Yi syllable Li

On Windows, enter Yi phonemes and select the matching syllable. The Yi input method turns sound-based keystrokes into a list of candidate characters.

As documented in 2024, the Windows Yi IME uses English keys for phoneme entry, then lets you accept the matching candidate. There is no dedicated key for ꆹ.

What does ꆹ mean?

It represents one Yi syllable, conventionally romanized “li.” The romanized label identifies the syllable; the character alone does not provide a fixed English translation. Read it with the other syllables in the word.

The writing system has no single agreed starting point. Guizhou objects from the Western Han period (206 BC–AD 9) have been proposed as early Yi-script evidence. The earliest commonly cited surviving monumental example is a bronze bell dated 1485.

Older Yi traditions, also called Cuan or Wei, carried religious, magical, medical, and genealogical texts. Nuosu bimo—ritual specialists—read them at funerals, healing and exorcism rites, disputes, and divination. The standardized Liangshan form was devised in 1974 and officially promulgated in 1980. As of 2024, standardized Yi is documented in schools, public notices, newspapers, reference works, and literature. A Unicode account published in 2019 describes the traditional ideographs as not derived from Han characters.