Lycian alphabet


The Lycian alphabet was used to write the Lycian language of the Asia Minor region of Lycia. It was an extension of the Greek alphabet, with half a dozen additional letters for sounds not found in Greek. It was largely similar to the Lydian and the Phrygian alphabets.

The alphabet

The Lycian alphabet contains letters for 29 sounds. Some sounds are represented by more than one symbol, which is considered one "letter". There are six vowel letters, one for each of the four oral vowels of Lycian, and separate letters for two of the four nasal vowels. Nine of the Lycian letters do not appear to derive from the Greek alphabet.
Lycian letterTransliterationIPANotes
a
b
g
d
i,
w
z
h
θ
j or y
k after nasals
l and ~
m
n
u,
p after nasals
κ or c? ?
r and ~
s
t after nasals. ñt is as in / Ñtemuχlida for Greek Δημοκλείδης / Dēmokleídēs.
e
ã / Lusãtra for Greek Λύσανδρος / Lúsandros.
ẽ
m̃,, originally perhaps syllabic, later coda
ñ,, originally perhaps syllabic, later coda
τ? ?
q after nasals
β? ?voiced after nasals
χ after nasals

Numbers

Lycian uses the following number symbols: I = 1, < = 5, O = 10; a horizontal stroke — is one half; a symbol somewhat like our letter H may mean 100.
The number 128½ would therefore be expressed as HOOUnicodeThe Lycian alphabet was added to the Unicode Standard in April, 2008 with the release of version 5.1.
It is encoded in Plane 1.
The Unicode block for Lycian is U+10280-U+1029F: