Tangut character 1739D

The record gives reconstructed readings, not an English definition.

As of 2026, its English gloss remains unsettled. Published Tangut reconstructions include *phja², *²pha₄, and *pha²; the leading asterisk marks a reconstructed reading. 𗎝 appears in the 12th-century Tóngyīn (“Homophones”), a Tangut rhyme dictionary that groups characters by sound.

Why was Tangut writing created?

It gave Western Xia a script for its own language, government, and religion.

Tangut writing appeared around 1036 under the orders of Li Yuanhao, ruler of Western Xia. It supported the state’s distinct identity and translation of Buddhist scriptures into Tangut.

Tangut characters took visual and structural inspiration from Chinese writing, but the script wrote Tangut, not Chinese. Neighboring Khitan states had already created scripts of their own. Surviving Tangut books include Buddhist scriptures, translated Chinese classics, encyclopedias, military works, and literature.

Why can 𗎝 look different across fonts?

One encoded character can have more than one glyph shape.

Tangut writing has variant glyph shapes in manuscripts and fonts. Where a shape difference does not distinguish words, Unicode may treat the forms as one character; fonts can therefore draw different strokes without changing the encoded text.