What ༸ means
It shows the following name deserves the highest respect. Tibetan writers put ༸ directly before the name or title of a lama (a Tibetan Buddhist teacher) of high standing, especially those recognised as reincarnations of earlier masters. Its best-known use is in front of titles of the Dalai Lama, so Tibetan news, prayers and letters mentioning him often show it.
In handwritten and printed books it can also stand at the start of a new text, alongside the other ornamental opening marks of Tibetan script. It does not end anything: the vertical stroke ། (shad) is the Tibetan mark that closes a phrase or section.
Someone sent me ༸ — what does it mean?
Look at what comes right after it. If Tibetan writing follows, the sender is naming a revered lama with respect. On its own it carries no established chat meaning; it was most likely copied from Tibetan text or used as a decorative swirl, so ask what they meant.
Formal and reverent; it belongs to Tibetan religious and respectful writing.
It honours specific revered people; using it as generic Buddhist decoration can look careless.
Part of the collection
Don't confuse it with
1
Questions people ask
1Is ༸ the Dalai Lama's symbol?
Not exclusively. It honours him most visibly, but Tibetan writers place it before other highly revered lamas too.
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10
How to type or find ༸
- Also called
- che go · chego · big head mark
- Search it as
- che mgo · Tibetan honorific mark · Dalai Lama symbol · Tibetan head mark · U+0F38
- Shows up in
- Anything that takes text · its shape is whatever your font draws
༸\0F38Codes and encoding1 code points
A visible symbol can contain several code points. JS .length counts UTF-16 units; UTF-8 counts bytes.