What 𘱀 means
A sign can stand for a word or a sound. Some signs stand for whole words; sound signs usually form clusters.
Text runs in vertical columns from right to left. Within sound clusters, characters are read left to right, then top to bottom.
Is this Chinese writing?
No; it was made to write Khitan. Khitan was spoken by the people who founded the Liao dynasty.
Its forms drew on Chinese characters; Uyghur writing inspired its sound system. Tradition dates its creation to 924/925, but a 2026 study argues practical adoption came later; the oldest securely dated surviving text is an epitaph from 1051.
Liao officials used it for records, inscriptions, poems and diplomacy. Jin rule ended official use in 1191. Jurchen writing followed Khitan models; 1922 discoveries revived scholarship.
Part of the collection
Who writes 𘱀
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Questions people ask
1Why does 𘱀 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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How to type or find 𘱀
- Search it as
- khitan small script · qidan xiaozi · kitan · khitan writing · khitan character · 契丹小字
- Shows up in
- Anything that takes text · its shape is whatever your font draws
𘱀\18C40Codes and encoding1 code points
A visible symbol can contain several code points. JS .length counts UTF-16 units; UTF-8 counts bytes.