BabelStone Twitter Archive : 2018

Thursday, 11 January 2018 at 19:40

Proposal to define standardized variation sequences for Horizontal and Vertical forms of Bopomofo Letter I by @eisoch and Selena Wei unicode.org/L2/L2018/18020…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 12 January 2018 at 11:10

In Duolun County where the Yuan summer capital of Shangdu (Xanadu) was located, no coinidence perhaps. twitter.com/JeremiahJenne/…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 12 January 2018 at 13:46

People need to use existing emoji creatively rather than trying to get every possible concept accepted as a discrete emoji. twitter.com/KeithBroni/sta…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 12 January 2018 at 16:13

Incontrovertibly false. twitter.com/pauldhunt/stat…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 16 January 2018 at 23:51

Response to feedback from WG2 email discussion list on PDAM 2.2 unicode.org/L2/L2018/18027…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 16 January 2018 at 23:54

"The proponents are welcome to submit a proposal as described on unicode.org/emoji/selectio…" × 5 ... and the ESC will reject any proposal, however well-written, if they don't want it in the first place, so what's the point?

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 17 January 2018 at 21:27

Proposal to encode the Palaeohispanic script unicode.org/L2/L2018/18030…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 17 January 2018 at 21:35

New feedback from the WG2 email discussion list on emoji and more unicode.org/L2/L2018/18031…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 18 January 2018 at 15:22

Really, "asperand" is not the "official name" of the @ sign; that is just one of several neologisms that never caught on. twitter.com/BBC/status/953…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

unicode.org/L2/L2018/18029…

Thursday, 18 January 2018 at 19:49

Two documents urging the UTC not to change the DIYA emoji to a generic oil lamp emoji which vendors could well render as a lantern or Aladdin lamp:

unicode.org/L2/L2018/18033…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 18 January 2018 at 23:34

Emoji Subcommittee recommendations for Emoji 11.0: "the UTC has a target “budget” of 50-70 emoji characters per release" unicode.org/L2/L2018/18023…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 18 January 2018 at 23:36

As expected, Emoji Subcommittee recommends emojifying a single chess piece only (U+265F BLACK CHESS PAWN) to represent a Chess emoji unicode.org/L2/L2018/18023…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 19 January 2018 at 00:33

Emoji Subcommittee proposes special case mappings for U+24C2 Ⓜ unicode.org/L2/L2018/18037… (this hurts so much):

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 19 January 2018 at 12:16

A Preliminary Proposal for Encoding Mayan Hieroglyphic Text in Unicode by Carlos Pallán Gayol unicode.org/L2/L2018/18038…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 19 January 2018 at 12:24

Unicode Emoji Subcommittee's Gender Emoji Strategy (revised) unicode.org/L2/L2018/18022… : Revert DANCER 💃 to neutral, add DANCER + ♀

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 19 January 2018 at 13:12

Essential reading on Emoji gender issues: Analysis of Emoji Proposals for Gender‐Specific Additions by @Random_Guy_32 unicode.org/L2/L2017/17439…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 19 January 2018 at 20:44

This is a good one. The Committee Draft for ISO 20674-1 Transliteration of scripts in use in Thailand -- Part 1: Transliteration of Akson-Thai-Noi defines transliterations for 20 unencoded Thai characters at provisional code points pending acceptance into ISO/IEC 10646/Unicode...

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 19 January 2018 at 20:52

...Unfortunately nobody on the ISO/TC 46 committee remembered to actually make a proposal to SC2 to encode these 20 Thai characters ... and now they have suddenly realized their embarrassing omission unicode.org/L2/L2018/18041…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 20 January 2018 at 10:27

甘肃武威亥母寺遗址出土250余片西夏文献 kaogu.net.cn/cn/xccz/201801…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 20 January 2018 at 11:34

Or they could just let subscribers choose what language they want to receive the alerts in. twitter.com/michellebvd/st…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 21 January 2018 at 00:20

Fragment of the Tangut "Homophones" 𗙏𘙰 text (folio 49A) found at the Haimusi site kaixian.tv/gd/2018/0120/1…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 22 January 2018 at 16:04

Proposal to encode an Invisible Letter in 2004 ... still needed in 2018. twitter.com/aharoni/status…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 22 January 2018 at 21:14

Surprisingly, the Standard Telegraph Codebook of 1983 标准电码本（修订本） includes an unencoded Chinese ideograph for IQH unicode.org/L2/L2018/18045…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 22 January 2018 at 21:15

IQH is available in my BabelStone Han PUA font at EFA0 babelstone.co.uk/Fonts/PUA.html

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 22 January 2018 at 21:21

Emoji Script Subcommittee Recommendations for Emoji 12.0 (deadline May 2018 for 2019 publication) unicode.org/L2/L2018/18024…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 22 January 2018 at 21:24

Yes to: Razor, Yawning Face, Axe, Parachute

No to: Mammoth, Dodo, Squirrel, Billiard Games, Troll

(anyone see any sort of pattern here?)

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 22 January 2018 at 21:39

Internet-Draft by Slevinski describes an implementation of SignWriting that uses unassigned Unicode Plane 4 characters in range U+40001 to U+4F428 tools.ietf.org/html/draft-sle… h/t @DougEwell

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 22 January 2018 at 21:43

It is quite likely that allocation for archaic Chinese scripts (Oracle Bone script, Small Seal script, etc.) will be moved from Plane 3 (unicode.org/roadmaps/tip/) to Plane 4 in the not too distant future.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 23 January 2018 at 00:03

Presentation to Unicode Technical Committee on encoding Mayan Hieroglyphs by Carlos Pallán Gayol unicode.org/L2/L2018/18047…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 24 January 2018 at 13:19

According to ISO/IEC JTC1 N13635 "Proposal for future JTC 1 plans", JTC1 wants to engage in discussions with relevant consortia (Linux Foundation, Open Connectivity Foundation, Apache, W3C, CSCC) regarding open source software development ...

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 24 January 2018 at 13:20

... the Unicode Consortium is not best pleased that it has been omitted from the list of relevant consortia, and complains in SC2 N4582 that some ISO/IEC subcommittees are ignoring the Unicode Consortium's open source projects such as CLDR.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 24 January 2018 at 23:13

Ad hoc responses on emoji by Mark Davis unicode.org/L2/L2018/18051… #UTC154

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 24 January 2018 at 23:16

"We are doing a single chess piece. Because they are widely supported in current fonts, unlikely to have problems" ... except for people playing twitter chess who will have huge 3D black pawns among the other pieces @Informoji

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 24 January 2018 at 23:19

"1F9A0 MICROBE; add cldr keywords AMOEBA, BACTERIA, VIRUS" — not like anyone would ever want to distinguish between amoeba, bacteria and virus because they're all just tiny organisms non-one can see @Evertype

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 25 January 2018 at 00:12

And in other news, the President of the Unicode Consortium is unable to put an umlaut on the name of Christoph Päper @Cr1ss0v @Informoji

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 25 January 2018 at 13:44

Proposal to add G source references to 3 characters in China’s telegraph codebook by Jaemin Chung appsrv.cse.cuhk.edu.hk/~irg/irg/irg50…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 25 January 2018 at 14:08

"the systematic study of Dūnhuáng variant characters" sounds like a good idea twitter.com/GhentCBS/statu…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 26 January 2018 at 18:49

The Unicode Consortium requests reserving the code point U+32FF ㋿ for the new Japanese era name unicode.org/L2/L2018/18056…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 30 January 2018 at 09:58

They've changed BRICKS emoji to BRICK @Evertype @Informoji

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 30 January 2018 at 10:00

But they've changed ROLL OF TOILET PAPER to ROLL OF PAPER

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 30 January 2018 at 10:03

No other emoji changes for Unicode 11.0

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 30 January 2018 at 17:17

Unicode 11.0 scheduled for release on 12 June 2018 unicode.org/versions/Unico…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 31 January 2018 at 01:19

Unicode pipeline updated unicode.org/alloc/Pipeline… but nothing unexpected @Evertype @Informoji

February

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 1 February 2018 at 00:35

Draft Minutes of UTC Meeting 154 unicode.org/L2/L2018/18007… @Evertype @Informoji @FakeUnicode

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 1 February 2018 at 00:44

"Change the glyph for U+1F3B1 BILLIARDS to show a cue and a ball"

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 1 February 2018 at 00:45

"Add RAZOR, YAWNING FACE, AXE,and PARACHUTE as provisional emoji candidates"

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 1 February 2018 at 00:45

"Do not accept MAMMOTH, DODO, SQUIRREL, BILLIARD GAMES, or TROLL as provisional emoji candidates"

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 1 February 2018 at 00:49

"Create new glyphs for U+13432..U+13435 based on L2/18-036 and discussion in the meeting"

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 1 February 2018 at 00:56

"The UTC will provide one of two outcomes for emoji proposals that are not immediately accepted ... (1) declines to encode; or (2) a "not now" status."

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 1 February 2018 at 01:02

"Add DIYA LAMP to the provisional emoji candidate list" (backed away from changing name to generic OIL LAMP)

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 1 February 2018 at 09:19

By having the foresight to put Portable Antiquities Scheme photos under Creative Commons license without a no-commercial-use clause @DEJPett has made an absolutely huge contribution to Wikimedia Commons and the large number of Wikipedia articles that use PAS photos. @wikimediauk twitter.com/captain_primat…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 1 February 2018 at 15:29

Today's addition to my library: "Histoire générale des voyages, ou nouvelle collection de toutes les relations de voyages par mer et par terre" tome 25: Description de la Tartarie orientale et du Tibet (Paris, 1749), including a map of the Xia (Tangut) Empire

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 2 February 2018 at 22:56

The 1749 map of the Xia Empire is pretty accurate, and correctly positions Etzina (Khara-khoto) and Lake Subo. If Kozlov had this map he may not have found it so hard to find Khara-khoto.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 2 February 2018 at 23:15

In contrast, the Western Xia Topographic Map from the Ming dynasty is not very accurate or useful for getting anywhere (modern redrawing of 1895 version shown) — Khara-khoto is shown at the top left as 鎮燕軍黑水

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 2 February 2018 at 23:17

This is a rather poor image of the earliest surviving 1608 version of the Western Xia Topographic Map.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 2 February 2018 at 23:57

A Fragment of Tangut Geography babelstone.blogspot.co.uk/2013/04/a-frag… which includes my Index of Tangut Place Names

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 3 February 2018 at 00:14

That takes the amount of money taken by the Unicode Consortium for emoji sponsorship to over a quarter of a million dollars ($251,200) since the program started just over two years ago. twitter.com/unicode/status…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 3 February 2018 at 00:32

How to Apply for an Adopt-a-Character Grant unicode.org/consortium/app…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 3 February 2018 at 10:30

Rejected emoji proposals twitter.com/Informoji/stat…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 4 February 2018 at 22:28

I have just released the first version of my BabelStone Zanabazar font for the Zanabazar Square script introduced in Unicode 10.0 babelstone.co.uk/Fonts/Zanabaza…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 7 February 2018 at 19:35

"The man and woman emoji can now have various hair styles (red-haired, curly-haired, white-haired, and bald)" — but no brown hair or grey hair or straight hair or balding hair. Why? twitter.com/unicode/status…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

unicode.org/Public/emoji/1…

Wednesday, 7 February 2018 at 19:44

Why define inconsistent order of ZWJ and VS characters in Unicode ZWJ flag sequences?

Rainbow flag 🏳️‍🌈 = 🏳 VS16 ZWJ 🌈

Pirate flag 🏴‍☠️ = 🏴 ZWJ ☠ VS16

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 9 February 2018 at 17:00

The History of Unicode according to XKCD (Randall nailed it)

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 9 February 2018 at 17:07

... except that the bearded guy looks suspiciously like @mark_e_davis

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 10 February 2018 at 23:03

1911 photo by Maurice-Louis Branger of the Yuan dynasty "Cloud Platform" (1342-1345) at the Juyong Pass of the Great Wall near Beijing china-underground.com/2017/09/28/rar…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 10 February 2018 at 23:09

2011 photo by Andrew West of the Yuan dynasty "Cloud Platform" from the same spot babeldiary.blogspot.co.uk/2011/08/cloud-…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 17 February 2018 at 19:47

I've just released BabelStone Maritime, a colour font for International Maritime Signal flags babelstone.co.uk/Fonts/Maritime…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 19 February 2018 at 23:13

The search for emoji perfection ... in my opinion if you want a photo-perfect skateboard emoji then you're better off posting a photo of your skateboard rather than using an emoji. twitter.com/tonyhawk/statu…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 19 February 2018 at 23:37

42 Unicode 11 characters in the next version of my BabelStone Han font (releasing next month).

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 22 February 2018 at 14:49

"陈[受鸟](音shou)教授逝世讣告" news.nankai.edu.cn/zhxw/system/20… — awkward when you cannot write the name of a professor in an obituary notice (⿰受鸟 and ⿰受鳥 both not encoded) h/t @eisoch

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 26 February 2018 at 01:01

Proposal for Interracial Couple Emoji Sequences unicode.org/L2/L2018/18067… by @jenny8lee et al. — where race is defined by skin color alone, so no East Asian men or women are depicted; and even black people are just white people with skin and hair that are colored dark. #racistemoji

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 26 February 2018 at 09:53

Did I mention that I proposed 25 of these characters for encoding? (although 2 were fast-tracked to Unicode 11 on the basis of subsequent proposals by others)

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 26 February 2018 at 16:00

Now revised as "Proposal for Inter-Skintone Couple Emoji Sequences" unicode.org/L2/L2018/18067…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 27 February 2018 at 01:32

The next release of BabelStone Han will include some polychromatic glyphs for the first time, including Xiangqi game symbols (will fall back to black and white glyphs where colour fonts are not supported).

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 28 February 2018 at 12:19

I take @Unicode's commitment to helping digitally disadvantaged languages with a large pinch of salt. Last year @Evertype and myself were invited to help finalize the encoding of the Shuishu script (twitter.com/BabelStone/sta…)

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 28 February 2018 at 12:21

The agreed Shuishu repertoire was accepted for encoding by the SC2 meeting at Hohhot in September 2018, and this is the response of the Unicode Consortium via their surrogate the "US National Body":

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 28 February 2018 at 12:26

@Evertype and myself do not receive any Emoji money (over $250,000 to date) for our work in encoding various ancient and modern scripts. Maybe it's just my cynicism, but I suspect that Unicode would be more supportive of encoding Shuishu if it was sponsoring it from Emoji money.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 28 February 2018 at 12:40

WTF do the Unicode Consortium think we were all doing in that room in Hohhot, and in email exchanges over the months preceding the meeting? We and Shuishu experts have been working on Shuishu encoding since at least 2014, ...

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 28 February 2018 at 12:42

... and have had previous face-to-face meetings at SC2/WG2 meetings in Sri Lanka (2014) and Japan (2015). Unicode Consortium/USNB have done nothing to help, and everything to hinder.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 28 February 2018 at 12:49

In other news, yesterday I joined the Unicode Consortium as a lifetime individual member unicode.org/consortium/mem… ... mutters something incoherent about keeping your friends close and your enemies closer.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 28 February 2018 at 22:47

I believe that the Emoji Subcommittee operates on the same principal -- they shout various emoji suggestions at each other and occasionally the Shadowy Emoji Overlord shouts out Emojiwang. twitter.com/jpwarren/statu…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 28 February 2018 at 22:54

(Oh, fuck, I can't spell principle)

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

unicode.org/L2/L2018/18070…

Wednesday, 28 February 2018 at 23:06

Feedback now posted:

unicode.org/L2/L2018/18068…

tl;dr ... not Thai letters and need to make a proper proposal for them.

March

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 2 March 2018 at 01:22

BabelStone Han PUA now includes 4,500 unencoded characters. babelstone.co.uk/Fonts/PUA.html

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 2 March 2018 at 11:14

Read the whole thread! twitter.com/Random_Guy_32/…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 2 March 2018 at 23:45

Today I took a lunchtime walk around Reading in the light snow. First stop, the Maiwand Lion (1884) en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maiwand_L…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 2 March 2018 at 23:55

Oscar Wilde (1895-1897), with the walls of Reading Gaol on the left and the River Kennet on the right.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 2 March 2018 at 23:57

Another view of Oscar Wilde.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 3 March 2018 at 00:04

St James Church (1840) — unmistakably Pugin (with the remains of the north transept of Reading Abbey Church)

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 3 March 2018 at 00:07

Reading Abbey, founded by Henry I in 1121 (he is buried in the car park)

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 3 March 2018 at 00:20

Christchurch Bridge (2015) spanning the River Thames.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 3 March 2018 at 00:29

Angels on either side of the west entrance to St Laurence's Church, one with a freshly-broken wing.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 3 March 2018 at 00:40

Reading Station. I arrived at the station at 17:15 to catch the train home; but due to 2 cm of snow it took until 21:35 to reach Guildford, 10 miles from where I really wanted to go, and it was an hour later that I eventually got home by alternative means.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 3 March 2018 at 00:50

The old Reading Station building. Interesting factoid, my great great granduncle Henry West (after whom my great grandfather is named) fell to his doom from the top of Reading Station during construction in the Great Whirlwind on 24th March 1840.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 3 March 2018 at 01:12

Reading Gaol in the background.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 4 March 2018 at 09:50

Read by John Hines as þ[-]æflæd ᚦ[-]ᚫᚠᛚᚫᛞ, an uncertain female name. twitter.com/TRegistrars/st…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 5 March 2018 at 14:34

"... And there be many men and women the whiche cannot speake one worde of Englyshe but all Cornyshe." (c. 1542) twitter.com/CBarnacles/sta…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 5 March 2018 at 16:24

Retweeting for #StPirans day twitter.com/BabelStone/sta…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 5 March 2018 at 23:49

Towards a comprehensive proposal for Thai Noi / Lao Buhan script by @OhBendy unicode.org/L2/L2018/18072…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 11 March 2018 at 22:29

Gets my vote. If it wins then it will be the first Unicode Standard cover to feature anything relating to Unicode since v. 5.0 in 2006. The last two covers were abominations. twitter.com/OxC0FFEE/statu…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 14 March 2018 at 22:10

BabelStone Han v. 11.0.0 available now: it covers 48,296 characters, including 35,716 CJK unified ideographs; and has 44 new Unicode 11 characters babelstone.co.uk/Fonts/Han.html

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 17 March 2018 at 00:36

᚛ᚌᚑᚑᚌᚂᚓ

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 18 March 2018 at 12:30

Waverley Abbey this morning.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 18 March 2018 at 12:35

Cows and calves at Waveley Abbey.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 18 March 2018 at 18:09

This weekend I have been working on a prototype font for Khitan Small Script with automatic cluster formation babelstone.co.uk/Fonts/KSS_Test… (works on Windows 10)

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 22 March 2018 at 16:57

Proposal to add decomposition mappings for three Unicode Tibetan characters unicode.org/L2/L2018/18078… — unfortunately the author forgot to read the Unicode Stability Policy unicode.org/policies/stabi… which make the proposed changes impossible.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 22 March 2018 at 23:00

The document has now been rewritten and retitled, taking into account the stability policy, and so now proposes deprecating the three characters. (It seems unnecessary to me.)

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 23 March 2018 at 01:06

Top animal emoji requests on @Emojipedia for March 2018 are Flamingo, Sloth and Triceratops blog.emojipedia.org/top-emoji-requ… ... I will not be surprised to see them all in Unicode 12 next year.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 23 March 2018 at 19:06

Apple makes a proposal to encode 13 new accessibility emoji unicode.org/L2/L2018/18080…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 27 March 2018 at 11:43

Rejang numbers are rather interesting — proposal to encode them from @anshumanpandey_ unicode.org/L2/L2018/18081…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 27 March 2018 at 23:16

I really hope that S. I. Rudenko’s unpublished manuscript monograph on the "Dead City of the Ancient Tangut Empire" can finally be published! scfh.ru/en/papers/in-s…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 29 March 2018 at 13:01

Documents for Mongolian Working Group Meeting 2, 3-5 April 2018 unicode.org/~lisa/mongolia…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 29 March 2018 at 13:30

Hmm, I wonder what is wrong with "改进的蒙古⽂编码字形模型" ?!

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 31 March 2018 at 19:31

After a hiatus of more than 2 years I return to my blog with a post about a Jurchen inscription on the River Arkhara in Russia babelstone.blogspot.co.uk/2018/03/jurche…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 31 March 2018 at 22:08

Rabban Sawma was supposedly entertained by Tangut Christians in Shazhou (Dunhuang) on his way to Europe, but by 1280 the Tangut regime had long since been annihilated, and it is doubtful there were many Tanguts left in what had been the far western corner of the Tangut empire. twitter.com/caitlinrgreen/…

April

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 1 April 2018 at 11:56

Mirrored at babelstone.co.uk/Blog/2018/03/j… for anyone in China. Another Jurchen post planned for later this month.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 2 April 2018 at 18:50

Beta version of BabelPad supporting Unicode 11.0 (scheduled for release on 5 June 2018) is now available for download from babelstone.co.uk/Software/Babel…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 2 April 2018 at 18:50

Beta version of BabelMap supporting Unicode 11.0 (scheduled for release on 5 June 2018) is now available for download from babelstone.co.uk/Software/Babel…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 2 April 2018 at 21:51

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 2 April 2018 at 23:29

Tangut Yinchuan font updated for five additional Tangut ideographs added in Unicode v. 11.0 babelstone.co.uk/Fonts/Yinchuan…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 3 April 2018 at 09:45

Today I learned from @Umihotarus that U+2CF01 𬼁 and U+2CF04 𬼄 in CJK Ext. F are kanji versions of U+0292 ʒ "dram" and U+2125 ℥ "ounce" respectively.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 3 April 2018 at 09:47

And that ⿰氵𬼁 "fluid dram" and ⿰氵𬼄 "fluid ounce" are not yet encoded. (Picture from dnp.co.jp/shueitai/konet…)

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 5 April 2018 at 08:11

9 unencoded CJK ideographs in the New Standard Telegraph Codebook (Hong Kong, 1972) unicode.org/L2/L2018/18097…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 7 April 2018 at 17:10

I've just released BabelStone Han v. 11.0.1 babelstone.co.uk/Fonts/Han.html, now with more than 36,000 CJK unified ideographs and 67 Unicode 11.0 characters.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 7 April 2018 at 18:22

Currently my main task is to complete coverage of CJK Ext. E characters submitted by China, but most of the 1,410 characters sourced to 《殷周金文集成引得》 are complex and time-consuming to create glyphs for — 656 left to do.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 7 April 2018 at 18:45

In the background I am preparing for CJK Ext. G likely to be in Unicode 13 (2020). I have completed 1,890 glyphs already, but still have 2,017 China-submitted characters left to do!

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 7 April 2018 at 18:49

(I might just do 18 Ext. G characters right now, just so that my to do list is under 2,000.)

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 9 April 2018 at 22:11

Mongolian Working Group Meeting 2 Report unicode.org/L2/L2018/18108… — it does not feel like there was much real progress, other then the abandonment of the brave attempt to radically reform the broken Mongolian encoding model.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 12 April 2018 at 09:15

A few months ago I mentioned that I did not know what had become of three of the six Tangut volumes found discarded at Miaoying Temple in 1900 by Morisse and Berteaux babeldiary.blogspot.co.uk/2017/09/beijin… — now I know! twitter.com/MongolsSilkRoa…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 12 April 2018 at 22:25

Recent emoji proposals (1/2):

Auto Rickshaw unicode.org/L2/L2018/18086…

Stitting & Standing unicode.org/L2/L2018/18091…

Ballet unicode.org/L2/L2018/18113…

Iceberg unicode.org/L2/L2018/18111…

Blood Drop unicode.org/L2/L2018/18092…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 12 April 2018 at 22:25

Recent emoji proposals (2/2):

Otter unicode.org/L2/L2018/18093…

Flamingo unicode.org/L2/L2018/18098…

Waffle unicode.org/L2/L2018/18087…

Butter unicode.org/L2/L2018/18112…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 13 April 2018 at 11:55

Looks like a squirrel emoji to me ... twitter.com/_xxyy/status/9…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 15 April 2018 at 20:54

Today I explore the discovery, loss and rediscovery of a golden Tangut manuscript babelstone.blogspot.co.uk/2018/04/redisc…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 15 April 2018 at 20:56

And for my friends in China the post is mirrored at babelstone.co.uk/Blog/2018/04/r…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 16 April 2018 at 22:55

Discussion of Cluster Formation Model for Khitan Small Script unicode.org/L2/L2018/18121…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 18 April 2018 at 19:36

Recent emoji proposals (3/2):

Banjo unicode.org/L2/L2018/18124…

Oyster unicode.org/L2/L2018/18123…

Falafel unicode.org/L2/L2018/18125…

Juice unicode.org/L2/L2018/18130…

Yo-yo unicode.org/L2/L2018/18129…

Ringed planet unicode.org/L2/L2018/18127…

Skunk unicode.org/L2/L2018/18128…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 19 April 2018 at 09:56

Unicode Technical Committee docs with "emoji" in file name:

2006: 0/407

2007: 1/423

2008: 5/431

2009: 9/425

2010: 5/476

2011: 5/451

2012: 3/391

2013: 1/243

2014: 15/304

2015: 30/343

2016: 55/385

2017: 72/442

2018: 32/131

Somebody please extrapolate the emoji singularity for me.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 19 April 2018 at 12:25

Nie Hongyin and Sun Bojun's review of Gerard Clauson's Skeleton Tangut (Hsi Hsia) Dictionary (Evertype, 2016. ISBN 978-1-78201-167-5) in Tangut Research 2018.01 en.cnki.com.cn/Journal_en/F-F…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Previous in Thread | Next in Thread 1 | Next in Thread 2

Thursday, 19 April 2018 at 13:49

Today's quote from the Shadowy Emoji Overlord (aka President of the Unicode Consortium): "Emoji are a relatively small part of the work of the consortium, and should remain that way". unicode.org/mail-arch/unic…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 19 April 2018 at 14:07

The agenda for the last Unicode Technical Committee meeting (#UTC154) unicode.org/L2/L2018/18006… throws doubt on the assertion that "Emoji are a relatively small part of the work of the consortium".

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 19 April 2018 at 15:10

Revised draft for extended Egyptian Hieroglyphs repertoire now has 6,324 additional Egyptian Hieroglyphs (1,820 more than previous draft) unicode.org/wg2/docs/n4944… @Evertype @FakeUnicode

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 19 April 2018 at 23:03

All vulgar fractions from 1/32 to 31/32, nice! twitter.com/FakeUnicode/st…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 25 April 2018 at 20:28

Recent emoji proposals (4/2):

Kite unicode.org/L2/L2018/18135…

Pinch unicode.org/L2/L2018/18139…

Orangutan unicode.org/L2/L2018/18137…

Stethoscope unicode.org/L2/L2018/18140…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 25 April 2018 at 20:48

Lot's of feedback on the proposed accessibility emoji unicode.org/L2/L2018/18138…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 26 April 2018 at 21:17

+ Sari emoji unicode.org/L2/L2018/18144…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 26 April 2018 at 22:50

Paper by Wang Rongfei on a newly-identified woodblock printed edition of the Tangut 1,000-character "Grains of Gold" 《𗵒𗭭𘃎𘐏𘝞》 (《碎金置掌文》) academia.edu/36507920 (important as the only known printed edition, all other versions being manuscript copies)

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 26 April 2018 at 22:55

My blog post on the many Tangut "Grains of Gold" fragments held at the British Library babelstone.co.uk/Blog/2015/05/t…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 27 April 2018 at 15:31

+ adhesive bandage emoji unicode.org/L2/L2018/18146…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 27 April 2018 at 21:35

Now it's just getting ridiculous:

+ one-piece swimsuit emoji unicode.org/L2/L2018/18166…

+ briefs and shorts emoji unicode.org/L2/L2018/18167…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 27 April 2018 at 21:44

Really shit proposal from Emoji Subcommittee to specify color of emoji by putting a red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple, black, white, or brown circle immediately after an emoji (i.e. no zwj between), e.g. 🐻○ = polar bear unicode.org/L2/L2018/18141…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 28 April 2018 at 07:56

Latest Emoji Subcommittee recommendations unicode.org/L2/L2018/18143…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 28 April 2018 at 07:57

Encode a skunk emoji, but because it may be confused with badger emoji, recommend that badger is depicted with brown fur.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 28 April 2018 at 07:59

Yes to ballet shoes, but no to male and female ballet dancers because it's too much trouble to have any more emoji depicting human skin.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 28 April 2018 at 08:05

Juice emoji accepted, but renamed as "beverage box" (emoji shown is not easy to identify at emoji size) — presumably there will be a need for a "freshly-squeezed juice" emoji as well.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 28 April 2018 at 08:08

Iceberg accepted, but changed to ice cube for use in drinks. Totally unrelated to the original proposal (unicode.org/L2/L2018/18111…) so ESC are just using it as a hook to hang their own preferred emoji on.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 28 April 2018 at 08:13

Sitting emoji accepted but as an empty chair, so that it can be used in ZWJ sequences such as "moderately-dark-skinned female firefighter with red hair sitting down while waiting for a call out" emoji.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 28 April 2018 at 08:16

One-piece bathing suit recommended — we already have swimmer 🏊 to represent swimming and bikini 👙 to represent sunbathing, so what is the use case for one-piece bathing suit?

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 28 April 2018 at 08:19

Shorts emoji and briefs emoji both recommended, but why on earth are either needed? The ESC is neutral on the stethoscope emoji which seems far more useful to me.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 28 April 2018 at 08:23

Finally, Yellow, Orange, Green, Purple and Brown circles for use in their bonkers scheme for specifying emoji colour twitter.com/BabelStone/sta…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 28 April 2018 at 10:16

Overheard somewhere this morning from someone influential in the Unicode Technical Committee: "UTC meetings ... completely consumed ... nowadays ... by emoji".

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 29 April 2018 at 08:17

Agenda for #UTC155 starting tomorrow posted unicode.org/L2/L2018/18114… — you see, "Emoji are a relatively small part of the work of the [Unicode] consortium"

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 29 April 2018 at 18:14

BabelStone Han PUA is now available in WOFF2 format, almost half the size of the WOFF file babelstone.co.uk/Fonts/PUA.html

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 30 April 2018 at 19:46

(Of course I should have said that the paper is by Prof. Jing Yongshi and Wang Rongfei.)

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 30 April 2018 at 19:59

Proposal by @mexamexo8 to encode a set of Shogi game pieces unicode.org/L2/L2018/18170… — the main problem is that there is very little evidence they are required as most Shogi books use plain kanji in game diagrams.

May

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 1 May 2018 at 10:56

Emoji colors proposal updated to exclude the cunning mechanism for showing any RGB color by zwj-ing sequences of primary color circles unicode.org/L2/L2018/18141…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 1 May 2018 at 13:12

Preliminary proposal to encode Old Uyghur in Unicode by @anshumanpandey_ unicode.org/L2/L2018/18126… — I am very much looking forward to Old Uyghur being encoded, and welcome this proposal!

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 1 May 2018 at 20:57

Emoji colors proposal revised yet again, this time to propose 14 new colored squares, circles and hearts to make emoji squares, circles and hearts each available in nine colors. No explanation why Squares, Circles and Hearts needed in nine colors. unicode.org/L2/L2018/18141…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 1 May 2018 at 23:39

New url: unicode.org/L2/L2018/18126…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 2 May 2018 at 09:18

So it seems that the proposed colored circles, squares and hearts are intended for use as visible emoji "adjectives", and not as swatches which will change the color of an emoji. But they leave open the possibility of using the color squares as colorizing swatches in the future.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 2 May 2018 at 21:45

Just stumbled upon this fine "Illustration of sportsmans knife containing 80 blades from the Official descriptive and illustrated catalogue of the Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nations, 1851" at @ExploreWellcome wellcomecollection.org/works/yhvvcx55

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 2 May 2018 at 21:47

In Manchu imprinted with imperial seal engraved ᡥᡝᠰᡝ ᠸᠠᠰᡳᠮᠪᡠᡵᡝ ᠪᠣᠣᠪᠠᡳ (hese wasimbure boobai) and 制誥之寶 ("precious imperial decree").

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 2 May 2018 at 21:53

Compare Seal #14 in the 1932 postcard set of 100 Precious Seals of the Qing Dynasty babelstone.co.uk/Manchu/Qingdai… which has the same text but the Manchu is written in seal script (postcards kindly given to me by @thg250)

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 2 May 2018 at 22:00

If anyone (@ken_lunde) is interested in the real "sportsman's knife containing eighty blades and other instruments" here it is iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/L0050382…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 3 May 2018 at 11:31

Buddhist Kanjur in Manchu at @ExploreWellcome wellcomecollection.org/works/qcarhzrt

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 3 May 2018 at 13:21

Illustrations of plants and animals for a Tibetan materia medica at @ExploreWellcome wellcomecollection.org/works/a59n273r

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 3 May 2018 at 13:23

Three leaves from a Tibetan musical score used in Buddhist monastic ritual with the notation for voice, drums, trumpets, horns and cymbals at @ExploreWellcome wellcomecollection.org/works/kt847fcq

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 3 May 2018 at 13:32

All leaves are available at wellcomecollection.org/works?query=%2…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 3 May 2018 at 13:37

I'm not entirely sure that this style of Tibetan musical notation can be represented in Unicode.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 3 May 2018 at 14:33

Glazed tile pagoda (琉璃塔) at Beijing's Fragrant Hills (香山) photographed by John Thomson in 1871 (91 years after it was built), in collection of @ExploreWellcome wellcomecollection.org/works/zd22j6y6

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 3 May 2018 at 18:13

Photograph of two pagodas in China, circa 1860, in collection of @ExploreWellcome wellcomecollection.org/works/p4ymu8s6 — 7 and 13 storey stone octagonal pagodas, probably Jin or Liao, possibly two of the pagodas at Silver Mountain (銀山塔林) north of Beijing?

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 3 May 2018 at 18:26

Illustrated description of the Porcelain Tower of Nanjing after its restoration in 1808, in collection of @ExploreWellcome wellcomecollection.org/works/t3eejdy6

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 3 May 2018 at 18:33

The tower was destroyed in 1856 during the Taiping Rebellion. Here is an 1871 photograph by John Thomson of its bronze top wellcomecollection.org/works/hetfphut

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 3 May 2018 at 19:58

Tibetan stupa drawing on back of a thangka painting in collection of @ExploreWellcome wellcomecollection.org/works/vraxpypm (image is mirrored for some reason) : om̐ āh hūṃ ཨོཾ ཨཱཿ ཧཱུཾ repeated in Rañjanā and Tibetan scripts.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 4 May 2018 at 21:12

Charles Bawden was head of department when I started at SOAS in 1983, but unfortunately I only met with him once, and he left in 1984 before I had a chance to study Mongolian with him. twitter.com/BuuralG/status…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 5 May 2018 at 17:03

"Confidentiality of meeting discussions" was inserted in the Technical Committee Procedures for the Unicode Consortium (unicode.org/consortium/tc-…) in January 2017; before then some people were known to live-tweet UTC meeting decisions. Now information is strictly controlled ...

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 5 May 2018 at 17:07

... the procedures do allow for the application of the "Chatham House Rule" (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chatham_H…), but has it ever been invoked at UTC? I think UTC meetings should be held under the Chatham House Rule as a matter of course. UTC secrecy only harms the reputation of the UTC.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 6 May 2018 at 08:24

Here are the other sides of the three sheets, including the title page wellcomecollection.org/works/t6ug7ndr

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 6 May 2018 at 23:02

Four footprints, two languages, one tile by @Katherine_McDon katherinemcdonald.net/2016/01/14/fou…

Two languages, two scripts, two writing directions:

𐌇𐌍 𐌔𐌀𐌕𐌕𐌉𐌉𐌄𐌝𐌔 𐌃𐌄𐌕𐌚𐌓𐌉 𐌔𐌄𐌂𐌀𐌍𐌀𐌕𐌕𐌄𐌃 𐌐𐌋𐌀𐌅𐌕𐌀𐌃

HERENNEIS AMICA SIGNAVIT QANDO APONEBAMVS TEGILA

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 8 May 2018 at 21:55

Recent emoji proposals (5/2):

Saw unicode.org/L2/L2018/18178…

Screwdriver unicode.org/L2/L2018/18179…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 9 May 2018 at 11:58

Justification for encoding new emoji is largely based on popularity of the corresponding English word, which I think is ridiculous. Because #screwdriver is a popular hashtag, does this mean if screwdriver emoji is encoded everyone will change to use #{screwdriver emoji} instead? twitter.com/jgerity/status…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

unicode.org/L2/L2018/18125…

Friday, 11 May 2018 at 13:37

Falafel proposal: Give us an unambiguously vegetarian food emoji that is not just fruit and vegetables!

Emoji Subcommittee: Right, meatballs it is.

unicode.org/emoji/future/e…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 11 May 2018 at 13:41

Don't even ask me what they are thinking about waffle.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 13 May 2018 at 08:58

Fantasy proposal by Norbert Lindenberg to replace the Japanese writing system with a new Hangul-based script called Niji norbertlindenberg.com/2018/03/niji-s…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 14 May 2018 at 21:18

Proposal to encode the Assamese script by the Bureau of Indian Standards unicode.org/L2/L2018/18181… i.e. disunify the Assamese alphabet from the Bengali alphabet — this could be interesting.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 15 May 2018 at 13:56

Japan has just submitted a "Proposal to start the development of CJK Regional Supplementary Ideographs and terminate the development of CJK Unified Ideographs" appsrv.cse.cuhk.edu.hk/~irg/irg/irg50… (it's a really bad idea btw)

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 15 May 2018 at 15:01

"the Japan NB has been very concerned about the proliferation of variant characters" ... ironic when Japan is the worst offender, with most of the 1,646 Japanese characters in CJK Ext. F being trivial variants.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 15 May 2018 at 15:12

"the Japan NB has been very concerned about the proliferation of ... rarely used ancient/academic characters in CJK Unified Ideographs extensions" — the characters complained about are actually of great importance to scholars studying ancient (bronze, silk, bamboo) texts.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 15 May 2018 at 15:13

Japan equally dislikes (and tries to obstruct) the encoding of new simplified Chinese characters. Japan basically has an "I don't like it" attitude to all non-Japanese characters, but at the same time gets very angry at anyone who questions any of their submissions.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 17 May 2018 at 19:44

The authors of the proposal obviously failed to notice that the BMP only has two free contiguous ranges (48 at 0870..089F and 16 at 2FE0..2FEF), and 0870..089F are pre-assigned for RTL characters, so the demand for BMP allocation of 104 contiguous characters is impossible.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 23 May 2018 at 20:00

Revised discussion of our proposed Cluster Formation Model for Khitan Small Script with @cosmicore and @Evertype unicode.org/L2/L2018/18121…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 25 May 2018 at 13:42

It is interesting that the Unicode Consortium recognizes "Taiwan (ROC)" as having equal status with "China (PRC)" — bravely bucking the current trend!

