Kha (Indic)


Kha is the second consonant of Indic abugidas. In modern Indic scripts, kha is derived from the Brahmi letter, which is probably derived from the Aramaic .

Mathematics

Āryabhaṭa numeration

used Devanagari letters for numbers, very similar to the Greek numerals, even after the invention of Indian numerals.
The values of the different forms of ख are:
There are three different general early historic scripts - Brahmi and its variants, Kharoshthi, and Tocharian, the so-called slanting Brahmi. Kha as found in standard Brahmi, was a simple geometric shape, with slight variations toward the Gupta. The Tocharian Kha did not have an alterante Fremdzeichen form. The third form of kha, in Kharoshthi was probably derived from Aramaic separately from the Brahmi letter.

Brahmi Kha

The Brahmi letter, Kha, is probably derived from the Aramaic Qoph, and is thus related to the modern Latin Q and Greek Koppa. Several identifiable styles of writing the Brahmi Kha can be found, most associated with a specific set of inscriptions from an artifact or diverse records from an historic period. As the earliest and most geometric style of Brahmi, the letters found on the Edicts of Ashoka and other records from around that time are normally the reference form for Brahmi letters, with vowel marks not attested until later forms of Brahmi back-formed to match the geometric writing style.
Ashoka
Girnar
Kushana
Gujarat
Gupta

Tocharian Kha

The Tocharian letteris derived from the Brahmi, but does not have an alternate Fremdzeichen form.
KhaKhāKhiKhīKhuKhūKhrKhr̄KheKhaiKhoKhauKhä

Kharoshthi Kha

The Kharoshthi letter is generally accepted as being derived from the Aramaic Qoph, and is thus related to Q and Koppa, in addition to the Brahmi Kha.

Devanagari Kha

Kha is the second consonant of the Devanagari abugida. It ultimately arose from the Brahmi letter, after having gone through the Gupta letter. Letters that derive from it are the Gujarati letter ખ and the Modi letter ?.

Devanagari-using Languages

In all languages, ख is pronounced as or when appropriate. Because of borrowings from languages with different phonemic inventories, Devanagari has employed the nukta to create an additional related letter ख़ ḫa that can be used to retain non-native distinctions in Hindi texts.
KhKhaKhāKhiKhīKhuKhūKhrKhr̄KhlKhl̄KheKhaiKhoKhau
ख्खखाखिखीखुखूखृखॄखॢखॣखेखैखोखौ

Conjuncts With ख

Devanagari exhibits conjunct ligatures, as is common in Indic scripts. Like most Devanagari letters, in modern texts ख forms very few irregular ligatures, and assumes a half form to create most conjuncts, such as ख् + य = ख्य. Earlier texts show many more ligature forms, with vertically stacked conjuncts being common. The use of modern ligatures and vertical conjuncts may vary across languages using the Devanagari script, with Marathi in particular preferring the use of half forms where texts in other languages would show ligatures and vertical stacks.

Ligature conjuncts of ख

True ligatures are quite rare in Indic scripts. The most common ligated conjuncts in Devanagari are in the form of a slight mutation to fit in context or as a consistent variant form appended to the adjacent characters. Those variants include Na and the Repha and Rakar forms of Ra. Nepali and Marathi texts use the "eyelash" Ra half form for an initial "R" instead of repha.

Stacked conjuncts of ख

Vertically stacked ligatures are the most common conjunct forms found in Devanagari text. Although the constituent characters may need to be stretched and moved slightly in order to stack neatly, stacked conjuncts can be broken down into recognizable base letters, or a letter and an otherwise standard ligature.

Bengali Kha

The Bengali script খ is derived from the Siddhaṃ, and is marked by the lack of a horizontal head line, unlike its Devanagari counterpart, ख. The inherent vowel of Bengali consonant letters is /ɔ/, so the bare letter খ will sometimes be transliterated as "kho" instead of "kha". Adding okar, the "o" vowel mark, খো, gives a reading of /kho/.
Like all Indic consonants, খ can be modified by marks to indicate another vowel than its inherent "a".
KhaKhāKhiKhīKhuKhūKhrKhr̄KheKhaiKhoKhauKh
খখাখিখীখুখূখৃখৄখেখৈখোখৌখ্

in Bengali-using languages

খ is used as a basic consonant character in all of the major Bengali script orthographies, including Bengali and Assamese.

Conjuncts with

Bengali খ does not exhibit any irregular conjunct ligatures, beyond adding the standard trailing forms of ব, য ya-phala, and র ra-phala, and the leading repha form of র.

Gurmukhi Kha

Khakhaa is the seventh letter of the Gurmukhi alphabet. Its name is and is pronounced as /kʰ/ when used in words. It is derived from the Laṇḍā letter kha, ultimately from the Brahmi kha. Gurmukhi kha does not have a special pairin or addha form for making conjuncts, and in modern Punjabi texts does not take a half form or halant to indicate the bare consonant /kʰ/, although Gurmukhi Sanskrit texts may use an explicit halant.

