Tifinagh
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Tifinagh is the alphabetic script used by the Tuareg, a Berber people of northern Africa, to write their language, Tamasheq or Tamashek. Before the 3rd century AD, Tifinagh was more widely used by speakers of Berber languages (or Tamazight) all across North Africa and on the Canary Islands. This older version of Tifinagh is sometimes named Libyan (French libyque) to distinguish it from the modern version used by the Tuareg. It dates from about the 6th century BC[1] (http://www.mondeberbere.com/langue/tifinagh/tifinagh_apparition.htm). While ultimate Phoenician origin is widely accepted (for it as for most of the world's alphabets), it is clearly very innovative and may have more than one ancestor, "probably Punic and Northern Arabic scripts" according to O'Connor 112; some scholars (eg M. Cohen) consider its origin to be a question as yet unresolved[2] (http://www.mondeberbere.com/langue/tifinagh/tifinagh_origine.htm). Some scholars consider it to be autochthonous in origin. Mustafa A'ashi considers "tifinagh" to be a Berber word deriving from the two words itif + nnegh, meaning our invention in the Berber language; however, given that the singular is tafineq (of which tifinagh is the regular plural), the etymology more commonly given (eg by Karl Prasse) relates to the Greek phoinikos "Phoenician". Mustafa A'ashi suggests that Tifinagh may be older than the Phoenician script, and that that might motivate translating "Tifinagh" as our invention. Other scholars argue that neither etymology is correct.
Traditionally, the script marks no vowels, except word-finally; however, various proposals to allow it to mark vowels have been made in recent times. In some areas, Arabic vowel diacritics are combined with Tifinagh characters to mark vowels. The letter forms vary significantly across the wide area where Tifinagh is used. The direction of writing varies; right-to-left is common, but the older "Libyan" inscriptions most commonly use the unusual orientation bottom-to-top. Occasionally the script has been used to write other neighboring languages, such as Tagdal Songhai.
A modern version, sometimes styled "Neo-Tifinagh", was put forward by the Académie Berbère in the 1960's; it is written left to right, marks vowels, and has been modified to better fit Northern Berber phonology. In a modified form, this script has recently (2003) been adopted for pedagogical purposes in Morocco.
Code chart
Tifinagh is encoded in the Unicode range U+2D30—U+2D7F, starting from version 4.1.0. There are 55 defined characters, but there are more characters being used than those defined. In ISO 15924, the code Tfng is assigned to Tifinagh. Here is a comparison chart for the character glyph and the transliteration.
| Code | Char | Unicode | Transliteration | Name |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2D30 |  | ⴰ | a | ya |
| 2D31 |  | ⴱ | b | yab |
| 2D32 |  | ⴲ | bh | yabh |
| 2D33 |  | ⴳ | g | yag |
| 2D34 |  | ⴴ | gh | yaghh |
| 2D35 |  | ⴵ | dj | Berber Academy yaj |
| 2D36 | Missing image 2D36.png Image:2D36.png | ⴶ | dj | yaj |
| 2D37 |  | ⴷ | d | yad |
| 2D38 |  | ⴸ | d. | yadh |
| 2D39 |  | ⴹ | d. | yadd |
| 2D3A | Missing image 2D3A.png Image:2D3A.png | ⴺ | d. | yaddh |
| 2D3B |  | ⴻ | e | yey |
| 2D3C |  | ⴼ | f | yaf |
| 2D3D |  | ⴽ | k | yak |
| 2D3E |  | ⴾ | k | Tuareg yak |
| 2D3F | Missing image 2D3F.png Image:2D3F.png | ⴿ | kh | yakhh |
| 2D40 |  | ⵀ | h | yah |
| 2D41 |  | ⵁ | h | Berber Academy yah |
| 2D42 |  | ⵂ | h | Tuareg yah |
| 2D43 |  | ⵃ | h. | yahh |
| 2D44 |  | ⵄ | a | yaa |
| 2D45 |  | ⵅ | kh | yakh |
| 2D46 |  | ⵆ | kh | Tuareg yakh |
| 2D47 |  | ⵇ | q | yaq |
| 2D48 |  | ⵈ | q | Tuareg yaq |
| 2D49 |  | ⵉ | i | yi |
| 2D4A |  | ⵊ | j | yazh |
| 2D4B | Missing image 2D4B.png Image:2D4B.png | ⵋ | j | Ahaggar yazh |
| 2D4C |  | ⵌ | j | Tuareg yazh |
| 2D4D |  | ⵍ | l | yal |
| 2D4E |  | ⵎ | m | yam |
| 2D4F |  | ⵏ | n | yan |
| 2D50 |  | ⵐ | ny | uareg yagn |
| 2D51 |  | ⵑ | ng | Tuareg yang |
| 2D52 |  | ⵒ | p | yap |
| 2D53 |  | ⵓ | u | yu |
| 2D54 |  | ⵔ | r | yar |
| 2D55 |  | ⵕ | r. | yarr |
| 2D56 |  | ⵖ | gh | yagh |
| 2D57 | Missing image 2D57.png Image:2D57.png | ⵗ | gh | Tuareg yagh |
| 2D58 | Missing image 2D58.png Image:2D58.png | ⵘ | gh | Ayer yagh |
| 2D59 |  | ⵙ | s | yas |
| 2D5A |  | ⵚ | s. | yass |
| 2D5B | Missing image 2D5B.png Image:2D5B.png | ⵛ | sh | yash |
| 2D5C |  | ⵜ | t | yat |
| 2D5D |  | ⵝ | t. | yath |
| 2D5E |  | ⵞ | ch | yach |
| 2D5F |  | ⵟ | t. | yatt |
| 2D60 |  | ⵠ | v | yav |
| 2D61 |  | ⵡ | w | yaw |
| 2D62 |  | ⵢ | y | yay |
| 2D63 |  | ⵣ | z | yaz |
| 2D64 |  | ⵤ | z | Tawellemet yaz |
| 2D65 |  | ⵥ | z. | yazz |
| 2D6F |  | ⵯ | +w | Labialization mark |
| 2D5C 2D59 | | ⵜⵙ | ts | yats |
| 2D37 2D63 | | ⴷⵣ | dz | yadz |
| 2D5C 2D5B | Missing image 2D5B.png Image:2D5B.png | ⵜⵙ | ch | yach |
| 2D37 2D4A | | ⴷⵊ | dj | yadzh |
External links
- Aligourane (http://www.quiresiste.com/a_carte.html) free modern Touareg Tifinagh fonts
- http://www.ancientscripts.com/berber.html
- http://amazighworld.net/studies/articles/touareg_histoire.php
- http://ennedi.free.fr/tifin.htm
- http://www.mondeberbere.com/langue/tifinagh/tifinagh_origine.htmar:تيفيناغ
de:Tifinagh-Schrift fr:Tifinagh nl:Tifinagh wa:Tifinar zh:提非納字母