Symbols
59Click a symbol to copy it and open its page.
Naxi Pinyin alphabet
Plain A to Z with no accents. At the end of a syllable l, q and f are tone letters (high, low, rising); the mid tone is unmarked.
Currency
The Chinese yuan renminbi, written either way.
Where it's spoken
Lijiang and Naxi culture
Jade Dragon Snow Mountain, the Old Town, Dongba manuscripts and Naxi ancient music.
On the map
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The Naxi alphabet: plain Latin letters, tones at the end
Naxi has three writing systems, and only one of them can be typed on a computer: the Latin alphabet known as Naxi Pinyin, drawn up in the 1950s when China created romanised alphabets for several of its minority languages. It uses the ordinary letters A to Z in capital and small forms, with no accented letters at all. Some Naxi sounds have no single Latin letter, so they are spelled with two letters together, much as Chinese Pinyin writes zh, ch and sh.
Naxi is a tonal language, and Naxi Pinyin writes tone without accents. In the standard Lijiang speech a syllable carries one of four tones; the mid tone is left unmarked, and the others are shown by a consonant letter added at the end of the syllable: l for the high tone, q for the low tone and f for the rising tone. That is why the people's own name is spelled Naqxi: the q is not pronounced as a sound of its own, it tells you that na is said on a low pitch. The Hmong RPA alphabet and the older Zhuang alphabet mark tone the same way, with final letters.
Because the alphabet is plain A to Z, the grid above is short: every letter, capital and small, in alphabetical order. Nothing in it is a special Naxi character, and that is its advantage, since any keyboard, phone or font in the world can write it.
Naxi Dongba script and Geba: why you can't paste them yet
Most people searching for the Naxi script are looking for Dongba, the pictographic writing of the Naxi ritual priests, the dongba. Its signs are small drawings of people, animals, plants, tools and the sky, more than a thousand of them, some used for their picture and some borrowed for their sound. For centuries the dongba wrote their chants and myths in it on thick handmade Dongba paper, and the manuscripts served as prompts for texts the priests already knew by heart rather than as a word-for-word record. The Ancient Naxi Dongba Literature Manuscripts were added to UNESCO's Memory of the World Register in 2003, and Dongba is often described as the last pictographic script still in ritual use.
Beside it stands Geba, a syllabic script in which one simple sign stands for one syllable. Far fewer texts were written in it than in Dongba, and it was often used to gloss Dongba texts.
Neither script is part of Unicode as of version 17. Naxi Dongba has been the subject of encoding proposals for years, but until it is encoded there is no standard character you can copy, paste, search or send, which is why this page cannot list Dongba or Geba signs. What you see online as "Dongba symbols" is pictures, or special fonts that draw the pictographs in place of other characters; the text underneath is not Dongba and turns into something else on a device without that font.
How to type Naxi, the yuan sign and Chinese names
Naxi Pinyin needs nothing special: type it on any keyboard, English or Chinese, exactly as it is spelled, tone letters included. There are no Alt codes or long-presses to learn.
For money, China's currency is the yuan renminbi, written or with the Chinese character 元. On Windows is Alt0165 on the numeric keypad; on a Mac with the US layout it is OptionY; on phones it sits among the currency signs of the symbols keyboard. 元 comes from any Chinese input method by typing yuan. In everyday life most Naxi also read and write Chinese, where the people are 纳西族 and the Dongba script 东巴文; the Chinese collection covers those characters.
Where the Naxi language is spoken
Naxi is spoken in the far northwest of Yunnan province in China , above all in and around Lijiang, at the foot of the Jade Dragon Snow Mountain , with smaller communities in neighbouring parts of Sichuan and Tibet. CLDR estimates about 340,000 speakers. The Old Town of Lijiang, with its canals, stone bridges and grey-tiled courtyard houses , became a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1997, and Naxi ancient music , played by orchestras of elderly musicians, is part of its evening life.
Naxi belongs to the Tibeto-Burman family, and its closest relative is the speech of the Na, also called Mosuo, around Lugu Lake. More distant relatives with collections on this site are Sichuan Yi, Lisu and Tibetan; for Chinese characters see the Chinese collection, and for the flag and emoji of the country see China.
How to use them
5 situationsClick to copyNaxi Script & Alphabet combos
8Worth knowing
- In Naqxi, the Naxi name for themselves, the q is silent: it is a tone letter that tells you na is said on a low pitch.
- Dongba, the Naxi pictographic script, was written by priests for centuries but is still not in Unicode, so the only Naxi you can paste is written in plain A to Z.
- One of the largest collections of Dongba manuscripts outside China is in the Library of Congress in Washington, much of it gathered by the botanist and explorer Joseph Rock, who lived near Lijiang for years.
- The traditional cape of Naxi women is a sheepskin with seven embroidered roundels, said to stand for the stars, so Naxi women are said to carry the stars on their backs.
Questions people ask
8What script does the Naxi language use?
Three. Naxi Pinyin, a Latin alphabet from the 1950s, is the only one you can type and paste. Dongba, a pictographic script, and Geba, a syllabic script, were used by Naxi ritual priests for their manuscripts; neither is in Unicode yet.
Is Dongba script in Unicode?
Not as of Unicode 17. Encoding proposals for Naxi Dongba exist, but there are no standard Dongba characters yet, so Dongba shown online is images or special fonts that only work where that font is installed.
Can I copy and paste Dongba symbols?
Not as real text. Until Dongba is encoded, copy the pictographs as images. What you can copy as text is Naxi in Naxi Pinyin, like Naqxi, and the yuan sign or 元.
How are tones written in Naxi?
With letters at the end of the syllable instead of accents: l for the high tone, q for the low tone and f for the rising tone, while the mid tone has no letter. So Naqxi is na on a low tone followed by xi on the mid tone.
What is the Naxi Geba script?
A syllabic script used by some Naxi priests beside the Dongba pictographs, with one simple sign per syllable. Far fewer texts were written in it than in Dongba, and it is not in Unicode either.
How many people speak Naxi?
CLDR estimates about 340,000 speakers, almost all in China, mainly around Lijiang in northwest Yunnan.
Is Naxi the same as Mosuo?
No, but they are close. The Mosuo or Na around Lugu Lake speak a closely related language, and in Yunnan they are officially counted as part of the Naxi nationality.
How do I type Naxi on my keyboard?
Just type it: Naxi Pinyin uses only the letters A to Z, with tones written as letters, so any English or Chinese keyboard works. For use Alt0165 on Windows or OptionY on a Mac.