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 25 May 2018 at 18:15

Actually the Google Maps view showing just the north fence and watchtowers looking over an otherwise invisible detention facility is more interesting to me. google.com/maps/place/43%… twitter.com/shawnwzhang/st…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 25 May 2018 at 18:16

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 27 May 2018 at 15:44

The Unicode Consortium is worried about people representing the "pistol" emoji facing the wrong direction (but apparently not whether it is a gun or a water pistol) unicode.org/reports/tr51/ h/t Ivan Panchenko on Unicode public mailing list

June

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 1 June 2018 at 12:47

Comments on Emoji 12.0 Candidates by @Random_Guy_32 unicode.org/L2/L2018/18191… — I strongly agree with their comments on Coloured Squares and Circles, Stethoscope, Ice Cube, and Service Animal Vest.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 2 June 2018 at 13:29

Just received my signed copy of Словари кяхтинского пиджина [Dictionaries of Kyakhta Pidgin] by Profs. Irina F. Popova and Takata Tokio orientalstudies.ru/rus/index.php?… for which I provided the Chinese font covering some rare and as yet unencoded Han ideographs.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 2 June 2018 at 13:30

Abstract, Contents and Introduction available as PDF at orientalstudies.ru/rus/images/pdf…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 2 June 2018 at 13:37

Here is an example of one of the unencoded characters on p. 71 and p. 446: 猞{⿰犭立}猻 (@eisoch)

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 4 June 2018 at 15:30

"Analysis of Shuishu character repertoire" unicode.org/L2/L2018/18193… with @eisoch

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 4 June 2018 at 21:54

Four of the Shuishu scan fonts used in this document are now freely available for download from babelstone.co.uk/Fonts/Shuishu.…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

babelstone.co.uk/Fonts/Shuishu.…

Monday, 4 June 2018 at 22:00

PUA scan fonts for Shuishu 水书 and Naxi Dongba 纳西东巴文 scripts that are not yet encoded in Unicode:

babelstone.co.uk/Fonts/Naxi.html

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 6 June 2018 at 00:25

BabelMap Online updated for Unicode 11.0 babelstone.co.uk/Unicode/babelm…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 6 June 2018 at 00:33

BabelMap Online en français mis à jour pour Unicode 10.0 babelstone.co.uk/Unicode/babelm…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 6 June 2018 at 11:27

Translation by Ma Xiaofang 麻晓芳 of a paper based on my blog post Preliminary Analysis of a Newly-Discovered Tangut Wordbook babelstone.co.uk/Blog/2015/08/p… has just been published as 新见西夏字书初探 in 《西夏研究》2018年02期 cnki.com.cn/Journal/F-F4-X…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 8 June 2018 at 08:21

Recent emoji proposals (6/2):

Ninja Emoji unicode.org/L2/L2018/18197…

Feather Emoji unicode.org/L2/L2018/18200…

Camouflage Helmet Emoji unicode.org/L2/L2018/18199…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 9 June 2018 at 14:29

BabelStone Shapes is a new font covering geometric shapes, arrows and stuff, including the half stars recently encoded in #Unicode11 babelstone.co.uk/Fonts/Shapes.h…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 9 June 2018 at 14:34

BabelStone Xiangqi is a new font covering the Xiangqi 象棋 (Chinese chess) game symbols recently encoded in #Unicode11 babelstone.co.uk/Fonts/Xiangqi.… — it comes in black & white and colour versions

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 9 June 2018 at 14:37

BabelStone Mayan Numerals is a new font covering the twenty Mayan numerals recently encoded in #Unicode11 babelstone.co.uk/Fonts/Mayan.ht…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 13 June 2018 at 11:08

Comments by UTC experts on Khitan Small Script clustering model unicode.org/wg2/docs/n4977…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 13 June 2018 at 11:09

This is in response to the proposed Khitan Small Script clustering model documented in unicode.org/wg2/docs/n4943… by myself and @Evertype and @cosmicore

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 13 June 2018 at 11:13

Test page for my prototype Khitan Small Script font which works just fine using existing OpenType features is here: babelstone.co.uk/Fonts/KSS_Test…

Three prototype KSS fonts can be downloaded for testing from babelstone.co.uk/Khitan/Prototy…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Previous in Thread | Next in Thread 1 | Next in Thread 2

Wednesday, 13 June 2018 at 11:15

"Use of space to separate clusters would be a new model ..."

I simply cannot understand this statement at all. Spaces separate words in most scripts, and spaces are required in KSS whatever clustering model. There is no added complexity or burden on implementers.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 13 June 2018 at 11:16

"Editing is not ideal ..."

Editing behaviour is defined at the application level, and should not depend upon the encoding model.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 13 June 2018 at 11:16

"Model requires OpenType features that are not yet supported."

My prototype font works fine with existing OT features, and @d_s_corbett has demonstrated that new OT features are not required for dynamic clustering. twitter.com/d_s_corbett/st…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 13 June 2018 at 11:57

And anyway, space characters do not have any special function in our model. KSS clusters are typically separated by whitespace, but could be punctuation marks or 💩 ... what is on either side of a KSS cluster should be irrelevant to the font and the rendering engine.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 13 June 2018 at 12:12

A Letter from Shui Community (Shuishu Users) in China: 关于水书国际编码提案研究情况的说明 unicode.org/wg2/docs/n4981…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 13 June 2018 at 12:13

I originally supported the Chinese proposal, but after spending considerable time on an analysis of the Shuishu repertoire unicode.org/wg2/docs/n4956… with @eisoch I believe that the current repertoire does need to be improved before Shuishu can be encoded.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 14 June 2018 at 11:24

Michel Suignard presenting the current state of the project to encode extended Egyptian Hieroglyphs in Unicode at UCL London

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 14 June 2018 at 14:58

Classification of Hieratic signs presented by Svenja Gülden of the Altägyptische Kursivschriften project

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 14 June 2018 at 15:27

A new Hieroglyphic font created in collaboration with Montpellier 3 University presented by Pierre Fournier

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 15 June 2018 at 12:42

Day 2 of the Unicode Egyptian Hieroglyphs meeting at UCL — contemplating making an auto-icon of myself.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 15 June 2018 at 21:03

Shabti on display at the Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology at UCL, where most of the participants at the Meeting on Egyptian Hieroglyphs in Unicode went after the two-meeting finished early this afternoon.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 15 June 2018 at 23:09

I'll be there, along with @Evertype -- it should be an interesting meeting! twitter.com/ken_lunde/stat…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 18 June 2018 at 11:51

At #WG2_67 at SOAS London discussing #emoji with @Evertype 🦕 and @jeremyburge 🦘

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 18 June 2018 at 11:55

Why no submarine emoji? @jeremyburge #WG2_67

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 19 June 2018 at 09:57

Lively exchange of opinions during discussion of the proposal to disunify Assamese from Bengali (unicode.org/wg2/docs/n4947…) on Day 2 of #WG2_67 at SOAS London — Mahendra Kumar Yadava speaking.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 19 June 2018 at 15:14

At #WG2_67 today I presented proposals for additional characters for Gongche Notation (unicode.org/wg2/docs/n4967…), Zanabazar Square (unicode.org/wg2/docs/n4945…), and Tangut Components (unicode.org/wg2/docs/n4957…). @eisoch @JerryYou517

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 20 June 2018 at 10:56

At #WG2_67 this morning I presented for an hour on the Cluster Formation Model for Khitan Small Script (unicode.org/wg2/docs/n4943…) ... interesting exchange of opinions @cosmicore

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 20 June 2018 at 14:30

Most of #WG2_67 today spent discussing various CJK matters, including the Japanese "Proposal to start the development of CJK Regional Supplementary Ideographs and terminate the development of CJK Unified Ideographs" (unicode.org/wg2/docs/n4948…) 🦃🦃🦃

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 21 June 2018 at 09:22

We discussed Khitan Small Script from 17:00 to 18:00 yesterday at #WG2_67 (after spending an hour discussing it first thing that morning) — here is me trying to explain something.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 21 June 2018 at 10:05

At #WG2_67 this morning we discussed contributions on Sui script (Shuishu) by Suzuki Toshiya (unicode.org/wg2/docs/n4942… and unicode.org/wg2/docs/n4946…) as well as the big document by myself and @eisoch (unicode.org/wg2/docs/n4956…).

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 21 June 2018 at 10:07

The letter from Chinese Shuishu experts (unicode.org/wg2/docs/n4981…) was noted, but it did not provide a way of progressing the encoding of Sui script. A completely new proposal is required.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 21 June 2018 at 14:00

#WG2_67 at SOAS University of London finished early this afternoon, but SC2 will convene tomorrow morning for resolutions. Here is a group photo taken on Wednesday morning.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 22 June 2018 at 08:56

Final day of #WG2_67 at the Ministry of Truth #󠇯1984

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 22 June 2018 at 12:50

Proposal for an emoji sequence of "light bulb" 💡 emoji and "house" 🏠 emoji to form "lighthouse" emoji unicode.org/L2/L2018/18204… — this is a very bad idea as light + house is a rebus that works only in English, and makes no sense to speakers of most other languages.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 22 June 2018 at 12:52

Lighthouse would be a good emoji (compared with most of the current candidates for Unicode 12.0), but it should be encoded as an atomic character.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 22 June 2018 at 13:03

Dodo emoji anyone? twitter.com/NLNatArchief/s…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 22 June 2018 at 19:36

After #WG2_67 finished for the week at 15:00 today, @Evertype and myself went to the nearby British Library to look at medieval Cornish manuscripts.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 23 June 2018 at 00:06

Mary's writing practice on the back of a page in a 1571 book of sample writing hands, including "abcdefghiklmnopqrstuwxyz" in Thomas Shelton's 1650 Zeiglographia shorthand system (a few small errors: i is inverted, w is mirrored, and x & y are swapped). @Evertype

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 23 June 2018 at 00:15

The four and twenty zeiglographic letters in a 1659 edition of Thomas Shelton's "Zeiglographia, or A New art of Short-writing never before published".

