Women's script

Women's script
Related to	Vorinism
World of Origin	Roshar

Women's script, sometimes called Alethi script, is a writing system used in Vorin nations, such as Alethkar, Jah Keved, and Kharbranth, on Roshar. The script is a phonetic alphabet. Each letter is determined by both shape and size. As is indicated by the name, it is a system only used by women, as writing is considered a feminine pursuit. Women's script is distinctly different from glyphs, which are a combination of pictograms and phonetics, and are what men read.

Design

Brandon Sanderson's main stipulation for the design of women's script was that it look like sound waves.

Translation

It should be noted that all current examples of women's script exist in illustrations in the books, as pages from Navani's notebook or Shallan's sketchbook. A few dedicated fans translated them into a close approximation of English. Template:Http://twg.17thshard.com/forum/index.php?topic=7882.0 ref

Since there are only twenty-five letters in women's script, not every letter in English has a counterpart. The letter C is written as either K or S, depending on the sound it makes. X is made with a K and S, W is made with a U and sometimes another vowel, and Q is written with a K and U.

Organization

Phenomes

There are twenty-five letters, organized in five phenomes: E, T, S, P, and K. Each phenome has a distinctive shape, with five letters that follow a specific pattern.

Characters

The first letter in a phenome is full height, the second is of medium height, and the third is the smallest. The fourth is full height again, but with two lines of the smallest height, and the fifth is small with one line after it.

The E phenome contains all the vowels: E, A, O, U, and I, the T phenome consists of T, D, R, Th, and L, the S phenome is made up of S, Z, N, SH, and H, the P phenome has P, B, M, F, and V, and the K phenome has K, G, Y, CH, and J.

Punctuation

Women's script has only one character for punctuation. It is a line of full height, much like the character E, but it has a small, horizontal line at the top and bottom. It is written at the beginning of each sentence to denote maximum character height. It is assumed that the language that the script would be used to write in does not use or need other punctuation.

• 

  e

• 

  a

• 

  o

• 

  u

• 

  i

• 

  t

• 

  d

• 

  r

• 

  th

• 

  l

• 

  s

• 

  z

• 

  n

• 

  sh

• 

  h

• 

  p

• 

  b

• 

  m

• 

  f

• 

  v

• 

  k

• 

  g

• 

  y

• 

  ch

• 

  j

• 

  symbol used to denote maximum character height

Trivia

• The only samples of Alethi script currently available are three excerpts from Navani's notebook and on a sketch depicting a lait in Shallan's sketchbook
• It was designed by Isaac Stewart, to look like waveforms.
• Neither Brandon nor Isaac can read the women's script without reference.
• The women's script is often erroneously referred to as the "Alethi script" among fans. This term is never used in the books, and is demonstrably false as the script is also used in places such as Jah Keved and Kharbranth, at the very least.

Notes

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