Khitan Small Script Character 18C5A

It is a sign in a historical Khitan writing system. The Khitan small script was used to write the language of the Khitan people.

The character's inventory label does not translate it. Khitan small script is only partly deciphered, and many sound values remain unknown, so this sign alone does not establish a definite sound or word. Signs representing sounds often combine into word clusters.

The script was created around 925 to write Khitan. Surviving examples are mainly funerary inscriptions on stone memorials for the dead, with others on walls and monuments, bronze mirrors, tallies, special-purpose coins, and a jade cup. Three known inscriptions in Jurchen Small Script, another historical writing system, also arrange signs in clusters.

Why does 𘱚 change shape or spacing?

Its font and neighboring signs control the layout.

Khitan signs that represent sounds usually form groups of two or more for a word. A cluster-aware font composes and positions the group, while a linear font displays each character separately. The same encoded character can therefore appear in a different position or with different spacing.

Historical Khitan text runs vertically in columns from right to left. Digital fonts may show the signs in a line, rotate them, keep them upright, or shape them as clusters; appearance and spacing vary with font and layout.