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 23 June 2018 at 11:39

Sample of lettre frizée calligraphy in a 1571 manual of handwriting.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 24 June 2018 at 20:23

I spent all day at Cambridge today — beautiful sunny day, but I spent most of the time coding a new feature for BabelPad (which was incidental to me being at Cambridge)

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 24 June 2018 at 21:00

Recommendations from last week's #WG2_67 (which I attended as "expert from UK") unicode.org/wg2/docs/n4954…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 24 June 2018 at 21:12

Repertoire for the final draft of ISO/IEC 10646 (5th ed.) Amendment 1 (FDAM1): 911 characters corresponding to content already added to Unicode 11.0 unicode.org/wg2/docs/n5005…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 24 June 2018 at 21:13

Repertoire for the draft of ISO/IEC 10646 (5th ed.) Amendment 2 (DAM2): 609 characters corresponding to some content already added to Unicode 11.0 as well as some new content for Unicode 12.0 unicode.org/wg2/docs/n5000…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 24 June 2018 at 21:14

Repertoire for the committee draft (CD) of ISO/IEC 10646 (6th ed.): 5,738 characters including CJK Ext. G, mostly corresponding to content targeted for Unicode 13.0 (but some will be fast-tracked to Unicode 12.0) unicode.org/wg2/docs/n5006…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 24 June 2018 at 21:46

CJK Unified Ideographs Supplement (32 code points) is squeezed between CJK Exts. B and C — the Platform 9¾ of CJK encoding. The seven characters in this block proposed by @eisoch and @JerryYou517 are in BabelStone Han PUA at F1D3..F1D9.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 24 June 2018 at 21:54

Some of the emoji accepted for encoding at last week's #WG2_67 meeting, including Dodo, Mammoth and Troll ... @Informoji @FakeUnicode

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 24 June 2018 at 21:57

... oddly the expert from UK abstained on encoding these emoji, whereas the experts from the Unicode Consortium and US voted for them. twitter.com/BabelStone/sta…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 25 June 2018 at 20:54

How not to write a Unicode proposal unicode.org/L2/L2018/18206… — this demand for 1120 more superscripts, subscripts and small capitals is not a well-formed proposal and will simply be thrown out without consideration.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 27 June 2018 at 14:37

Could an emoji save your life? by @maryhalton bbc.co.uk/news/science-e… "Unicode are currently considering Emerji's flood and earthquake designs" — I can find no evidence that that is the case ... probably lost in Emoji Subcommittee limbo.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 28 June 2018 at 18:49

Resolutions of the 23rd ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 2 Plenary Meeting, London, UK, 2018-06-18/22 isotc.iso.org/livelink/livel…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 29 June 2018 at 20:10

Need to complete Unicode encoding of Egyptian hieroglyphs used on the Rosetta Stone was mentioned at the Egyptian Hieroglyphs in Unicode meeting at UCL 2 weeks ago. I think it should be a priority. @Evertype twitter.com/Eleanor_Robson…

July

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 2 July 2018 at 11:36

Unravelling an archaeological silk bundle blogs.bl.uk/collectioncare… — revealing a date in Chinese characters: 嘉定七年 = 7th year of the Jiading era (of Emperor Ningzong of Southern Song) = 1214

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 3 July 2018 at 12:04

Early 15th century Russian written in Uighur script! "Thus the note seems to be the earliest text in Russian transcribed in characters other than Cyrillic, preceding those in Greek and Latin characters for centuries." elibrary.ru/item.asp?id=25… twitter.com/dmatsui1217/st…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 6 July 2018 at 21:53

Boy discovers mammoth bone pendant with Old Turkic (Orkhon) inscription in Yakutia siberiantimes.com/science/others…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 6 July 2018 at 21:56

The inscription is relatively clear but frustratingly difficult to make sense out of. The top word is probably :𐰇𐰲 üč "three", and the bottom word is :𐰉𐰆𐰞 bol "to be, to become", but the middle two words are not obvious to me.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 6 July 2018 at 21:58

In particular the second word has a back vowel o/u 𐰆 between two front consonants ök 𐰜 and äb 𐰋 which should not occur.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 7 July 2018 at 19:07

Ditto for Tangut! twitter.com/tkasasagi/stat…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 9 July 2018 at 12:41

Love the hype: "The most important Chinese manuscript ever to have appeared at auction" — a late copy of an often-copied Buddhist manuscript has little intrinsic importance, whether written in ink, gold or blood. twitter.com/incunabula/sta…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 9 July 2018 at 12:50

The gold-inked Yuan dynasty Tangut Buddhist manuscript recently rediscovered in Poland babelstone.blogspot.com/2018/04/redisc… is much more interesting (and even important, dare I say) ... I just hope it never goes under the hammer.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 9 July 2018 at 22:17

My apologies for the late release of BabelMap for Unicode 11.0 babelstone.co.uk/Software/Babel…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 10 July 2018 at 19:06

Recent emoji proposals (7/2):

Inhaler emoji unicode.org/L2/L2018/18215…

Magic Wand emoji unicode.org/L2/L2018/18218…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 13 July 2018 at 14:35

I think that this article clearly demonstrates that emoji are fundamentally not ordinary Unicode characters. twitter.com/mark_e_davis/s…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 13 July 2018 at 14:43

List of all digitized Anglo-Saxon charters at the British Library blogs.bl.uk/files/list-of-…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 13 July 2018 at 19:41

To be brutally honest, I really like the cover of this one. twitter.com/unicode/status…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 15 July 2018 at 13:12

The index character 來 after the title is the 18th character of the Thousand Character Classic and indicates that this volume belongs in the 18th of 479 cases that the Chinese Buddhist canon was traditionally divided into. babelstone.co.uk/Tangut/Kaiyuan… twitter.com/incunabula/sta…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 17 July 2018 at 00:19

At the very least it is misleading to state that emoji adoption money supports "digitally disadvantaged languages". What it actually supports is encoding long extinct scripts used mostly by a small number of scholars. twitter.com/unicode/status…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 17 July 2018 at 00:25

I'm all for encoding obscure historic scripts, but it is disingenuous to pretend that the money raised from emoji adoption is used for "digitally disadvantaged languages", which most people would assume refers to minority or endangered languages actually spoken by living people.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 17 July 2018 at 18:15

Proposal for Deaf Woman and Deaf Man emoji sequences unicode.org/L2/L2018/18229… — what about deaf girl and boy? and deaf gender-neutral adult/child? or even deaf red-haired persons?

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 17 July 2018 at 18:33

Defining a complex sequence containing three different body parts that may each take a different skin tone modifier seems to me to be a recipe for disaster.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 17 July 2018 at 18:52

More emoji documents coming soon in readiness for next week's UTC meeting. Obviously nothing here to suggest that the UTC will be dominated by emoji issues. unicode.org/L2/L-curdoc.htm

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 18 July 2018 at 10:21

'brog mi phyag rgya འབྲོག་མི་ཕྱག་རྒྱ = "seal of the nomad". Is "Nomad" here the name of the Tibetan scholar-traveller 'Brog-mi (992-1072)? twitter.com/idp_uk/status/…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 18 July 2018 at 11:38

Revised proposal for Inter-Skintone Couple Emoji Sequences unicode.org/L2/L2018/18228…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 18 July 2018 at 11:45

Frisian flag Emoji Submission unicode.org/L2/L2018/18233… — already representable as NL-FR flag tag sequence 1F3F4 E006E E006C E0066 E0072 E007F {🏴󠁮󠁬󠁦󠁲󠁿} but not currently recommended for general interchange (RGI) so not supported by vendors.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 18 July 2018 at 11:53

Draft proposal to add 330 new gender neutral emojis (55 gender neutral glyphs × 6 skintones) unicode.org/L2/L2018/18225…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 18 July 2018 at 11:55

In order to ensure cross-platform alignment of glyph forms I think -- the proposal is not very clear, and does not give any examples of the proposed gender neutral glyphs.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 18 July 2018 at 20:18

Just a reminder that the Unicode Square Japanese Era Name characters ㍾㍽㍼㍻ were encoded for compatibility only, and are not used in most calendar software, where the corresponding ordinary kanji are ordinarily used (W10 Japanese calendar shown using 平成 rather than ㍻) ...

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 18 July 2018 at 20:23

... so there really should be no need for the mad rush to encode a new Unicode Square Era Name compatibility character for the new Japanese Emperor's era in Unicode 12.1 as very few applications use them (and those that do may not be updated in a timely manner anyway).

