Malayalam script

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Not to be confused with the Jawi alphabet used for the Malay language.
Malayalam script
Malayalam Script Sample.svg
Languages Malayalam
Time period
C. 830 – present[1][2]
Parent systems
Sister systems
Sinhalese alphabet
Tigalari script
Direction Left-to-right
ISO 15924 Mlym, 347
Unicode alias

The Malayalam script (Malayāḷalipi; IPA: [mələjɑːɭə lɪpɪ]), also known as Kairali script[citation needed] is a Brahmic script used commonly to write Malayalam, which is the principal language of Kerala, India, spoken by 35 million people in the world.[3] Malayalam script is also widely used for writing Sanskrit texts in Kerala. Like many other Indic scripts, it is an alphasyllabary (abugida), a writing system that is partially “alphabetic” and partially syllable-based. The modern Malayalam alphabet has 15 vowel letters, 36 consonant letters, and a few other symbols. The Malayalam script is a Vatteluttu alphabet extended with symbols from the Grantha alphabet to represent Indo-Aryan loanwords.[4] The script is also used to write several minority languages such as Paniya, Betta Kurumba, and Ravula.[5] The Malayalam language itself was historically written in several different scripts.



The basic characters can be classified as follows:

  • Vowels (സ്വരം, svaram)
    1. Independent vowel letters
    2. Dependent vowel signs
  • Consonant letters (വ്യഞ്ജനം, vyañjanam)


  • കി ki = ka + ി vowel sign i
  • കു ku = ka + vowel sign u
  • കൈ kai = ka + vowel sign ai
  • ക് k = ka + virama
  • ka = consonant letter ka itself, with no vowel sign

Malayalam alphabet is unicase, or does not have a case distinction. It is written from left to right, but certain vowel signs are attached to the left (the opposite direction) of a consonant letter that it logically follows. In the word കേരളം (Kēraḷam), the vowel sign (ē) visually appears in the leftmost position, though the vowel ē logically follows the consonant k.


Malayalam was first written in the Vatteluttu alphabet, an ancient script of Tamil. However, the modern Malayalam script evolved from the Grantha alphabet, which was originally used to write Sanskrit. Both Vatteluttu and Grantha evolved from the Brahmi script, but independently.

Vatteluttu alphabet[edit]

Vatteluttu (Malayalamവട്ടെഴുത്ത്, Vaṭṭeḻuttŭ ?, “round writing”) is a script that had evolved from Tamil-Brahmi and was once used extensively in the southern part of present-day Tamil Nadu and in Kerala.



Image: scripts comparison
Grantha, Tigalari and Malayalam scripts

According to Arthur Coke Burnell, one form of the Grantha alphabet, originally used in the Chola dynasty, was imported into the southwest coast of India in the 8th or 9th century, which was then modified in course of time in this secluded area, where communication with the east coast was very limited.[10] It later evolved into Tigalari-Malayalam script was used by the Malayali, Havyaka Brahmins and Tulu Brahmin people, but was originally only applied to write Sanskrit. This script split into two scripts: Tigalari and Malayalam. While Malayalam script was extended and modified to write vernacular language Malayalam, the Tigalari was written for Sanskrit only.[10][11] In Malabar, this writing system was termed Arya-eluttu (ആര്യ എഴുത്ത്, Ārya eḻuttŭ),[12] meaning “Arya writing” (Sanskrit is Indo-Aryan language while Malayalam is a Dravidian language).

Vatteluttu was in general use, but was not suitable for literature where many Sanskrit words were used. Like Tamil-Brahmi, it was originally used to write Tamil, and as such, did not have letters for voiced or aspirated consonants used in Sanskrit but not used in Tamil. For this reason, Vatteluttu and the Grantha alphabet were sometimes mixed, as in the Manipravalam. One of the oldest examples of the Manipravalam literature, Vaishikatantram (വൈശികതന്ത്രം, Vaiśikatantram), dates back to the 12th century,[13][14] where the earliest form of the Malayalam script was used, which seems to have been systematized to some extent by the first half of the 13th century.[1][8]

