Hi Matthew,

Pali was a vernacular which did not necessary have a script, just as
gypsies did not have a script for their language. This is why they
are called vernaculars, just like the dozens of Chinese dialects and
the Malay language used in Singapore and Malaysia. Of course, in
recent time, linguists have helped to develop a script or alphabet
for these vernacular by borrowing from another script.

The script used during Buddha's time by the Northern Indian was
Brahmi, the ancestor to Devanagari, Sanskrit and Hindi:
http://www.ancientscripts.com/brahmi.html

It is to be noted that Buddhism is not a religion that insist the
protection of a particular language or culture, so as Buddhism spread
to different countries, the scriptures were translated and the
original scripts mostly lost. For example, many Indian Buddhist
scripts were brought to China by Indian and Chinese monks, but hardly
any of them exist now.

Sidetrack: http://www.ancientscripts.com/latin.html

metta,
Yong Peng

--- In Pali@yahoogroups.com, solidaudio1 wrote:
I was wondering if anyone could show me what the words Dhamma and
Maiti (love) in the common form of written Pali in the time of
Gotama. Any help would be greatly appreciated.