Meroitic Cursive Letter Da

It is a letter used to spell words in Meroitic.

Its conventional reading is written da in Latin letters. Basic consonant signs carry an unwritten a unless another vowel sign follows, so da describes the letter’s reading, not a word with its own translation. Meroitic was the language of Kush, a Nile Valley kingdom south of Egypt. As of 2026, scholars have deciphered the signs’ values but understand the language only through names and a few words.

Kushite scribes used cursive Meroitic for everyday writing, including records, documents, labels, and funerary texts. Its appearance was based on Egyptian Demotic, a fast handwritten form of Egyptian; Meroitic hieroglyphs, based on Egyptian hieroglyphs, were used for royal and temple inscriptions. The earliest dated cursive texts are around 200 BCE; less-developed inscriptions suggest the script was emerging by the 3rd century BCE and passed through archaic, transitional, and late forms.

Is 𐦷 different from its hieroglyphic form?

No; it is the same Meroitic letter in a separate script. 𐦷 is the cursive form; 𐦝 is its hieroglyphic counterpart, used for inscriptions on temples and royal monuments.