ÿþ<HTML><HEAD><TITLE>GURMUKH&#298</TITLE> <style type="text/css"> .BODY { background-color: #EAF1F7; background-image: url('images/gtbh.jpg'); background-repeat: no-repeat; background-attachment: fixed; background-position: center; color: #0066CC;} .C1{text-align: justify;color: #0066CC;FONT-size: SMALL;FONT-family: Tahoma;} .BIB{text-align: center;color: #000099;FONT-size: SMALL;FONT-family: Tahoma;} .CONT{text-align: right;color: #FF0000;FONT-size: SMALL;FONT-family: Tahoma;} </style><META NAME="keywords" CONTENT="GURMUKH*"> <META http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8"></HEAD> <BODY class="BODY" oncontextmenu="return false" ondragstart="return false" onselectstart="return false"> <FONT ALIGN="JUSTIFY" FACE="Tahoma"> <p class="C1">&#65279GURMUKH&#298 is the name of the script used in writing primarily Punjabi and, secondarily, Sindhi language. The word <i>gurmukh&#299</i> seems to have gained currency from the use of these letters to record the sayings coming from the <i>mukh</i> (lit. mouth or lips) of the (Sikh) Gur&#363s. The letters no doubt existed before the time of Gur&#363 A&#7749gad (even of Gur&#363 N&#257nak) as they had their origin in the Brahm&#299, but the origin of the script is attributed to Gur&#363 A&#7749gad. He not only modified and rearranged certain letters but also shaped them into a script. He gave new shape and new order to the alphabet and made it precise and accurate. He fixed one letter for each of the Punjabi phonemes; use of vowel-symbols was made obligatory, the letters meant for conjuncts were not adopted and only those letters were retained which depicted sounds of the then spoken language. There was some rearrangement of the letters also.; and j which were in the last line of the existing alphabets, were shifted to the first line. Again, T was given the first place in the new alphabet.</p> <p class="C1">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; It is commonly accepted that Gurmukh&#299 is a member of the Brahm&#299 family. Brahm&#299 is an &#256ryan script which was developed by the &#256ryans and adapted to local needs. According to an opinion, the Brahm&#299 script was introduced between the 8th and the 6th centuries BC. It does not concern us here whether the script was foreign or local, but it has now been established, on the basis of internal evidence, that whatever be its name, the &#256ryans did have a system of writing which must have been borrowed freely from local scripts. The Iranians ruled in the Punjab in the 3rd and 4th centuries BC. They brought with them Aramaic script, which helped in the growth of Kharo&#7779&#7789h&#299 largely used in the Punjab, Gandh&#257r and Sindh between 300 BC and 3rd century AD. But even then Brahm&#299, which in its development in the Punjab had undergone several changes, was commonly used along with Kharo&#7779&#7789h&#299. There are coins of the Bactrian kings and inscriptions of the Kush&#257n rulers having both scripts on them. Brahm&#299 was, of course, more popular on account of its simple curves alternated with straight strokes. Hence, in due course, it replaced Kharo&#7779&#7789h&#299 and became the single script with composite features effected by various local and neighbourly influences. With the growth of literary and cultural activity during the Gupta period (4th and 5th century AD), the Brahm&#299 script improved further and became more expansive and common.</p> <p class="C1">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Immediately later, it developed, especially in northern India, fine curves and embellished flourishes with a small headline over each letter, and became rather ornamental. This stage of Indian script was called Ku&#7789il, meaning curved. From Ku&#7789il evolved the Siddham&#257trik&#257 which had the widest use in northern India. Some scholars think that these two scripts existed simultaneously. From the sixth century to the ninth, Siddham&#257trik&#257 had a very wide use from Kashm&#299r to V&#257r&#257&#7751as&#299. With the rise of regional languages taking the place of Sanskrit and Pr&#257krit, regional scripts grew in number. Ardhan&#257gar&#299 (west), Sh&#257rd&#257 (Kashm&#299r) and N&#257gar&#299 (beyond Delhi) came into use, and later both Sh&#257rd&#257 and Devan&#257gar&#299, an offshort of Nag&#257r&#299, started their inroads into the land of the five rivers. This is evident from the coins of the <u>Gh</u>aznavids and <u>Gh</u>or&#299s minted at Lahore and Delhi. It is also known that the common (non-Br&#257hma&#7751 and non-official) people used a number of scripts for their temporal and commercial requirements. Of these La&#7751&#7693e and &#7788&#257kre characters were most prevalent.