Letters from the Seams of a Skull

Devanagari is one of the widely used scripts in the world

Devanagari is used for Hindi, Sanskrit, Marathi, and Nepali languages and so is used all over the Indian subcontinent and the surrounding areas.

Devanagari is an abugida alphabet or alphasyllabary, which means that there are distinct vowels and consonants, but that vowels are also used to modify the consonants, which unmodified have a certain syllable sound.

Devanagari is most easily recognized by the bar that runs across the top of the script, from which all the letter seem to descend.

Some consonants in Devanagari. (Wikimedia)

Devanagari has been used from about the 12th century CE. There are about 50 letters in the Devanagari script, not counting the numerous derivations caused by combining the consonants with vowels. Devanagari is read from left to right.

The Vedas, the Hindu scriptures are generally written in Devanagari and the word "Devanagari" derives from deva, deity, and nagari, city.

In Hindu myth, the Devanagari script comes from Brahma. When Brahma went to write down his teachings, he found that there was no system to record them with. In order to share his teachings, he invented writing, using the seams of the skull as a pattern for the letters.

In some forms of the myth, it is Sarasvati, Brahma's wife, who invents the letters. Sarasvati (sometimes Saraswati or Saraswathi) is the goddess of knowledge, music, and arts, so writing would fall within her purview.

Svarasvati, holding a string of crystals, a book of the Vedas, and playing the veena (Wikimedia)

For the first post in my Writing Systems series, see The Beginning of History.