Thunchaththu Ezhuthachan, a poet from around the 17th century, used Arya-eluttu to write his Malayalam poems based on Classical Sanskrit literature.[10] For a few letters missing in Arya-eluttu (ḷa, ḻa, ṟa), he used Vatteluttu. His works became unprecedentedly popular to the point that the Malayali people eventually started to call him the father of the Malayalam language, which also popularized Arya-eluttu as a script to write Malayalam. However, Grantha did not have distinctions between e and ē, and between o and ō, as it was as an alphabet to write a Sanskrit language. The Malayalam script as it is today was modified in the middle of the 19th century when Hermann Gundert invented the new vowel signs to distinguish them.[10]

By the 19th century, old scripts like Kolezhuthu had been supplanted by Arya-eluttu – that is the current Malayalam script. Nowadays, it is widely used in the press of the Malayali population in Kerala.[15]


Orthography reform[edit]

In 1969–1971 and in 1981, the Government of Kerala reformed the orthography of Malayalam.[16][17] In the traditional orthography, certain consonants followed by u, ū, or are represented by special glyphs (consonant-vowel ligatures), where the corresponding basic consonant letter is transformed irregularly. For example:

  • ka<image: ku (old)> ku
  • na<image: nu (old)> nu
  • śa<image: śu (old)> śu


  • kaകു ku
  • naനു nu
  • śaശു śu


  • ഗ് g + da = ഗ്‌ദ gda (Traditional: <image: gda>)
  • ല്‌ l + ta = ല്‌ത lta (Traditional: <image: lta>)

The new orthography, puthiya lipi (Malayalamപുതിയ ലിപി, putiya lipi ?), is now used commonly, but has not completely replaced the traditional system, palaya lipi (പഴയ ലിപി, paḻaya lipi)[dubious ].[18]

Malayalam letters[edit]

Malayalam letters


Vowel letters and vowel signs[edit]


  Short Long
Independent Dependent Indep. Dependent
Vowel sign Example Vowel sign Example
a a
(none) pa
i i
പി pi
u u
പു pu

പൃ pr̥
പൄ pr̥̄

പൢ pl̥
പൣ pl̥̄
e e
പെ pe
o o
പൊ po
Image: school sign
A Malayalam sign. Notice the word-initial a in akkādami, and the vowel sign ē in Kēraḷa.

, r̥̄, , l̥̄, used to write Sanskrit words, are treated as vowels. They are phonetically not vowels in Malayalam or in Classical Sanskrit, but originally they were (see Proto-Indo-European language and Vedic Sanskrit). The letters and signs for r̥̄, , l̥̄ are very rare, and are not considered as part of the modern orthography.[19]

The vowel signs ā, i, ī are placed to the right of a consonant letter to which it is attached. The vowel signs e, ē, ai are placed to the left of a consonant letter. The vowel signs o and ō consist of two parts: the first part goes to the left of a consonant letter and the second part goes to the right of it. In the reformed orthography, the vowel signs u, ū, are simply placed to the right of the consonant letter, while they often make consonant-vowel ligatures in the traditional orthography.

  Independent Dependent
Vowel sign Example
ai ai
പൈ pai
au au
പൌ pau
പൗ pau

It is important to note the vowel duration as it can be used to differentiate words that would otherwise be the same. For example, /kalam/ means "earthenware pot" while /kaːlam/ means "time" or "season".[20]


aṁ അം aṁ
പം paṁ



aḥ അഃ aḥ
പഃ paḥ



Basic consonant letters[edit]


Varga consonants
  Voiceless Voiced
Unaspirated Aspirated Unaspirated Aspirated Nasal
Velar ka
/ka/ KA
/kʰa/ KHA
/ɡa/ GA
/ɡʱa/ GHA
/ŋa/ NGA
/t͡ʃa/ CA
/t͡ʃʰa/ CHA
/ɟa/ JA
/ɟʱa/ JHA
/ɲa/ NYA
nha (nja)
Retroflex ṭa
/ʈa/ TTA
ta (hard ta)
/ʈʰa/ TTHA
tta (hard tha)
/ɖa/ DDA
hard da
/ɖʱa/ DDHA
hard dda (hard dha)
/ɳa/ NNA
hard na
Dental ta
/t̪a/ TA
tha (soft ta)
/t̪ʰa/ THA
ttha (soft tha)
/d̪a/ DA
soft da
/d̪ʱa/ DHA
soft dda (soft dha)
/n̪a, na/[A] NA
soft na
Labial pa
/pa/ PA
/pʰa/ PHA
/ba/ BA
/bʱa/ BHA
/ma/ MA

The consonants /ʈ, ɖ, ɳ/ are retroflex. In Malayalam, they are produced by touching the underside of the tip of the tongue to the front part of the hard palate (apico-palatal).

