What ᝐ means
It represents the syllable “sa” in the Buhid script.
Mangyan writers inscribed poems, songs, and messages on bamboo. The 1593 Doctrina Christiana, a Christian teaching book, is the oldest known document in Tagalog script; it does not establish when this Buhid letter first appeared.
ᝐ carries an unwritten “a”; a vowel mark changes its syllable. A 2011 report describes Buhid, Hanunóo, and Tagbanwa forms as stylistic variants within 17th-century Philippine handwriting. The wider family links to the South Asian Pallava tradition, perhaps through Kawi, an older Southeast Asian script. Latin literacy narrowed Buhid’s wider use during the colonial period; a 2014 study describes revival efforts. A box means the font lacks Buhid support.
It functions as a letter within Buhid writing.
Use it for Buhid or script context, not as generic “Asian” decoration.
Part of the collection
Who writes ᝐ
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Related characters
2
Questions people ask
1Why does ᝐ show as a box on some devices?
Because that device's fonts have no glyph for it. The character is still correct and still copies correctly — the box is a missing glyph, not a broken character.
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11
How to type or find ᝐ
- Also called
- Surat Buhid · Mangyan script
- Search it as
- Buhid script
- Shows up in
- Anything that takes text · its shape is whatever your font draws
Codes and encoding1 code points
A visible symbol can contain several code points. JS .length counts UTF-16 units; UTF-8 counts bytes.