Multani Letter E

It is an independent Multani vowel letter, usually read as e.

Multani has four standalone vowel letters and no small vowel marks attached to consonants, so written vowels generally appear only alone, at a word’s start, or at the end of a one-syllable word. This letter usually represents /e/ in the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA), a clear “e” sound; some sources use it for /æ/ (the vowel in “cat”) or /o/ (a pure “o” sound).

Where did the Multani script come from?

It belongs to the Landa family, a group of related scripts.

Multani was used to write the Seraiki language in Pakistan’s Punjab and northern Sindh, for everyday writing and business. The script is also called Karikki or Sarai; it is related to Gurmukhi and more distantly to Khudawadi and Khojki.

In 1819, the first book in Multani, a Christian New Testament, was printed with metal type. By the latter half of the 19th century, the British administration made Arabic script standard for languages of Sindh; Multani declined but continued into the 20th century. Unicode 18.0 describes Seraiki as written in an Arabic-derived script.

Why does 𑊃 have different readings?

Multani spelling varied between historical sources. Unicode 18.0 says the script has no standard form, and Multani spelling changed in the first quarter of the 20th century. The encoded repertoire records distinct attested characters rather than one imposed spelling.

The Unicode chart draws on printed and handwritten specimens, whose letter shapes can differ. A font may therefore show 𑊃 with a different attested outline.