Pha (Indic)

Pha
Pha
Example glyphs
Bengali
Tibetan
Thai	ผ
Malayalam	ഫ
Sinhala	ඵ
Ashoka Brahmi
Devanagari
Cognates
Hebrew	פ ,ף
Greek	Π
Latin	P
Cyrillic	П
Properties
Phonemic representation	/pʰ/
IAST transliteration	ph Ph
ISCII code point	C9 (201)

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Pha is a consonant of Indic abugidas. In modern Indic scripts, Pha is derived from the early "Ashoka" Brahmi letter after having gone through the Gupta letter .

Āryabhaṭa numeration[]

Aryabhata used Devanagari letters for numbers, very similar to the Greek numerals, even after the invention of Indian numerals. The values of the different forms of फ are:^[1]

फ [pʰə] = 22 (२२)
फि [pʰɪ] = 2,200 (२ २००)
फु [pʰʊ] = 220,000 (२ २० ०००)
फृ [pʰri] = 22,000,000 (२ २० ०० ०००)
फॢ [pʰlə] = 22×10⁸ (२२×१०^८)
फे [pʰe] = 22×10¹⁰ (२२×१०^१०)
फै [pʰɛː] = 22×10¹² (२२×१०^१२)
फो [pʰoː] = 22×10¹⁴ (२२×१०^१४)
फौ [pʰɔː] = 22×10¹⁶ (२२×१०^१६)

Historic Pha[]

There are three different general early historic scripts - Brahmi and its variants, Kharoṣṭhī, and Tocharian, the so-called slanting Brahmi. Pha as found in standard Brahmi, was a simple geometric shape, with variations toward more flowing forms by the Gupta . The Tocharian Pha did not have an alterante Fremdzeichen form. The third form of pha, in Kharoshthi () was probably derived from Aramaic separately from the Brahmi letter.

Brahmi Pha[]

The Brahmi letter , Pha, is probably derived from the altered Aramaic Pe , and is thus related to the modern Latin P and Greek Pi.^[2] Several identifiable styles of writing the Brahmi Pha can be found, most associated with a specific set of inscriptions from an artifact or diverse records from an historic period.^[3] As the earliest and most geometric style of Brahmi, the letters found on the Edicts of Ashoka and other records from around that time are normally the reference form for Brahmi letters, with vowel marks not attested until later forms of Brahmi back-formed to match the geometric writing style.

Brahmi Pha historic forms
Ashoka (3rd-1st c. BCE)	Girnar (~150 BCE)	Kushana (~150-250 CE)	Gujarat (~250 CE)	Gupta (~350 CE)
	No sample	No sample

Tocharian Pha[]

The Tocharian letter is derived from the Brahmi , but does not have an alternate Fremdzeichen form.

Tocharian Pha with vowel marks
Pha	Phā	Phi	Phī	Phu	Phū	Phr	Phr̄	Phe	Phai	Pho	Phau	Phä

Kharoṣṭhī Pha[]

The Kharoṣṭhī letter is generally accepted as being derived from the altered Aramaic Pe , and is thus related to P and Pi, in addition to the Brahmi Pha.^[2]

Devanagari Pha[]

Pha (फ) is a consonant of the Devanagari abugida. It ultimately arose from the Brahmi letter , after having gone through the Gupta letter . Letters that derive from it are the Gujarati letter ફ, and the Modi letter

[1]

[2]

[3]