Sinhalese Braille

Sinhalese Braille
Sinhala Braille
Type
Languages Sinhala
Parent systems
Print basis
 Sinhalese alphabet

Sinhalese Braille is one of the Bharati braille alphabets. While it largely conforms to the letter values of other Bharati alphabets, it diverges in the values of the letters assigned toward the end of those alphabets.[1]

Alphabet

Although Sinhalese Braille was adopted from Bharati Braille, several letters toward the end of the Bharati alphabet (in the row of 'extra' letters) have been reassigned in Sinhalese: ⠟ (Bharati kṣ) is used for Sinhalese ඥ gn (Sanskrit jñ), ⠱ (Bharati jñ) for Sinhalese ඵ ph, ⠷ (Bharati ḻ) for Sinhalese ඇ æ, ⠻ (Bharati ṟ) for Sinhalese ඈ ǣ, and ⠵ (Bharati z) for Sinhalese ණ ṇ.

In addition, the pairs of letters e/ē and ś/ṣ have interchanged braille values from what one would expect from other Bharati alphabets, and the syllable codas (last row below) are mostly innovative. Punctuation and the digits, however, are as in the rest of Bharati braille. Also as in other Bharati alphabets, letters rather than diacritics are used for vowels, and they occur after consonants in their spoken order.

Print අ ආ ඇ[2] ඈ[2] ඉ ඊ උ ඌ එ[3] ඒ[3] ඓ ඔ ඕ ඖ
ISO a ā æ ǣ i ī u ū e ē ai o ō au
Braille ⠁ (braille pattern dots-1) ⠜ (braille pattern dots-345) ⠷ (braille pattern dots-12356) ⠻ (braille pattern dots-12456) ⠊ (braille pattern dots-24) ⠔ (braille pattern dots-35) ⠥ (braille pattern dots-136) ⠳ (braille pattern dots-1256) ⠑ (braille pattern dots-15) ⠢ (braille pattern dots-26) ⠌ (braille pattern dots-34) ⠭ (braille pattern dots-1346) ⠕ (braille pattern dots-135) ⠪ (braille pattern dots-246)
Print ඍ ඎ ඏ[4] ඐ[4]
ISO ṛ ṝ ḷ ḹ
Braille ⠐ (braille pattern dots-5)⠗ (braille pattern dots-1235) ⠠ (braille pattern dots-6)⠗ (braille pattern dots-1235) ⠐ (braille pattern dots-5)⠇ (braille pattern dots-123) ⠠ (braille pattern dots-6)⠇ (braille pattern dots-123)
Print ක ඛ ග ඝ ඞ ච ඡ ජ ඣ ඤ
ISO k kh g gh ṅ c ch j jh ñ
Braille ⠅ (braille pattern dots-13) ⠨ (braille pattern dots-46) ⠛ (braille pattern dots-1245) ⠣ (braille pattern dots-126) ⠬ (braille pattern dots-346) ⠉ (braille pattern dots-14) ⠡ (braille pattern dots-16) ⠚ (braille pattern dots-245) ⠴ (braille pattern dots-356) ⠒ (braille pattern dots-25)
Print ට ඨ ඩ ඪ ණ[2] ත ථ ද ධ න
ISO ṭ ṭh ḍ ḍh ṇ t th d dh n
Braille ⠾ (braille pattern dots-23456) ⠺ (braille pattern dots-2456) ⠫ (braille pattern dots-1246) ⠿ (braille pattern dots-123456) ⠵ (braille pattern dots-1356) ⠞ (braille pattern dots-2345) ⠹ (braille pattern dots-1456) ⠙ (braille pattern dots-145) ⠮ (braille pattern dots-2346) ⠝ (braille pattern dots-1345)
Print ප ඵ[2] බ භ ම ය ර ල ළ ව
ISO p ph b bh m y r l ḷ v
Braille ⠏ (braille pattern dots-1234) ⠱ (braille pattern dots-156) ⠃ (braille pattern dots-12) ⠘ (braille pattern dots-45) ⠍ (braille pattern dots-134) ⠽ (braille pattern dots-13456) ⠗ (braille pattern dots-1235) ⠇ (braille pattern dots-123) ⠸ (braille pattern dots-456) ⠧ (braille pattern dots-1236)
Print ශ[5] ෂ[5] ස හ ඥ[2] ෆ
ISO ś ṣ s h gn f
Braille ⠯ (braille pattern dots-12346) ⠩ (braille pattern dots-146) ⠎ (braille pattern dots-234) ⠓ (braille pattern dots-125) ⠟ (braille pattern dots-12345) ⠋ (braille pattern dots-124)

Codas

Print ක් කං[6] කඃ[6] (see below)*
Diacritics Halant Anusvara Visarga Candrabindu
Braille ⠈ (braille pattern dots-4) ⠄ (braille pattern dots-3) ⠄ (braille pattern dots-3)⠄ (braille pattern dots-3) ⠆ (braille pattern dots-23)

* In print Sinhala, this is indicated by an additional set of letters:

ඟ n̆ga ⠆⠛, ඬ n̆ḍa ⠆⠫, ඳ n̆da ⠆⠙, ඹ m̆ba ⠆⠃

Punctuation

See Bharati Braille#Punctuation.

References

  1. ↑ World Braille Usage, UNESCO, 2013
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 These letters are out of keeping with the values of Bharati braille, as described in the text.
  3. 1 2 Sinhala e and ē are reversed from what one would expect from other Bharati alphabets.
  4. 1 2 Not listed in Unesco (2013)
  5. 1 2 Ś and ṣ are reversed from the expected Bharati order, and also from the Acharya website.
  6. 1 2 Apart from the halant (hal kirīma), the diacritics differ from Bharati norms. Acharya, however, has කං ⠰ and කඃ ⠠ as expected for Bharati.
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