Manichaean Letter Samekh

It is the Manichaean script’s s-letter.

The letter is called samekh and conventionally transliterated s. That label identifies a letter, not one universal sound: the language being written determines its exact value. Read it inside a Manichaean word; a lone 𐫘 cannot identify the word or language.

Why did the Manichaean script spread east?

It began as religious writing and later carried texts across languages.

Manichaean letter forms belong to an Aramaic-related tradition. Scholars connect them with Palmyrene Aramaic and Syriac Estrangelo; Mandaean writing has parallels. Mesopotamian bowls inscribed with incantations from the 3rd–7th centuries CE include Syriac and Proto-Manichaean examples.

Manichaeans used the script for religious literature in Middle Persian, Parthian, Sogdian, and Bactrian. It also recorded Old Uyghur. Compared with some older conventions, its spelling represented Iranian languages more directly, without some inherited spellings or Aramaic word-signs called heterograms, which readers understood as Iranian words.

In the 8th century, Uyghur state adoption of Manichaeism helped bring the script into Old Uyghur translation culture. Manichaean Turkish texts from Turfan, now held in Berlin, date to the 8th–10th centuries CE and show its later life in Central Asian manuscripts.

Someone sent me 𐫘 alone—what does it mean?

Treat it as a letter sample unless context adds meaning.

As of 2026, no documented everyday chat convention is attached to this lone letter. Read it as a sample of the script or a prompt to identify it; ask the sender if the context matters.