Combining Grantha Letter Na

𑍲 marks namana svara, a named singing pattern in Sama Veda chants. It is notation, not the ordinary Grantha consonant na. Grantha grew from Brahmi for Sanskrit writing alongside Tamil.

Text symbol

What 𑍲 means

It labels a specific singing pattern.

Here, svara means a sung tone. With a syllable, 𑍲 appears above its base to guide the chant; it does not spell a separate na.

Grantha grew from Brahmi; recognizable forms appear in early Pallava inscriptions from the fourth century CE. Modern Grantha belongs to the period after the thirteenth century. Its larger set of letters represented Sanskrit sounds more directly than Tamil script. It also appeared in Manipravalam, a mixed Tamil-Sanskrit literary language. Early printing and nationalist language policies narrowed that practice.

Specialist Vedic chant notation.

It is not the consonant na.

Part of the collection

𑌅

Grantha Script

Who writes 𑍲

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Don't confuse it with

𑌨

Grantha Letter Na

Grantha na vs 𑍲: 𑌨 is the consonant; 𑍲 marks singing.

Questions people ask

Why does 𑍲 show as a box on some devices?

Not every system ships a font for the Grantha block. Where none is installed, the character shows as an empty box; adding a font such as Noto fixes it. The character itself is still correct and copies correctly.