What ᱕ means
In Santali writing, it means the number five.
Ol Chiki was developed for Santali because writing systems then used for the language, including Roman, Bengali, Devanagari, and Odia, did not represent all its sounds well. Early Ol Chiki books included books for learning to read and elementary mathematics lessons.
In books and political movements among Santal people, Ol Chiki has also been used to press for recognition of Santali and unity among people who write it in different scripts.
Don't confuse it with
4Questions people ask
1Why does ᱕ 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.
How to type ᱕
Windows (Word)
Alt+XType 1C55, then Alt+X to get ᱕.
Windows
Win+Rrun charmap for the full table, or use the emoji picker's Ω symbols tab (Win + .).
macOS
Control+Command+SpaceOpen the character viewer and search “ol chiki digit five”.
Linux
Ctrl+Shift+UType 1c55, then Enter or Space.
HTML
᱕CSS
\1C55Sarjom baha
How to type ᱕: press the number-row 5 key.
Inscript2
Ol Chiki keyboard 5: press the number-row 5 key.
Codes and encoding1 code points
HTML decimal
᱕
HTML hex
᱕
CSS content
content: "\1C55";
Each escape is closed by the next backslash; a trailing space is needed before a literal hex digit.
URL encoded
%E1%B1%95
1
On screen
1
Code points
1
JS .length
3
UTF-8 bytes
A visible symbol can contain several code points. JS .length counts UTF-16 units; UTF-8 counts bytes.