Gujarati Kha

Kha is the second letter of the Gujarati script. It is derived from 16th century Devanagari letter kha, with the top bar removed. Like most Gujarati letters, it forms conjunct clusters with a half-form, where the vertical stem on the right is dropped and the remaining letter body appended to the following letter:
ખ્ખ

Oriya Kha

The Oriya letter kha is the second letter of the Oriya script. It is derived from the Brahmi-based Kalinga kha. It does not form conjunct ligatures with other characters, and like other Oriya letters with an open top, takes the subjoined matra form of the vowel i :
ଖି
Its subjoined form is identical to, though smaller than, its full form:
ଖ୍ଖ

Telugu Kha

Kha is the second letter of the Telugu script. It is derived from the Bhattiprolu letter kha, and is very closely related to the Kannada ಖ kha. Since it lacks the v-shaped headstroke common to most Telugu letters, ఖ remains unaltered by most vowel matras, and its subjoined form is simply a smaller version of the normal letter shape:
ఖ్ఖ

Kannada Kha

Kannada kha is the second letter of its script, and like its closely related Telugu counterpart ఖ, is derived from the Bhattiprolu letter kha. Like its Telugu counterpart, it is generally unchanged by matras, and its subjoined form is the same as its full form:
ಖ್ಖ

Malayalam Kha

Kha is the second letter of the Malayalam script. It is derived from the Grantha kha. It does not exhibit ligation in conjuncts with other letters, does not have a chillu form, and uses the explicit virama unless coupled with the normal post-base and repha consonant forms.

Sinhala Kha

The Sinhala Suddha ka, called mahaapraana kayanna in Unicode, is the second letter of Sinhala script, and is part of the Miśra set of Sinhala consonants. Although it is derived from the Grantha letter kha, modern Sinhala no longer distinguishes between aspirated and unaspirated consonants, and ඛ is pronounced the same as ක, ka, but is used for loanwords and in higher register writing. ඛ does not have any unique ligatures or conjunct forms, and displays an explicit virama as the first member of a conjunct cluster.

Thai High Kho

Kho khai and kho khuat are the second and third letters of the Thai script. They fall under the high class of Thai consonants. In IPA, kho khai and kho khuat are pronounced as at the beginning of a syllable and are pronounced as at the end of a syllable. Both kho khwai and kho khuat are derived from the old Khmer kha. The next three letters of the alphabet, kho khwai, kho khon, and kho ra-khang, are also named kho, however, they all fall under the low class of Thai consonants. Unlike many Indic scripts, Thai consonants do not form conjunct ligatures, and use the pinthu—an explicit virama with a dot shape—to indicate bare consonants.

Kho Khai

In the acrophony of the Thai script, khai means ‘egg’. Kho khai corresponds to the Sanskrit character ‘ख’.

Kho Khuat

In the acrophony of the Thai script, khuat means ‘bottle’. Kho khuat represents the voiceless velar fricativesound /x/ that existed in Old Thai at the time the alphabet was created but no longer exists in Modern Thai. When the Thai script was developed, the voiceless velar fricative sound did not have a Sanskrit or Pali counterpart so the character kho khai was slightly modified to create kho khuat. During the Old Thai period, this sound merged into the aspirated stop /kʰ/, and as a result the use of this letters became unstable. Although kho khuat is now obsolete, it remains in dictionaries, preserving the traditional count of 44 letters in the Thai alphabet. When the first Thai typewriter was developed by Edwin Hunter McFarland in 1892, there was simply no space for all characters, thus kho khuat was of the two letters left out along with kho khon. Although kho khuat does not appear in modern Thai orthography, some writers and publishers are trying to reintroduce its usage.

Lao Kha

Kho sung or kʰāi is the second letter of the Lao script. It is derived from the old Khmer kha, and is essentially a fossil of Thai kho khai as it existed in the 14th century. Like its Thai counterpart, it is a high tone letter and does not form ligatures or conjuncts.

Tibetan Kha

Kha is the second letter of the Tibetan script, and is derived from the equivalent Siddhaṃ letter. As with all Tibetan letters, it can appear as a head consonant or subjoined to a head consonant. Like many Indic scripts, the halant - an explicit virama - can be used for indicating a bare consonant, although subjoined forms are used to form consonant conjuncts. The subjoined form of kha is essentially identical to its head form:
ཁྑ

Burmese Kha

Kha is the second letter of the Burmese script, and is probably derived from the Grantha letter kha. Like many Burmese letters, it is not seen with the virama, as /kh/ does not occur syllable finally. It can form conjuncts with other velar letters in abbreviations and foreign terms: