North Indic Fraction One Eighth

꠴ means one eighth in an old North Indic fraction system. It was used for money, weights, measures, and time; written examples date to at least the 16th century, and printed examples appear as late as 1970. Paired with ꠱, it makes 5/8.

Text symbol

What ꠴ means

It means one eighth. This old fraction set was used with the Devanagari, Gujarati, Gurmukhi, Kaithi, Mahajani, Maithili, Modi, and Takri scripts. Bengali uses a different set of fraction signs. The signs combine additively: ꠱꠴ is one half plus one eighth, giving 5/8. Fonts may draw ꠴ slanted or horizontal; the value stays the same.

Specialized historical notation; ⅛ or “one eighth” reads more readily in general prose.

Don't confuse it with

⅛

Vulgar Fraction One Eighth

⅛ is the general one-eighth fraction sign; ꠴ belongs to the historical North Indic set.

Combination ideas

Five eighths, formed by adding one half and one eighth.

Questions people ask

Why does ꠴ show as a box on some devices?

Because that device's fonts have no glyph for it. The character is still correct and still copies correctly — the box is a missing glyph, not a broken character.