Khitan Small Script Character 18CCD

Specialist tables reconstruct its value as iá.

“Reconstructed” means scholars infer an ancient sound from surviving writing. iá is written with Latin letters and names a proposed sound, not an English translation. In Khitan Small Script, signs for sounds usually combine into word clusters, so this one sign need not spell a whole word.

Tradition credits Khitan scholar Yelü Diela with devising the script about 925 CE, using Chinese character forms and drawing on the Uyghur writing system. A 2026 study argues it became established later: Korean officials could not read a Khitan letter in 1011, and the oldest securely dated surviving text is a 1051 tomb inscription. Khitan writing continued in use into the Jin period; Jurchens later based their own scripts on Khitan models.