Tangut Ideograph-18575

The dictionary gloss is “branch.”

Li Fanwen’s Tangut–Chinese dictionary lists 𘕵 as entry 5897; its English index glosses the entry “branch.” That is a word translation, not a picture-based explanation.

Why was the Tangut script created?

It gave the Tangut kingdom a written language of its own.

In 1036, Emperor Li Yuanhao ordered the script’s creation as part of building the state. A native script could support a Tangut Buddhist canon—a collection of Buddhist texts—and mark a cultural identity distinct from Song China.

The Tanguts followed their Khitan neighbors, who had created two scripts about a century earlier; one drew heavily on Chinese writing. Tangut was also inspired by Chinese visually and in how characters were constructed, but was not derived from Chinese. A manuscript fragment from the ruins of Khara-khoto (in Inner Mongolia) preserves a Tangut translation of a secular Chinese text and probably dates to the 12th or early 13th century. Tangut Buddhist inscriptions include examples dated 1502.