</p> <p class="C1">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; It is on account of these currents that scholars have tried to establish relationships of Gurmukh&#299 with Devan&#257gr&#299 (G.H. Ojh&#257), Ardhan&#257gar&#299 (G.B. Si&#7749<u>gh</u>), Siddham&#257trik&#257 (Pr&#299tam Si&#7749gh), Sh&#257rd&#257 (Diringer) and Brahm&#299 (generally). Some ascribe it to La&#7751&#7693e and some others to &#7788&#257kr&#299, a branch of Sh&#257rd&#257 used in Chamb&#257 and K&#257&#7749g&#7771&#257. The fact is that it is derived from or at least allied to all these and others mentioned above in their historical perspective.</p> <p class="C1">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Regionally and contemporarily compared, Gurmukh&#299 characters have direct similarities with Gujr&#257t&#299, La&#7751&#7693e, N&#257gar&#299, Sh&#257rd&#257 and &#7788&#257kr&#299: they are either exactly the same or essentially alike.</p> <p class="C1">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Internally, &#2565, &#2617, &#2586, &#2590, &#2593, &#2595, &#2600, &#2610, letters of Gurmukh&#299 had undergone some minor orthographical changes before AD 1610. Further changes came in the forms of &#2565, &#2617 and &#2610 in the first half of the nineteenth century. The manuscripts belonging to the eighteenth century have slightly different forms of these letters. But the modern as well as old forms of these letters are found in the orthography of the same writers in seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.</p> <p class="C1">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;Another reform carried out is the separation of lexical units of the sentence which previously formed one jumbled unit; lately punctuation marks borrowed from English have been incorporated besides the full stop (I) which existed traditionally.</p> <p class="C1">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; The Gurmukh&#299 script is semi-syllabic in the sense that <i>'a'</i> is included in the consonant signs in some situations. This <i>'a'</i> is not pronounced at the end of the syllable. Thus, &#2581&#2610 is kal, and &#2608&#2622&#2606 is R&#257m, that is, &#2581 in &#2581&#2610 (kal) represents k+a, while &#2610 represents only I. Other vowels after consonants are shown by vowel symbols which also happen to be the first three letters of the Gurmukh&#299 alphabet. Of these, the first and the third are not used independently. They always have a diacritic attached to them. The second letter is used without diacritics also, and in that case it is equivalent to 'a' as in English 'about'. With diacritics a total of ten vowels are formed, viz., u, &#363, o, a, &#257, ai, au, i, &#299 and e. Of these vocalic diacritics, 'i' occurs before a consonant (although pronounced after it), u and &#363 are written below; &#257 and &#299 after a consonant; and e, ai, o and au over a consonant. Similarly, the nasalization sign is also used over a <i>consonant</i> though in fact it nasalizes the vowel. Of all the vowel-marks, called <i>lag&#257&#7749</i> in Punjabi, &#257 is the oldest, though initially just a dot was used for it. The vowel-marks &#299 and &#363 are found in A&#347okan edicts and later inscriptions.</p> <p class="C1">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; All Gurmukh&#299 letters have uniform height and can be written between two parallel horizontal lines, with the only exception of &#2675 (the first letter of the alphabet) the top curve of which extends beyond the upper line. From left to right, too, they have almost uniform length, only &#2565 (<i>ai&#7771&#257</i>) and &#2584 (<i>ghaggh&#257</i>) may be slightly longer than the rest. However, the placing of vowel-symbols under and over the letters, a characteristic of all Indian scripts, creates some problems in printing and typing.