ABSTRACT
The Devanāgarī script is the most important derivative of the Brāhmī script, itself a left-to-right adaptation of a right-to-left Semitic script, which seems to have been introduced into north-west India from Mesopotamia early in the first millennium BC. The Devanāgari letters used for Sanskrit date from the eighth century AD. The name may be translated as 'sacred city writing' or 'city writing of the gods' (Macdonell 1924); deva 'divine, god', nāgara 'urban'. The thirty-four consonants and thirteen vowels of the script are set out in the accompanying chart, plus the vowels in combination with /k/:
