Nabataean letter mem

𐢓 marks the m consonant in a Nabataean word.

Nabataean is an alphabet written from right to left, with 22 consonants. The script was widely used from the second century BCE to the fourth century CE.

Surviving examples include carved stone inscriptions and graffiti, plus papyrus documents for administration and law. This letter’s value comes from the word in which it appears.

How did Nabataean writing lead to Arabic?

A cursive Nabataean form is generally considered an ancestor of Arabic script.

Nabataean developed from Aramaic. A cursive form means handwriting with flowing letter shapes; that form is the one generally linked to Arabic’s development.

By the fourth century CE, the Namara inscription, an early Arabic text, was written in Nabataean script. Script alone does not identify a text’s language: the Nabataean realm used both Arabic and Aramaic, depending on the text and setting.

Why does it look different on screen?

Right-to-left layout and font coverage affect what appears.

Unicode assigns Nabataean text right-to-left direction. Historical ligatures—joined letter shapes—were irregular, so Unicode does not prescribe one universal joining pattern.

If a box appears, the selected font lacks a drawing for 𐢓. That is a font display problem, not a different character.