Yi syllable hniet

ꅬ represents the Liangshan Yi syllable hniet; the word supplies its meaning. Older Yi writing varied locally; the earliest surviving inscription, on a bronze bell, dates to 1485.

Text symbol

What ꅬ means

It marks one syllable, not a whole word.

In Latin-letter spelling, hniet rra means “vegetable”; ꅬ represents its first syllable. The Nuosu speak Liangshan Yi.

Older Yi writing, called Cuan or Wei, used meaning-bearing signs; local forms and writing directions varied. One tradition credits Aki with devising about 1,840 signs during the Tang dynasty. Bimo (Yi ritual specialists) passed down religious, medical, magical, and genealogical manuscripts. The standardized Liangshan syllabary grew from Yi tradition. It was devised in 1974 and became official in 1980 for Liangshan Yi alone.

Part of the collection

ꆈ

Yi Script & Syllables

Who writes ꅬ

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Questions people ask

Why does ꅬ show as a box on some devices?

Because that device's fonts have no glyph for it. The character is still correct and still copies correctly — the box is a missing glyph, not a broken character.