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 18 July 2018 at 20:28

Sure, applications need to update to use the kanji for the new era name when it is announced (?? in the W10 Japanese calandar shown), but they mostly don't need any new Unicode character to be encoded. The whole Unicode frenzy over the new era name is rather unnecessary I think.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 18 July 2018 at 20:47

Three emoji-related documents from Mark Davis:

UTS #51: add skin-tone/gender info for groups unicode.org/L2/L2018/18223…

Emoji Skin-Tone Combinatorics unicode.org/L2/L2018/18226…

Unspecified-Gender Census unicode.org/L2/L2018/18227…

(tbh, I don't really understand any of them)

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 18 July 2018 at 22:19

Brief Report from London meeting of [Unicode] Egyptologists, 14-15 June 2018 at UCL unicode.org/L2/L2018/18237… (I was there with @Evertype and @r12a)

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 18 July 2018 at 22:21

Emoji Subcommittee recommendations for Emoji/Unicode 12.0 and Emoji/Unicode 13.0 unicode.org/L2/L2018/18222…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 19 July 2018 at 18:34

Proposal to encode the recently revived Yezidi script unicode.org/L2/L2018/18238…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 24 July 2018 at 11:00

Difficult to be excited about this one ... twitter.com/unicode/status…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 26 July 2018 at 22:27

Proposal for animal service vest emoji replaced by proposal for human safety vest -- more useful, recognizable and flexible; and can be zwj-ed with dog to make a service dog emoji. unicode.org/L2/L2018/18256…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 26 July 2018 at 23:27

Where did it all go so wrong? unicode.org/L2/L2018/18223…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 26 July 2018 at 23:41

And just a reminder, U+1F46F 👯 is actually named WOMAN WITH BUNNY EARS, and when originally encoded in 2010 it was depicted as a single woman with bunny ears in the official Unicode code charts. unicode.org/Public/6.0.0/c…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 27 July 2018 at 10:10

L2/17-067R2 Wancho @Evertype

L2/17-342 Cornish @Evertype

L2/18-164R2 Chorasmian @anshumanpandey_

L2/18-184 Symbol @mexamexo8

L2/18-194 Tangut @BabelStone

L2/18-221 Small Khitan @BabelStone @cosmicore @Evertype

L2/18-245 Gongche @eisoch @JerryYou517

L2/18-255 Bopomofo twitter.com/ken_lunde/stat…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 27 July 2018 at 11:08

If the Unicode Consortium enforced the singularity of the character, and Apple did not willfully disregard the consortium it is a member of, then it would all be a whole lot simpler.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 27 July 2018 at 17:50

᚛ᚆᚉᚐᚂᚂᚓᚉᚓᚂᚂᚐᚉᚆ twitter.com/eDIL_Dictionar…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 29 July 2018 at 11:47

"An inscribed travertine bowl has just flashed briefly on the internet, the image now gone, the find spot unknown." decipherment.wordpress.com/2018/07/07/if-…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 30 July 2018 at 09:11

That is some panther in an image from a 15th century ms in @BLMedieval's post on medieval pilgrimages (human and animal). blogs.bl.uk/digitisedmanus… Are panthers commonly depicted thus in medieval manuscripts?

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 30 July 2018 at 09:17

Got to love the MVSEVM BRITANNICVM stamp. You have to be a brave librarian to do that. (A Guide to British Library Bookstamps blogs.bl.uk/collectioncare…) twitter.com/BLMedieval/sta…

August

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 2 August 2018 at 12:26

Japanese postcard to Mrs Phelps, i.e. Rose Janet née Hutchinson, wife of John Jay Phelps (1861–1848) of Red Towers Hackensack NJ, found in a second-hand book purchased from the #Yale Co-op in 1995.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 2 August 2018 at 12:27

With a limerick to Mrs Phelps on the back:

This lady resides at Red Towers

Such is named after one of the flowers,

And that is the rose,

As everyone knows,

So she is the Rose of Red Towers.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 2 August 2018 at 18:59

Recent emoji proposals (8/2):

Pickup truck emoji unicode.org/L2/L2018/18260…

Potted plant emoji unicode.org/L2/L2018/18261…

Tissue box emoji unicode.org/L2/L2018/18262…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 2 August 2018 at 22:13

John Jay Phelps (1861–1948)

And is named after one of the flowers

I hate twitter

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 7 August 2018 at 19:16

Feather emoji unicode.org/L2/L2018/18265…

Grave emoji unicode.org/L2/L2018/18266…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 10 August 2018 at 17:42

Bodhisattva Mañjuśrī riding a lion on a Tangut silk painting from Khara-Khoto hermitagemuseum.org/wps/portal/her… #WorldLionDay

As is the case with so much Tangut vocabulary, the Tangut word for 'lion' 𘆅𗹛 ₂ka¹₂che³ is of unknown etymology (the 2nd element 𗹛 is a homophone of 𗗯 'dog').

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 11 August 2018 at 15:37

Contrary to China's anti-terrorism laws, three Uyghurs were found living in privately-rented accommodation in Henan and seditiously cooking Uyghur flat bread. Their landlord was fined and detained for 15 days; the Uyghurs were forcibly sent back to Xinjiang for "education". twitter.com/liuhu2017/stat…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 12 August 2018 at 13:32

Tangut clay elephant from inside one of the 108 stupas in Ningxia en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:108_… — possibly the base for a statue of the Bodhisattva Samantabhadra #WorldElephantDay

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 12 August 2018 at 13:38

There are five possible Tangut words for 'elephant' : 𗦵𘇇 ¹py₁ ²bu₄, 𘁔𗵚 ²rer₁ ¹bu₃, 𘁆𘁉 ²khan₄ ²ngwo₁, 𘁊𘁉 ²lhiq₄ ²ngwo₁, 𘑞𘁉 ²zon₁ ²ngwo₁, but like much of Tangut vocabulary we do not know what each of these words exactly mean.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 13 August 2018 at 21:04

First eleven letters of the Anglo-Saxon runic alphabet (ᚠᚢᚦᚩᚱᚳᚷᚹᚻᚾᛁ). twitter.com/liddyprosser/s…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 13 August 2018 at 21:06

The PAS record (finds.org.uk/database/artef…) reads the mostly missing letters at the 7th and 8th positions as the letter 'e' ᛖ (which is normally the 19th letter), but the three surviving strokes look like the remains of the expected letters 'g' ᚷ and 'w' ᚹ to me.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 13 August 2018 at 21:11

The PAS record gives the penultimate letter as 'g' ᚷ, but I think it is clearly the expected letter 'n' ᚾ. Thus the inscription reads f-u-þ-o-r-c-g-w-h-n-i ᚠᚢᚦᚩᚱᚳᚷᚹᚻᚾᛁ, the normal first eleven letters of the Anglo-Saxon runic alphabet or fuþorc.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 13 August 2018 at 21:19

Compare with the Malton runic pin held at the British Museum which is also engraved with eleven letters of the Anglo-Saxon runic alphabet, f-u-þ-o-r-c-g-l-a-æ-e ᚠᚢᚦᚩᚱᚳᚷᛚᚪᚫᛖ, but mistakenly with 'l' ᛚ for 'w' ᚹ, and three vowels after the first eight runic letters.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 14 August 2018 at 09:36

ON BM Add. MS 47967 f. 1 are neatly written the Anglo-Saxon runes y-r-þ-e-r-o-ng-t-ng-æ-o-n-ḡ-o-n-ḡ ᚣᚱᚦᛖᚱᚩᛝᛏᛝᚫᚩᚾᚸᚩᚾᚸ incongruously annotated as a-b-c-d-e-f-g-h-i-l-m-n-o-p-r-s. bl.uk/catalogues/ill…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 14 August 2018 at 09:38

It is difficult to make any sense of them. They could be the key to a runic cipher except that several runes are used several times. Page 1973 honestly admits "I have no idea what their significance is".

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 14 August 2018 at 20:25

Another Anglo-Saxon disc-headed pin with a runic inscription, found at Bardney in Lincolnshire, this time engraved with the 15th through 25th letters of the Anglo-Saxon runic alphabet: ᛉᛋᛏᛒᛖᛗᛚᛝᛞᛟᚪ x-s-t-b-e-m-l-ng-d-oe-a finds.org.uk/database/artef…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 14 August 2018 at 20:32

The inscription comprises 11 runes, as is the case with the other two Anglo-Saxon runic-inscribed disc-headed pins. The order of runes on this pin exactly matches the order given in the Vienna Codex (Codex Vindobonensis 795).

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 15 August 2018 at 09:20

If the standard Anglo-Saxon runic alphabet has 28 letters; and A/S Pin A has runes #1-11; and A/S Pin B has runes #15-25; then I surmise that runic pins like this were part of a set of four matching items, ...

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 15 August 2018 at 09:27

... two disc-headed pins with 11 runes engraved on each (#1-11 and #15-25), together with two other items of jewellery with three runes engraved on each (#12-14 j-eo-p ᛄᛇᛈ and #26-28 æ-y-ea ᚫᚣᛠ).

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 15 August 2018 at 21:52

How many couple emojis would there be if you allow for 3 genders and 6 skin tones and 5 hair types (neutral, red, white, curly, bald) for each person in the pair? And what about beards and tattoos and wheelchairs and prosthetic limbs and ... and still none of them look like me!

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 17 August 2018 at 17:47

Whenever I go to the British Museum, as I did today, I get to this Ogham stone from Devon, and just stop and gaze at it for ten minutes. For me it is one of the most perfect objects in the museum.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 17 August 2018 at 17:49

FANONI MAQVI RINI on the front

SAGRANVI on the back

ᚄᚃᚐᚊᚊᚒᚉᚔ and ᚋᚐᚊᚔᚊᚔᚉᚔ around the edge

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 17 August 2018 at 18:02

Ogham-inscribed jewellery is very rare. This amber bead from Co. Clare is inscribed with a magical word in Ogham script that Macalister, with no great conviction, reads as ATUCMLU ᚐᚈᚒᚉᚋᚂᚒ (-CMLU visible in the image, the V-shaped mark below the stemline is U apparently).

