U+0D85 "අ" Sinhala Letter Ayanna Unicode Character
Unicode Version 17.0
අ
U+0D85 "අ" Sinhala Letter Ayanna is the first letter of the Sinhala abugida used to write the Sinhala language, primarily in Sri Lanka. It represents the inherent vowel sound "a" and serves as the foundational vowel character from which many other vowel forms and diacritics are derived. In the Sinhala script, Ayanna is considered a pure vowel and is distinct in its phonetic role, often appearing at the start of words or as a base for combining with consonant symbols. Its unique curved shape is a defining feature of the script's aesthetic, and it holds cultural and linguistic significance as a primary building block for literacy in Sinhala.
General Properties
| Code Point | U+0D85 |
| Version Added | 3.0 |
| Name | Sinhala Letter Ayanna |
| Block | Sinhala |
| General Category | Other Letter |
| Canonical Combining Class | Not Reordered |
| Bidirectional Class | Left To Right |
Encodings
| HTML Decimal Encoding | අ |
| HTML Hex Encoding | අ |
| UTF-8 Encoding | 0xE0 0xB6 0x85 |
| UTF-16 Encoding | 0x0D85 |
| UTF-32 Encoding | 0x00000D85 |
| C/C++/Java Escape | \u0d85 |