Soyombo

The Soyombo script was created in 1686 by Bogdo Zanabazar, a Mongolian monk and scholar who modelled it on the Devanagari alphabet. The Soyombo script was designed to write Mongolian, Sanskrit and Tibetan and for transcribing foreign words. The name means "Self developed Holy Letters" in Sanskrit. It is used mainly for inscriptions on prayer wheels official seals and temples.

Notable features

Type of writing system: Abugida / Syllabic Alphabet
Writing direction: left to right in horizontal lines. Can also be written vertically.
Used to write: Mongolian, Tibetan and Sanskrit

Soyomobo alphabet for Mongolian

Soyombo alphabet for Mongolian

Notes

The national symbol of Mongolia has a number of forms, and is widely used on flags, banknotes, stamps. etc. It is also used to indicate the beginning of a text. This symbol is known in Mongolian as соёмбо / ᠰᠣᠶᠤᠮᠪᠤ, which comes from the Sanskrit word svayambhu (self-manifested, self-existing)
The terminal marks cintamani and candamani indicate the end of a text.
The tsheg is used to separate words
The shad is used to separate separate sentences

Soyomobo alphabet for Sanskrit and Tibetan

Soyombo alphabet for Sanskrit and Tibetan

The Soyombo font used on this page was created by Jason Glavy

Download an alphabet chart for Soyombo (Excel)

Download a font for Soyombo by Bryson Schnatimann (OTF, Unicode)

Sample texts

Sample text in the Soyombo script

Source: https://www.trends.mn/n/1453

Sample text (Mongolian)

Sample text in the Soyombo script in Mongolian

Sample text (Sanskrit)

Sample text in the Soyombo script in Sanskrit

Tranliteration (Devanagari script)

सर्वे मानवाः स्वतन्त्राः समुत्पन्नाः वर्तन्ते अपि च, गौरवदृशा अधिकारदृशा च समानाः एव वर्तन्ते। एते सर्वे चेतना-तर्क-शक्तिभ्यां सुसम्पन्नाः सन्ति। अपि च, सर्वेऽपि बन्धुत्व-भावनया परस्परं व्यवहरन्तु।

Tranliteration (Latin script)

Sarvē mānavāḥ svatantrāḥ samutpannāḥ vartantē api ca, gauravadr̥śā adhikāradr̥śā ca samānāḥ ēva vartantē. Ētē sarvē cētanā-tarka-śaktibhyāṁ susampannāḥ santi. Api ca, sarvē´pi bandhutva-bhāvanayā parasparaṁ vyavaharantu.

Sample text (Tibetan)

Sample text in the Soyombo script in Tibetan

Transliteration (Tibetan script)

འགྲོ་བ་མིའི་རིགས་རྒྱུད་ཡོངས་ལ་སྐྱེས་ཙམ་ཉིད་ནས་ཆེ་མཐོངས་དང༌། ཐོབ་ཐངགི་རང་དབང་འདྲ་མཉམ་དུ་ཡོད་ལ། ཁོང་ཚོར་རང་བྱུང་གི་བློ་རྩལ་དང་བསམ་ཚུལ་བཟང་པོ་འདོན་པའི་འོས་བབས་ཀྱང་ཡོད། དེ་བཞིན་ཕན་ཚུན་གཅིག་གིས་གཅིག་ལ་བུ་སྤུན་གྱི་འདུ་ཤེས་འཛིན་པའི་བྱ་སྤྱོད་ཀྱང་ལག་ལེན་བསྟར་དགོས་པ་ཡིན༎

Transliteration (Wylie)

'gro ba mi'i rigs rgyud yongs la skyes tsam nyid nas che mthongs dang*/_thob thangagi rang dbang 'dra mnyam du yod la/_khong tshor rang byung gi blo rtsal dang bsam tshul bzang po 'don pa'i 'os babs kyang yod/_de bzhin phan tshun gcig gis gcig la bu spun gyi 'du shes 'dzin pa'i bya spyod kyang lag len bstar dgos pa yin//

Translation

All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.
(Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights)

Sample texts in Mongolian, Sanskrit and Tibetan provided by Zein Shbeeb.

Video about the Soyomobo script

Links

Information about Soyombo
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soyombo_alphabet
https://www.unicode.org/charts/PDF/U11A50.pdf
http://silverhorde.viahistoria.com/main.html?research/MongolScripts.html

Soyombo fonts
https://web.archive.org/web/20020203192752/http://www.geocities.com/jglavy/asian.html
http://userpage.fu-berlin.de/~corff/im/Soyombo/overview.Soyombo.html

Abugidas / Syllabic alphabets

Ahom, Aima, Arleng, Badagu, Badlit, Basahan, Balinese, Balti-A, Balti-B, Batak, Baybayin, Bengali, Bhaiksuki, Bhujimol, Bilang-bilang, Bima, Blackfoot, Brahmi, Buhid, Burmese, Carrier, Chakma, Cham, Cree, Dehong Dai, Devanagari, Dham Lipi, Dhankari / Sirmauri, Ditema, Dives Akuru, Dogra, Ethiopic, Evēla Akuru, Fox, Fraser, Gond, Goykanadi, Grantha, Gujarati, Gunjala Gondi, Gupta, Gurmukhi, Halbi Lipi, Hanifi, Hanuno'o, Hočąk, Ibalnan, Incung, Inuktitut, Jaunsari Takri, Javanese, Kaithi, Kadamba, Kamarupi, Kannada, Kawi, Kharosthi, Khema, Khe Prih, Khmer, Khojki, Khom Thai, Khudabadi, Kirat Rai, Kōchi, Kodava Lipi, Komering, Kulitan, Kurukh Banna, Lai Tay (Tai Yo), Lampung, Lanna, Lao, Leke, Lepcha, Limbu, Lontara/Makasar, Lota Ende, Magar Akkha, Mahajani, Malayalam, Meitei (Modern), Manpuri (Old), Marchen, Meetei Yelhou Mayek, Meroïtic, Masarm Gondi, Modi, Mon, Mongolian Horizontal Square Script, Multani, Nandinagari, Newa, New Tai Lue, Ojibwe, Odia, Ogan, Pahawh Hmong, Pallava, Phags-pa, Purva Licchavi, Qiang / Rma, Ranjana, Rejang (Kaganga), Sasak, Savara, Satera Jontal, Shan, Sharda, Sheek Bakrii Saphaloo, Siddham, Sinhala, Sorang Sompeng, Sourashtra, Soyombo, Sukhothai, Sundanese, Syloti Nagri, Tagbanwa, Tai Noi, Takri, Tamil, Tanchangya (Ka-Pat), Tani, Thaana, Telugu, Thai, Thirke, Tibetan, Tigalari, Tikamuli, Tocharian, Tolong Siki, Vatteluttu, Warang Citi

Other writing systems

Page last modified: 10.02.26

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