Nāgarī script

Nāgarī
Copper plates in Nāgarī script, 1035 CE
Type	Abugida
Languages	Sanskrit Old Javanese Old Sundanese
Time period	c. 750–?
Parent systems	Proto-Sinaitic alphabet [a] Phoenician alphabet [a] Aramaic alphabet [a] Brāhmī Gupta Nāgarī
Child systems	Devanāgarī Nandināgarī
Sister systems	Śāradā Siddhaṃ
[a] The Semitic origin of the Brahmic scripts is not universally agreed upon.

The Nāgarī script is the ancestor of Devanagari and other variants, and was first used to write Prakrit and Sanskrit. It was in vogue from before the 10th century.

The Nāgarī script appeared in ancient India around the 8th century CE as an central- eastern variant of the Gupta script (whereas Śāradā was the western variety and Siddham was the far eastern variety). In turn it branched off into several scripts, such as Devanagari and Nandinagari, and also influenced the development of the Śāradā-derived Gurmukhī script.

The museum in Mrauk-u (Mrohaung) in the Arakan state of Birma held in 1972 two examples of Nāgarī script. Archaeologist Aung Thaw writes: "... epigraphs in mixed Sanskrit and Pali in North-eastern Nāgarī script of the 6th century dedicated by (kings) Niti Candra and Vira Candra", a dynasty hailing from Vesáli in India.

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