abjadbased

An abjad is a writing system where each symbol represents a consonant. Vowels are either omitted entirely or indicated through diacritical marks, which are optional additions. This contrasts with an alphabet, where both consonants and vowels have dedicated symbols. Abjads are primarily used for Semitic languages like Arabic, Hebrew, and Aramaic. The term "abjad" itself is derived from the first four letters of the old Phoenician alphabet: aleph, bet, gimel, and daleth.

The development of abjads allowed for the efficient transcription of languages where vowel sounds were often understood from context by native speakers. This system was particularly well-suited to Semitic languages, which tend to have a root-and-pattern morphology where consonants carry the core meaning and vowels modify it. While the core of the writing system remains consonantal, many modern abjads have developed ways to indicate vowels for clarity, especially in texts intended for learners or in specific contexts like religious scriptures.

In practice, readers of languages written with an abjad learn to infer the correct vowels based on grammatical rules and the surrounding words. This requires a degree of linguistic knowledge and familiarity with the language. The oldest known abjad is the Proto-Sinaitic script, which emerged in the Sinai Peninsula around the 19th century BCE. This script is considered the ancestor of many modern writing systems, including the abjads used today.