Other consonants
/ja/[A] YA
/ɾa/[B] RA
/la/[C] LA
/ʋa/[D] VA
/ʃa/[E] SHA
soft sha (sha)
/ʂa/[F] SSA
sha (hard sha)
/sa/[G] SA
/ɦa/ HA
/ɭa/[H] LLA
hard la
/ɻa/[J] LLLA/ṛ /ɽ/
zha(retroflexed ra)
[K] ṟa, ṯa
/ra, ta/ RRA
(hard ra)
/na/ NNNA
/ta/ TTTA
  • B Alveolar tap.
  • C The tip of the tongue almost touches the teeth ([l̪]), forward than the English l.
  • D [ʋʷ].
  • E [ʃʷ].
  • F Voiceless apico-palatal approximant [ʂ̺̠˕].[21]
  • G Dental sibilant fricative [s̪].
  • H Apico-palatal [ɭ̺̠].
  • J Voiced apico-palatal approximant [ʐ̺̠˕].[21] This consonant is usually described as /ɻ/, but also can be approximated by /ɹ/.[22]
  • K (1) Repetition of this letter (റ + റ) often represents a geminated voiceless alveolar plosive, /tːa/; (2) chillu-n + this letter (ൻ + റ) often represents /nda/; (3) otherwise alveolar trill (apical) /ra/. Optionally, (1) may be transliterated as ṯṯa instead of ṟṟa, (2) as nṯa (not nḏa) instead of nṟa.
  • L Corresponds to Tamil ṉa . Used rarely in scholarly texts to represent the alveolar nasal, as opposed to the dental nasal.[23] In ordinary texts both are represented by na .


A chillu, or a chillaksharam (ചില്ലക്ഷരം, cillakṣaram), is a special consonant letter that represents a pure consonant independently, without help of a virama. Unlike a consonant represented by an ordinary consonant letter, this consonant is never followed by an inherent vowel. Anusvara and visarga fit this definition but are not usually included. ISCII and Unicode 5.0 treat a chillu as a glyph variant of a normal (“base”) consonant letter.[24] In Unicode 5.1 and later, however, chillu letters are treated as independent characters, encoded atomically.[25]


Chillu letters
Letter Unicode name Base Remarks
CHILLU RR ra Historically from ra, not from ṟa (RRA) .
CHILLU L la Historically from ta .
CHILLU LL ḷa Historically from ṭa
ൿ CHILLU K ka  


As virama[edit]

Chandrakkala  ് (ചന്ദ്രക്കല, candrakkala) is a diacritic attached to a consonant letter to show that the consonant is not followed by an inherent vowel or any other vowel (for example, kaക് k). This kind of diacritic is common in Indic scripts, generically called virama in Sanskrit, or halant in Hindi.


At the end of a word, the same symbol sometimes represents a very short vowel, known as “half-u”, or samvruthokaram (സംവൃതോകാരം, saṁvr̥tōkāram), or kuṯṯiyal ukaram (കുറ്റിയൽ ഉകരം).[26] The exact pronunciation of this vowel varies from dialect to dialect, but it is approximately [ə][27] or [ɨ], and transliterated as ŭ (for example, naന് ). Optionally, a vowel sign u is inserted, as in നു് (= +  ു +  ്). According to one author, this alternative form is historically more correct, though the simplified form without a vowel sign u is common nowadays.[28] This means that the same spelling ന് may represent either n or depending on the context. Generally, it is at the end of a word, and n elsewhere; നു് always represents .


