Marchen Letter Ta

It marks ta within a Marchen spelling. Marchen, or Greater Mar, has distinct letterforms but can stack consonants vertically, as Tibetan does.

Tradition links Marchen’s origin to Zhangzhung, a kingdom in western and northern Tibet before Buddhism arrived in the seventh century. A bronze seal at Menri Monastery bears a Zhangzhung inscription. Marchung is the related Lesser Mar script. In Zhangzhung, smar meant “good,” “happy,” or “beautiful,” and appears in the name sMar-chen. A 2011 analysis suggests Marchen blends Nāgarī (an older Indian script) with formal Tibetan letterforms.