Khitan Small Script character 18B10

Its code name identifies the character, not its Khitan reading. Khitan Small Script uses logograms (signs for whole words) and phonograms (signs for sounds). Phonograms typically combine into compact blocks that spell a word; some logograms stand alone. The name “Khitan Small Script Character-18B10” is formed from the Unicode code point, not from a word or pronunciation. The inscription around the glyph is needed to identify how it functions.

When did Khitan Small Script begin?

Traditional accounts place its creation around 925. They credit Yelü Diela. Its forms draw on Chinese characters; Uyghur writing is also said to have inspired the script, though the two have few visual similarities. Studies date its first surviving inscription differently: one gives 1053, while a reassessment in 2026 cites the Wugulin Taishi epitaph from 1051 and argues that the script was systematized later, under Liao emperor Shengzong.

In the Liao state, Khitan writing appeared alongside Chinese in funerary epitaphs and monuments, as well as diplomatic letters, tribe and village names, tallies, examinations, poems, and translations. It remained in use after the Liao fell, until a Jin imperial order suppressed it in 1191. Jurchen rulers later adapted Khitan script models for a separate writing system for the Jurchen language.

Why does 𘬐 sometimes look like a plain glyph?

A single sign can render without the shaping a word block needs. In historical use, Khitan text ran top to bottom in columns arranged right to left. Digital text may instead show characters in a horizontal line. A font made for individual glyphs can display 𘬐 without assembling phonetic signs into a word block; cluster-aware shaping and vertical layout need Khitan-specific font support. If a box appears, the selected font may lack this glyph.