Sundanese script

The Sundanese script is a special way of writing used by the Sundanese people. It helps them write their own language, called the Sundanese language. This writing system has a long history and is very important to the culture of the Sundanese people.

The Sundanese script comes from an older form called the Old Sundanese script. People used this older script from the 1300s to the 1700s. The Sundanese script is beautiful and shows how clever and creative the Sundanese people have been for many years.

History

The Old Sundanese script was created using ideas from the Pallava script from India. People used it from the 1300s to the 1700s. The last book written with this old script was called Carita Waruga Guru. During the 1600s to 1800s, Sundanese was mostly spoken, not written. Instead, people used Javanese and Pegon scripts to write Sundanese. In 1996, the government of West Java decided to create an official Sundanese script. In October 1997, they picked the Old Sundanese script and named it Aksara Sunda.

Typology

The Sundanese script has 32 basic characters: seven vowels, 23 consonants, and thirteen special marks called rarangkén. It also includes numbers from zero to nine.

Each consonant has a default sound of "a," so a single consonant letter stands for a whole syllable. Originally there were eighteen consonants, grouped as ka-ga-nga, ca-ja-nya, ta-da-na, pa-ba-ma, ya-ra-la, wa-sa-ha. Later, five more consonants — fa, va, qa, xa, and za — were added to help write new words and sounds from other languages. These new letters are based on old ones; for example, fa and va come from an older form of pa.

There are seven vowels, each with its own symbol and a special mark that changes the sound of a consonant. By adding a vowel mark to a consonant, you change its sound from the default "a." If a special mark called the "killer stroke" is used, it removes the vowel sound completely, leaving just the consonant.

Numbers in Sundanese script are written between two vertical lines. For example, the year 2020 is shown as |᮲᮰᮲᮰|.

In older texts, special symbols were used instead of today’s regular punctuation. Some of these symbols marked special kinds of writing, like historical or religious texts. Other symbols looked like letters with extra lines and had various uses, such as marking pauses in the writing.

Sample text

Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights

ᮞᮊᮥᮙ᮪ᮔ ᮏᮜ᮪ᮙ ᮌᮥᮘᮢᮌ᮪ ᮊ ᮃᮜᮙ᮪ ᮓᮥᮑ ᮒᮦᮂ ᮞᮤᮕᮒ᮪ᮔ ᮙᮨᮁᮓᮤᮊ ᮏᮩᮀ ᮘᮧᮌ ᮙᮁᮒᮘᮒ᮪ ᮊᮒᮥᮒ᮪ ᮠᮊ᮪-ᮠᮊ᮪ ᮃᮔᮥ ᮞᮛᮥᮃ. ᮙᮛᮔᮦᮂᮔ ᮓᮤᮘᮦᮛᮦ ᮃᮊᮜ᮪ ᮏᮩᮀ ᮠᮒᮦ ᮔᮥᮛᮔᮤ, ᮎᮙ᮪ᮕᮥᮁ-ᮌᮅᮜ᮪ ᮏᮩᮀ ᮞᮞᮙᮔ ᮃᮚ ᮓᮤᮔ ᮞᮥᮙᮍᮨᮒ᮪ ᮓᮥᮓᮥᮜᮥᮛᮔ᮪.

Sakumna jalma gubrag ka alam dunya téh sipatna merdika jeung boga martabat katut hak-hak anu sarua. Maranéhna dibéré akal jeung haté nurani, campur-gaul jeung sasamana aya dina sumanget duduluran.

"All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood."

Unicode

The Sundanese script was added to the Unicode Standard in April 2008 with version 5.1. Later, in version 6.3, more characters were added to support the script better.

Main articles: Sundanese (Unicode block) and Sundanese Supplement (Unicode block)

The Unicode block for Sundanese is U+1B80–U+1BBF. The Unicode block for Sundanese Supplement is U+1CC0–U+1CCF.