Thread by @nubianscribes

Around the year 330CE, the Kingdom of Kush fell, and in its wake rose three Nubian Kingdoms: Nobatia, Makuria, and Alodia. With these kingdoms came a new, written language, influenced by the various writing traditions of the region.

A brief history of the Nubian script:

The Nubian script can be seen as a combination of 3 influential writing traditions in the region:

1) The Greek alphabet, brought to the region by the conquests of Alexander the Great.

2) The Coptic alphabet, which used letters borrowed from Greek and Demotic Egyptian.

3) The Meroitic cursive script, used in the Meroitic period of the Kingdom of Kush, largely based on Demotic Egyptian.

The Nubian script, which appeared in the 5th century, was largely based on the Greek alphabet, with two unique aesthetic qualities:

1) The script is uncial, meaning it has no capitalization.

2) For unknown reasons, the Nubian script is largely written on a slant, making it one of the few scripts to be written entirely in italics.

The Nubian script also borrowed a number of Coptic letters and Meroitic letters to represent sounds present in Nubian but missing from Greek.

In the Kingdom of Alodia, the furthest south Nubian kingdom, a different Nubian script was used, and while as-of-yet poorly understood, it also seems to contain influence from the Ge’ez language, used in the Axumite Kingdom, which bordered Alodia.

The Nubian script was used from the 5th century CE until the 14th century CE, which is when the Nubian kingdoms fell and Islam - along with the Arabic language - emerged as the most influential religion and language in the region.

However, in the 90s, a group of Nubian activists revived the Nubian script, with Mukhtar Khalil Kabbara making a number of orthographical modifications to streamline Nubian writing.

The Nubian script, largely with the orthography pioneered by Kabbara, continues to be used by Nubian language activists to write the Nubian language.

Our goal with this account is to encourage Nubians and lovers of Nubia to learn and use this script, as well as appreciate the long and beautiful history of Nubian calligraphy.