Tangut Component 409

It marks a structural piece within the Tangut writing system. Unicode uses such components for dictionary indexing and descriptions of character structure. The Tangut script was created in 1036 for the Tangut-led Western Xia, serving government and Buddhist translation and marking a distinct written culture beside Song China. Its forms drew inspiration from Chinese writing without deriving from it; Khitan scripts are a parallel case of a neighboring state developing its own script. A surviving manuscript is tentatively dated to the 12th or early 13th century; written use continued through 1502.