Lepcha Letter Bla

ᰔ is the Lepcha consonant letter bla, used inside written words. The language and script are also known as Rong. Each consonant carries a built-in vowel unless a vowel sign changes it, so this letter appears within a syllable.

The script is based directly on Tibetan writing. Its precursor ran in vertical columns; Lepcha adapted the forms for a horizontal, left-to-right line, effectively turning them a quarter-turn counterclockwise. A separate spelling history shifts from an earlier Tibetan model toward greater influence from Devanagari, another South Asian script.

Accounts credit different creators: one places its creation around 1720 under Sikkim king Chakdor Namgyal; Lepcha tradition credits scholar Thikúng Mensalóng. The earliest datable texts discussed by Sprigg are eyewitness accounts of the 1826 murder of Sikkim's Lepcha prime minister, archived in 1828. A traditional recited alphabet lesson called Lazóng teaches letters and syllables; Lepcha writing also carries stories, poetry, prayers, and religious works that bring local beliefs together with Tibetan Buddhist material.

Why does a Lepcha vowel show on the left?

Some Lepcha vowel signs are stored after the base but display on its left. Three dependent vowel signs behave this way; their position does not mean the text was encoded backward.

On the SIL phonetic Lepcha keyboard, the key sequence bl produces ᰔ.