Tangut Ideograph 18724

A Tangut dictionary glosses 𘜤 as “very fast.” The entry points to Li Fanwen’s Tangut–Chinese dictionary, a reference that gives Chinese translations of Tangut words, and lists the reconstructed reading xja. Treat xja as a scholarly transcription, not a reliable guide to sounding it out in English. This is one character in the Tangut script; its square shape does not spell out its meaning.

The Tangut script was created in 1036 under Li Yuanhao, ruler of the Western Xia state, which was led by the Tangut people. It helped build the state’s administration and identity; one major project was a Tangut-language Buddhist canon, a collection of Buddhist scriptures translated into Tangut. A manuscript found at the ruins of Khara-Khoto, a former city, probably dates to the 12th or early 13th century.

The Tangut state followed an earlier precedent set by the Khitan, another people with a state-backed writing system. Tangut writing drew on Chinese writing’s visual style and ways of building characters, but Tangut characters did not descend from Chinese characters. Surviving texts include Buddhist translations, Chinese histories and literature, teaching books, and military treatises.

Why does 𘜤 show as a box or look different?

A box usually means the font lacks Tangut coverage. The text may still contain 𘜤 correctly; a Tangut-capable font can display it. Unicode also treats some historically different source shapes as one character when their differences do not distinguish words, so a different manuscript shape need not mean a different character.