Unicode Block - Carian

Carian is an ancient script used primarily in the region of Caria in southwestern Anatolia, dating from roughly the 7th to 3rd centuries BCE, and it was used to write the Carian language, which remains only partially deciphered. The characters in this set include letters that represent both vowels and consonants, many of which bear a superficial resemblance to Greek letters but often have entirely different phonetic values, reflecting a unique local adaptation rather than a direct borrowing. The script appears on stone inscriptions, coin legends, and graffiti, with the majority of surviving examples found in Egypt, where Carian mercenaries left their marks, as well as in Caria itself. Its decipherment, achieved in the 20th century through the study of bilingual texts, has revealed a language that is not Indo-European, showing distinct grammatical and lexical traits that set it apart from neighboring Anatolian tongues like Lycian or Lydian.