20AKKADIAN%20%E1%B9%ACUPPU_djvu.txt|access-date=8 April 2015|doi=10.1080/05786967.2007.11864718|s2cid=191052711}}</ref>
{{clear}}

====Greek-Semitic model hypothesis====
[[File:Coin of the Bactrian King Agathokles.jpg|thumb|upright=1.36|Coin (circa 180 BCE) of [[Agathocles of Bactria|Agathocles]] with Indian deities, in Greek and Brahmi.<br />Obverse: With Greek legend: {{lang|grc|ΒΑΣΙΛΕΩΣ ΑΓΑΘΟΚΛΕΟΥΣ}} (''Basileōs Agathokleous'').<br />Reverse: With [[Brahmi]] legend:{{script|Brah|𑀭𑀸𑀚𑀦𑁂 𑀅𑀕𑀣𑀼𑀓𑁆𑀮𑀬𑁂𑀲}} {{Transliteration|Brah|Rājane Agathukleyesa}}  .<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Bopearachchi|first=Osmund|date=1993|title=On the so-called earliest representation of Ganesa|url=https://www.persee.fr/doc/topoi_1161-9473_1993_num_3_2_1479|journal=Topoi. Orient-Occident|volume=3|issue=2|doi=10.3406/topoi.1993.1479|page=436|access-date=2022-07-27|archive-date=2022-07-27|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220727044511/https://www.persee.fr/doc/topoi_1161-9473_1993_num_3_2_1479|url-status=live}}</ref><ref name="Bopearachchi" />]]
Falk's 1993 book {{lang|de|Schrift im Alten Indien}} is a study on writing in ancient India,<ref name="bronkhorst2002lar" />{{sfn|Falk|1993}} and has a section on the origins of Brahmi.{{sfn|Falk|1993|pp=109–167}} It features an extensive review of the literature up to that time. Falk sees the basic [[writing system]] of Brahmi as being derived from the Kharoṣṭhī script, itself a derivative of Aramaic. At the time of his writing, the Ashoka edicts were the oldest confidently dateable examples of Brahmi, and he perceives in them "a clear development in language from a faulty linguistic style to a well honed one"{{Sfn|Annette Wilke |Oliver Moebus |2011|p=194, footnote 421}} over time, which he takes to indicate that the script had been recently developed.{{sfn|Falk|1993|pp=109–167}}<ref name="salomon1995rev" /> Falk deviates from the mainstream of opinion in seeing Greek as also being a significant source for Brahmi. On this point particularly, Salomon disagrees with Falk, and after presenting evidence of very different methodology between Greek and Brahmi notation of vowel quantity, he states "it is doubtful whether Brahmi derived even the basic concept from a Greek prototype".{{Sfn|Salomon|1998|p=22}} Further, adds Salomon, in a "limited sense Brahmi can be said to be derived from Kharosthi, but in terms of the actual forms of the characters, the differences between the two Indian scripts are much greater than the similarities".{{Sfn|Salomon|1998|pp=23}}

Falk also dated the origin of Kharoṣṭhī to no earlier than 325&nbsp;BCE, based on a proposed connection to the Greek conquest.{{sfn|Falk|1993|pp=104}} Salomon questions Falk's arguments as to the date of Kharoṣṭhī and writes that it is "speculative at best and hardly constitutes firm grounds for a late date for Kharoṣṭhī. The stronger argument for this position is that we have no specimen of the script before the time of Ashoka, nor any direct evidence of intermediate stages in its development; but of course this does not mean that such earlier forms did not exist, only that, if they did exist, they have not survived, presumably because they were not employed for monumental purposes before Ashoka".<ref name="salomon1995rev">{{cite journal |last=Salomon |first=Richard |title=Review: On the Origin of the Early Indian Scripts |journal=Journal of the American Oriental Society |volume=115 |issue=2 |year=1995 |pages=271–278 |doi=10.2307/604670 |jstor=604670}}</ref>

Unlike Bühler, Falk does not provide details of which and how the presumptive prototypes may have been mapped to the individual characters of Brahmi. Further, states Salomon, Falk accepts there are anomalies in phonetic value and diacritics in Brahmi script that are not found in the presumed Kharoṣṭhī script source. Falk attempts to explain these anomalies by reviving the Greek influence hypothesis, a hypothesis that had previously fallen out of favor.<ref name="salomon1995rev" />{{Sfn|Salomon|1998|pp=19–24}}

Hartmut Scharfe, in his 2002 review of Kharoṣṭī and Brāhmī scripts, concurs with Salomon's questioning of Falk's proposal, and states, "the pattern of the phonemic analysis of the Sanskrit language achieved by the Vedic scholars is much closer to the Brahmi script than the Greek alphabet".<ref name="scharfe391" />

As of 2018, Harry Falk refined his view by affirming that Brahmi was developed from scratch in a rational way at the time of [[Ashoka]], by consciously combining the advantages of the pre-existing [[Greek script]] and northern [[Kharosthi]] script.<ref name="HF57" /> Greek-style letter types were selected for their "broad, upright and symmetrical form", and writing from left to right was also adopted for its convenience.<ref name="HF57" /> On the other hand, the Kharosthi treatment of vowels was retained, with its inherent vowel "a", derived from [[Aramaic]], and stroke additions to represent other vowel signs.<ref name="HF57" /> In addition, a new system of combining consonants vertically to represent complex sounds was also developed.<ref name="HF57">{{cite journal |last1=Falk |first1=Harry |title=The Creation and Spread of Scripts in Ancient India |journal=Literacy in Ancient Everyday Life |pages=43–66 (online 57–58) |date=2018 |doi=10.1515/9783110594065-004 |isbn=9783110594065 |s2cid=134470331 |url=https://www.academia.edu/37342561 |language=en |access-date=2020-01-04 |archive-date=2021-12-10 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211210121509/https://www.academia.edu/37342561 |url-status=live}}</ref>