</p> <p class="C1">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; No change is effected in the form of the letter when a vowel-symbol or diacritic is attached to it, the only exception being &#2675 to which an additional curve is added which represents two syllables. This is the only example of a single graphic form representing multiple sounds (and this form has a theological background) ; otherwise there is no Gurmukh&#299 letter representing more than one phoneme, and there are no digraphs.</p> <p class="C1">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&#2675, the first letter in the Gurmukh&#299 arrangement, is non-traditional and appears to be so due to its importance in the Sikh scriptures as &#2676, i.e. God is one. After vowels come <i>s</i> and <i>h</i> which are usually placed at the end of Indian syllabary. Other consonantal symbols are in their traditional order. The terms given to the consonants are their reduplicative phonetic values. Thus &#2581 is called <i>kakk&#257</i>, &#2613 is <i>v&#257v&#257</i>. Only &#2591 is <i>&#7789ai&#7749k&#257</i>. The syllabary ends with &#2652 <i>&#7771&#257&#7771&#257</i>. The total number of letters is 35 (3 vowels, 2 semi-vowels, and 30 consonants). They are 52 in Devan&#257gar&#299, 41 each in Sh&#257rd&#257 and &#7788&#257kr&#299. A dot at the bottom of a number of consonants has been used to represent borrowed sounds such as &#347, <u>Kh</u>, <u>gh</u>, z, and f. These have been lately introduced though not as a part of the original alphabet. Geminate (double or long) consonants are indicated by an overhead crescent sign, termed as <i>adhak</i> and placed above the consonant preceding the affected one. There is paucity of conjunct consonants in the system. Only &#2617, &#2608 , &#2613 are combined as second members of the clusters and placed without the head line under the first members. &#2608 as the second member of the conjuncts may also be depicted under the first member just in the shape of a slanting comma. It is felt that conjunct consonants, thanks to Sanskrit and English influence and expansion of the range of the Punjabi language, are no longer foreign to Punjabi pronunciation. There is, therefore, great need to adopt, adapt or invent them. Attempts have been made by some scholars but their acceptance is still limited.</p> <p class="C1">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Gurmukh&#299 has played a significant role in Sikh faith and tradition. It was originally employed for the Sikh sriptures. The script spread widely under Mah&#257r&#257j&#257 Ra&#7751j&#299t Si&#7749gh and after him under the Punjab Sikh chiefs, for administrative purposes. It played a great part in consolidating and standardizing the Punjabi language. For centuries it has been the main medium of literacy in the Punjab and its adjoining areas where earliest schools were attached to <i>gurdw&#257r&#257s</i>. Now it is used in all spheres of culture, arts, education and administration. It is the state script of the Punjab and as such its common and secular character has been firmly established.</p> <p class="C1">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; The alphabet has also crossed the frontiers of its homeland. Sikhs have settled in all parts of the world and Gurmukh&#299 has accompanied them everywhere. It has a brighter future, indeed, in and outside the land of its birth. Till recently, Persian script was largely used for Punjabi and there was initially a considerable amount of writing in this script, but it is becoming dated now. However, in the Pakistan Punjab Punjabi is still studied, at postgraduate level, in Persian script.</p> </font> <p class="BIB"> BIBLIOGRAPHY<p class="C1"><ol class="C1"><li class="C1"> Si&#7749gh, G.B., <i>Gurmukh&#299 Lip&#299 d&#257 Janam te Vik&#257s</i>. Chandigarh, 1972<BR> <li class="C1"> Tej&#257 Si&#7749gh, <i>S&#257hit Darshan</i>. Patiala, 1951<BR> <li class="C1"> Bed&#299, Tarlochan Si&#7749gh, <i>Pañj&#257b&#299 V&#257rtak d&#257 Alochn&#257tmak Adhyan</i>. Delhi, n.d.<BR> <li class="C1"> Arun, V.B., <i>Pañj&#257b&#299 Bh&#257sh&#257 d&#257 Itih&#257s</i>. Ludhiana, 1956<BR> <li class="C1"> Bed&#299, K&#257l&#257 Si&#7749gh, <i>Pañj&#257b&#299 Bh&#257sh&#257 d&#257 Vik&#257s</i>. Delhi, 1971<BR> <li class="C1"> Chatterji, Suniti Kumar, ed., <i>The Cultural Heritage of India</i>. Calcutta, 1978<BR> <li class="C1"> Grierson, G.A., <i>Linguistic Survey of India</i>. Calcutta, 1916<BR> </ol><p class="CONT">Hardev B&#257hr&#299<br></p><BR> </font> <img src="counter.aspx" width="1px" height="1px" alt=""> </HTML></BODY>