Consonant ligatures[edit]

Like in other Indic scripts, a virama is used in the Malayalam script to cancel—or “kill”—the inherent vowel of a consonant letter and represent a consonant without a vowel, so-called a “dead” consonant. For example,

  1. is a consonant letter na,
  2. is a virama; therefore,
  3. ന്‌ (na + virama) represents a dead consonant n.

If this n ന്‌ is further followed by another consonant letter, for example, ma , the result may look like ന്‌മ, which represents nma as na + virama + ma. In this case, two elements n ന്‌ and ma are simply placed one by one, side by side. Alternatively, nma can be also written as a ligature ന്മ.


  1. A fully conjoined ligature of C1+C2;
  2. Half-conjoined—

If the result is fully or half-conjoined, the (conceptual) virama which made C1 dead becomes invisible, only logically existing in a character encoding scheme such as Unicode. If the result is non-ligated, a virama is visible, attached to C1. The glyphs for nma has a visible virama if not ligated (ന്‌മ), but if ligated, the virama disappears (ന്മ). Usually the difference between those forms is superficial and both are semantically identical, just like the meaning of the English word palaeography does not change even if it is spelled palæography, with the ligature æ.

Common consonant ligatures[edit]


Common ligatures
  kka ṅka ṅṅa cca ñca ñña ṭṭa ṇṭa ṇṇa tta nta nna ppa mpa mma
Non-ligated ക്‌ക ങ്‌ക ങ്‌ങ ച്‌ച ഞ്‌ച ഞ്‌ഞ ട്‌ട ണ്‌ട ണ്‌ണ ത്‌ത ന്‌ത ന്‌ന പ്‌പ മ്‌പ മ്‌മ
Ligated ക്ക ങ്ക ങ്ങ ച്ച ഞ്ച ഞ്ഞ ട്ട ണ്ട ണ്ണ ത്ത ന്ത ന്ന പ്പ മ്പ മ്മ

The ligature mpa മ്പ was historically derived from npa ന്‌പ. The ligatures cca, bba, yya, and vva are special in that a doubled consonant is denoted by a triangle sign below a consonant letter.

  cca bba yya vva
Non-ligated ച്‌ച ബ്‌ബ യ്‌യ വ്‌വ
Ligated ച്ച ബ്ബ യ്യ വ്വ
Consonant + ya, va, la, ra[edit]


  • k ക് + ya = kya ക്യ
  • p പ് + ya = pya പ്യ

In kya ക്യ, a variant form of ya ( ്യ) is placed after the full form of ka , just like ki കി is written ka followed by the vowel sign i ി. In other words, the variant form of ya ( ്യ) used after a consonant letter can be considered as a diacritic. Since it is placed after the base character, it is sometimes referred to as a post-base form. An exception is yya യ്യ (see above).


  • k ക് + va = kva ക്വ
  • p പ് + va = pva പ്വ

An exception is vva വ്വ (see above).


  • k ക് + la = kla ക്ല
  • p പ് + la = pla പ്ല
  • l ല് + la = lla ല്ല (Not <triangle below ല>)


  • k ക് + ra = kra ക്ര (Traditional: <image: kra (old)>)
  • p പ് + ra = pra പ്ര (Traditional: <image: pra (old)>)
nṯa and ṯṯa[edit]

The ligature nṯa is written as n ന്‌ + ṟa and pronounced /nda/. The ligature ṯṯa is written as റ് + ṟa .

  nṯa ṯṯa
Non-ligated ന്‌റ റ്‌റ
Ligated <image: nṯa> റ്റ
Digraph ൻറ ററ

In those two ligatures, a small ṟa ‌റ is written below the first letter (chillu-n if it is a dead n). Alternatively, the letter ṟa is sometimes written to the right of the first letter, making a digraph (just like ωι used instead of in Greek). The spelling ൻറ is therefore read either nṟa (two separate letters) or nṯa (digraph) depending on the word. Similarly, ‌റ‌റ is read either ṟaṟa or ṯṯa.[25]

Dot reph[edit]


  • r ര് + ga = rga <image: rga (old)> (Reformed: ർഗ)
  • r ര് + ja = rja <image: rja (old)> (Reformed: ർജ)

