Re: What makes an abjad?

John Cowan wrote:

>
> Michael Everson scripsit:
>
> > No. Thaana and Quenya-mode Tengwar are alphabets.
>
> Well, Quenya-mode is an alphabet that could easily become an abugida,
> given the omissibility of the "a" diacritic. True, it has no virama,
> but no more does Buginese.

Neither did the original abugida, Kharosthi, and its improvement Brahmi,
because Prakrit doesn't have any final consonants. The virama turned up
centuries later when they started writing Sanskrit.
--
Peter T. Daniels grammatim@...