124. Tagbanwa

 

The Tagbanwa alphabet is one of a number of closely related scripts used in the Philippines until the 17th Century AD. It is thought to have descended from the Kawi script of Java, Bali and Sumatra, which in turn descended from the Pallava script, one of the southern Indian scripts derived from Brahmi.

Notable features

• Type of writing system: syllabic alphabet in which each consonant has an inherent vowel /a/. Other vowels are indicated either by separate letters, or by diacritics. When vowels appear at the beginning of words or one they own, they are represented by separate letters.
• Direction of writing: traditionally written on bamboo in vertical columns from bottom to top and left to right, andread from left to right in horizontal lines.
• Used to write: Tagbanwa

Tagbawan, which is also known as Aborlan Tagbanwa, Apurawnon or Tagbanua, is spoken by about 10,000 people in central Palawan in the Philippines. Related languages include Central Tagbanwa, which is spoken by about 2,000 people in the northwest of Palawan; and Calamian Tagbanwa, which has about 10,000 speakers in the Calamian Islands north of Palawan.

Tagbanwa alphabet

Sample text in Tagbanwa (Lord's prayer)

Source: http://archive.org/details/tagbanwaalphabet00romurich
Supplied by Wolfgang Kuhl
Tower of Babel in Tagbanwa

Links

Information about the Tagbanwa alphabet and languages
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tagbanwa_alphabet
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aborlan_Tagbanwa_language
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_Tagbanwa_language
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calamian_Tagbanwa_language
http://www.ethnologue.org/show_language.asp?code=tgt
http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/29792634?uid=3738032&uid=2129&uid=2&uid=70&uid=4&sid=47699044966057
Free Tagbanwa font
http://youpibouh.thefreecat.org/download/tagbanwa.htm
Information about Philippine history, language, writing, etc
http://www.mts.net/~pmorrow
An introduction to the alphabets of the Philippines by Hector Santos
http://www.bibingka.com/dahon