Lepcha Digit Nine

It stands for nine. This is the written digit for that value in the Lepcha script, used to write the Lepcha language.

The Unicode account places the script's creation around 1720 CE under Sikkim's king Chakdor Namgyal; Lepcha tradition credits Thikúng Mensalóng. Lepcha writing drew on Tibetan dbu-med, a style written in vertical columns, then turned the forms a quarter-turn to run from left to right.

Lepcha literary tradition dates to the eighteenth century, while the oldest identified handwritten materials date from the second half of the nineteenth century. Those texts bring indigenous beliefs together with Tibetan Buddhist values. Sikkim granted the Lepcha language official status in 1977.