Editing Abugida (section)

== Development ==
As the term ''alphasyllabary'' suggests, abugidas have been considered <ref>{{cite journal | last=Bright | first=William | title=A Matter of Typology: Alphasyllabaries and Abugidas | journal=Written Language and Literacy | date=1999 | url=https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/4818937.pdf | access-date=2024-08-06 | page=65}}</ref> an intermediate step between alphabets and [[syllabary|syllabaries]]. Historically, abugidas appear to have evolved from [[abjad]]s (vowelless alphabets).{{Citation needed|date=April 2023}} They contrast with syllabaries, where there is a distinct symbol for each syllable or consonant-vowel combination, and where these have no systematic similarity to each other, and typically develop directly from [[logogram|logographic scripts]]. Compare the examples above to sets of syllables in the Japanese [[hiragana]] syllabary: か ''ka'', き ''ki'', く ''ku'', け ''ke'', こ ''ko'' have nothing in common to indicate ''k;'' while ら ''ra'', り ''ri'', る ''ru'', れ ''re'', ろ ''ro'' have neither anything in common for ''r'', nor anything to indicate that they have the same vowels as the ''k'' set.

Most Indian and Indochinese abugidas appear to have first been developed from abjads with the [[Kharoṣṭhī]] and [[Brāhmī script]]s; the abjad in question is usually considered to be the [[Aramaic alphabet|Aramaic]] one, but while the link between Aramaic and Kharosthi is more or less undisputed, this is not the case with Brahmi. The Kharosthi family does not survive today, but Brahmi's descendants include most of the modern scripts of [[South Asia|South]] and [[Southeast Asia]].

The Geʽez script derived from a different abjad, the [[Sabaean language#Script|Sabean script]] of [[Yemen]]; the advent of vowels coincided with the introduction or adoption of Christianity about AD 350.<ref name="WWS_Ethiopic" /> The Ethiopic script is the elaboration of an abjad.

The [[Canadian Aboriginal syllabics#History|Cree syllabary]] was invented with full knowledge of the Devanagari system.

The [[Meroitic script]] was developed from [[Egyptian hieroglyphs]], within which various schemes of 'group writing'<ref name=Hoch_Semitic/> had been used for showing vowels.