Consonant-vowel ligatures[edit]

Other symbols[edit]

Praslesham Corresponds to Devanagari avagraha, used when a Sanskrit phrase containing an avagraha is written in Malayalam script. The symbol indicates the elision of the word-initial vowel a after a word that ends in ā, ē, or ō, and is transliterated as an apostrophe (’), or sometimes as a colon + an apostrophe (:’).
(Malayalamപ്രശ്ലേഷം, praślēṣam ?)
Malayalam date mark Used in an abbreviation of a date.
Double danda


0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 100 1000 ¼ ½ ¾




The Unicode block for Malayalam is U+0D00–U+0D7F:

Official Unicode Consortium code chart (PDF)
U+0D3x ി
U+0D7x ൿ
1.^ As of Unicode version 9.0
2.^ Grey areas indicate non-assigned code points

Chillus in Unicode[edit]

For example, avan അവൻ (“he”) is written as a + va + chillu-n , where chillu-n represents the n sound without a vowel. In other Indic scripts, the same word would be possibly written as a + va + na + virama. However, in Malayalam script, that sequence represents a different word, avanŭ അവന്‌ (“to him”), and is not interchangeable with avan.[30] This is because in modern Malayalam script, the sign for a virama also works as the sign for a vowel ŭ at the end of a word, and is not able to cleanly “kill” the inherent vowel in this case.[27]


The ligature nṯa <image: nṯa> is very common and supported by most Malayalam fonts in one way or another, but exactly how it should be encoded was not clear in Unicode 5.0 and earlier, and two incompatible implementations are currently in use.[31] In Unicode 5.1 (2008), the sequence to represent it was explicitly redefined as chillu-n + virama + ṟa (ൻ്റ).[25]

See also[edit]


  7. ^ Burnell (1874), p. 39.
  11. ^ "Grantha alphabet". Encyclopædia Britannica Online. Encyclopædia Britannica. 2009. Retrieved 2009-10-28. 
  12. ^ "EPIGRAPHY - Inscriptions in Grantha Script". Department of Archaeology, government of Tamil Nadu. Retrieved 2009-11-11. 
  16. ^ "Malayalam Script—Adoption of New Script for Use" (PDF). Government of Kerala. 1971. Retrieved 2009-10-25. 
  18. ^ John, Vijay. "The Concept of ലിപി (Lipi)". Learn Malayalam Online!. Retrieved 2009-09-08. 
  19. ^ a b "Report of the Committee on Malayalam Character Encoding and Keyboard Layout Standardisation". Kerala Gazette. Government of Kerala. 46 (2023). December 18, 2001. Archived from the original on October 6, 2009. Retrieved 2009-10-08.  See also the May 2001 version (PDF).
  22. ^ Mohanan (1996), p.421.
  24. ^ a b "South Asian Scripts-I" (PDF). The Unicode Standard 5.0 — Electronic Edition. Unicode, Inc. 1991–2007. pp. 42–44. Retrieved 2009-09-08. 
  26. ^ Chitrajakumar, R; Gangadharan, N (2005-08-07). "Samvruthokaram and Chandrakkala" (PDF). Unicode Consortium. Archived (PDF) from the original on 2014-07-12. Retrieved 2010-08-23. 
  28. ^ a b Chitrajakumar, R. & Gangadharan, N. (2005). "Chandrakkala. Samvruthokaram. Chillaksharam." (PDF). L2/05-210. Retrieved 2009-09-10. 
  29. ^ Constable, Peter (2004). "Clarification of the Use of Zero Width Joiner in Indic Scripts" (PDF). Public Review Issue #37. Unicode, Inc. Retrieved 2009-09-10.  External link in |work= (help)
  30. ^ Johny, Cibu C. (2005). "Unicode Public Review Issue #66: Encoding of Chillu Forms in Malayalam". Retrieved 2009-09-16.  See also L2/05-085 (PDF).
  31. ^ "Encoding of Chillu Forms in Malayalam". Public Review Issue #66. Unicode, Inc. 2005. Retrieved 2009-09-24.  External link in |work= (help)


External links[edit]