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 17 August 2018 at 18:27

This set of three linked Anglo-Saxon disc-headed pins shows how the runic-inscribed disc-headed pins might have been linked (the Malton pin has a hole for linking on the right side), with runes #12-14 and #26-28 engraved on the linking pieces.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 17 August 2018 at 19:03

The Anglo-Saxon runic-inscribed Seax of Beagnoth en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seax_of_B…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 17 August 2018 at 19:10

Detail of the wire-inlaid runic inscription, comprising the 28 letters of the standard Anglo-Saxon runic alphabet (ᚠᚢᚦᚩᚱᚳᚷᚹᚻᚾᛁᛄᛇᛈᛉᛋᛏᛒᛖᛝᛞᛚᛗᛟᚪᚫᚣᛠ) and the name Beagnoþ ᛒᛠᚷᚾᚩᚦ.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 17 August 2018 at 20:00

Anglo-Saxon gold runic ring, found in June 1817 at Kingmoor near Carlisle, and inscribed with an uninterpretable inscription comprising 30 Anglo-Saxon runes (last 3 on inside):

+ÆRKRIUFLTKRIURIÞONGLÆSTÆPON / TOL

᛭ᚫᚱᛣᚱᛁᚢᚠᛚᛏᛣᚱᛁᚢᚱᛁᚦᚩᚾᚷᛚᚫᛋᛏᚫᛈᚩᚾ / ᛏᚩᛚ

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 17 August 2018 at 20:32

Anglo-Saxon stone cross-head from St Mary's Church, Lancaster, inscribed with runes reading: ᚷᛁᛒᛁᛞᚫᚦᚠᚩ | ᚱᚫᚳᚣᚾᛁᛒᚪᛚ | ᚦᚳᚢᚦᛒᛖᚱᛖ[ᚻᛏ] ''gibidæþ foræ cynibalþ cuþbere[ht]'' ("Pray for Cynibalth, Cuthbert").

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 17 August 2018 at 20:36

Detail of the runic inscription.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 17 August 2018 at 23:42

"I believe the true line of research lies in the careful noting and comparison of the smallest details" — Flinders Petrie, 1931. On the entrance staircase to the Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology in London.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 19 August 2018 at 21:51

I saw this as I left the museum, but it kept gnawing away at me as I walked through the streets of London, and so I had to turn back and take a photo. Petrie's words have haunted me every since, as I patiently but belatedly try to untangle the Tangut script. Eight years too late.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 20 August 2018 at 09:01

Beautiful and unusual example of the use of the X-shaped supplementary ogham letter k ᚕ. Three of the stones in this cluster commemorate members of the Toicacas tribe, twice spelt normally as TOICACI ᚈᚑᚔᚉᚐᚉᚔ, but once spelt TOICAKI ᚈᚑᚔᚉᚐᚕᚔ (as shown on the photo). twitter.com/Vkkokko/status…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 21 August 2018 at 16:37

A brick, a couple of bricks, or a brick wall? Looks like the vendors are waiting for Apple to tell them all how to the draw the *Brick* emoji. Proposal was for a single brick (unicode.org/L2/L2017/17172…), but I predict brick wall will win in the end ...

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 21 August 2018 at 16:41

... in the meantime don't be surprised if your emoji-tweet about a wall crumbles into a single brick on someone else's device.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 27 August 2018 at 18:08

"A bit of Tangut printing" from T. F. Carter's "The invention of printing in China and its spread westward" (1931) twitter.com/shugeorg/statu…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 27 August 2018 at 18:24

T. M. 188 (T. M. = Manuscripte aus Turkistan) means collected from Turfan by Albert Von Le Coq, and held at the Museum für Völkerkunde (now the Ethnological Museum of Berlin) — Berlin Turfan collection not digitized under IDP? @idp_uk

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 28 August 2018 at 00:24

Here's my transcription of the Tangut text with the corresponding Chinese version:

𗧓𘌽𘛽𗍊𘉏𗲠 = ...如我此身空處

𗈐𗌮𗒘𗍊𘗫𗾫 = ...如如無妄想

？𗫌𘐩𘋢𗥤𗗙 = ...出家菩薩住

𘗀𘍞𘏋𘟂𗥗𗁆 = 是名...修滿...。長者！

𗳒𗤁𘏞𗓽𗕥𘍞 = ...滿六波羅蜜。

𗨄𗌭𗠝𘍑𘎑𗯩 = ...知阿練兒處。

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 28 August 2018 at 00:25

It seems to be a translation of part of ch. 82 of the Mahāratnakūṭa Sūtra 大寶積經 (Sutra of the Heap of Jewels) tripitaka.cbeta.org/T11n0310_082#0…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 30 August 2018 at 19:35

Recent emoji proposals (9/2):

Capsicum emoji unicode.org/L2/L2018/18277…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 30 August 2018 at 19:38

The proposed capsicum emoji is red and has the proposed keyword "red", but capsicum are also commonly green, and often yellow. At emoji size it looks like a red apple (or a green apple if it were green). Still, only another 500 varieties of fruit and vegetable emoji needed.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 31 August 2018 at 10:15

ᚴᚢᚱᛁᛚᛋᛅᚱᚦᚢᛅᚱᛅᚠᛅᚱᚦᚢᚾᚢᚠᚢᚾᛏᛁᚾᛁᛋᛏᚢᚦᚢᚱᚢᛁᚵᛁᚦᛁᚴ

ᚦᚨᚱᛋᛅᛏᚱᚢᛏᛁᚾᛁᚢᚱᛁᛚᛋᛅᚱᚦᚢᛅᚱᛅᚢᛁᚦᚱᛅᚦᚱᛅᚢᛅᚱᛁ

kurilsarþuarafarþunufuntinistuþuruigiþik

þorsatrutiniurilsarþuarauiþraþrauari twitter.com/wyrdwritere/st…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 31 August 2018 at 10:28

Transcription into Old Norse:

Gyril sárþvara, far þú nú, fundinn ertu. Þórr vígi þik,

þursa dróttin, [G]yril sárþvara. Við æðrafari.

John McKinnell and Rudolf Simek with Klaus Düwel, "Runes, Magic and Religion : A Sourcebook" (Vienna: Fassbaender, 2004) dro.dur.ac.uk/1053/1/

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 31 August 2018 at 10:30

And translation into English from the same source:

Gyril wound-stirrer, go now! You are found! May Þórr ‘hallow’ you, lord of ogres (= demons), (G)yril wound-stirrer. Against rushing (infection?) in the veins.

September

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 12 September 2018 at 13:16

I just mapped the location of all 200+ tombs at the Western Xia imperial cemetery at Yinchuan google.com/maps/d/viewer?…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

babelstone.co.uk/BabelDiary/201…

Wednesday, 12 September 2018 at 14:59

Account of my visits to the Western Xia tombs at Yinchuan in 2016:

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 13 September 2018 at 10:10

On Tuesday I visited St Peter's, parish church of Farnborough, to look at the exquisite medieval (early 13th century) wall paintings of three female saints. babeldiary.blogspot.com/2018/09/farnbo…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 13 September 2018 at 10:13

Saint Eugenia, holding her breast with her right hand to show she is a woman, and thus prove her innocence to a charge of adultery while secretly living as an abbot. This may be the only surviving medieval depiction of Eugenia in England.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 13 September 2018 at 10:16

Saint Agnes, who was martyred for refusing to marry the son of the Prefect of Rome.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 13 September 2018 at 10:21

Saint Maria, identified as Mary Magdalene by the pot of ointment for anointing the feet of Jesus that she holds. Painted in semi-profile this picture is particularly stunning in its lifelikeness.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 14 September 2018 at 11:48

Continuing to catch up on the backlog for my photo diary for 2016, I have just published the account of my visit to the Western Xia twin pagodas at Baisikou in Ningxia babelstone.co.uk/BabelDiary/201…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 14 September 2018 at 11:53

Western Xia Imperial Tombs seek world heritage status xinhuanet.com/english/2018-0… — "We will move the museum, tourist center, and offices to a new museum complex one km away from the site. The modern buildings in the site will be demolished."

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 14 September 2018 at 23:18

I finish off my stay in Yinchuan with a visit to Hongfo Pagoda babelstone.co.uk/BabelDiary/201…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 22 September 2018 at 11:32

Shang, Zhou and Han depictions of rhinoceroses in bronze are extremely accurate and lifelike. Ancient Chinese rhinos had two horns, and are thought to have been a subspecies of the Sumatran Rhinoceros. This Han rhino in the National Museum of China has a saddle. #WorldRhinoDay

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 25 September 2018 at 19:08

Recent emoji proposals (⑩/⧜):

Disguised Face emoji unicode.org/L2/L2018/18311…

Coin Emoji unicode.org/L2/L2018/18310…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 25 September 2018 at 19:14

It is interesting to me that both proposals talk about adding the proposed emoji to the "Unicode emoji character library" or "emoji library" rather than adding it to a character encoding standard. Makes it seem that the Unicode Standard is something different than it actually is.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 25 September 2018 at 19:16

I'm also looking forward to see a proposal for a Round Coin with Square Hole emoji. @eisoch

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 25 September 2018 at 19:29

The Wikipedia article on "The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog" (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_quick…) is frequently edited by people who sincerely believe that it is missing one or more letters of the basic English alphabet ...

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 25 September 2018 at 19:30

Today: "Where are the letters W annd V?" en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?ti…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 25 September 2018 at 19:33

Yesterday: "The phrase 'A quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog' is missing the letters 't' and 'h'" en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?ti…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 30 September 2018 at 17:38

Special Tangut issue of the Journal of Chinese Writing Systems (September 2018) journals.sagepub.com/toc/cwsa/2/3 — with papers by Nie Hongyin, Sun Bojun, Tai Chung-pui, Ma Xiaofang and myself.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 30 September 2018 at 17:48

I am pleased to say that the contributions by myself and Tai Chung-pui use Unicode Tangut. Unfortunately the contributions by all the mainland PRC scholars still use a GB hack encoding, even though Nie and Sun were instrumental in getting Tangut into Unicode.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 30 September 2018 at 19:22

Sunset at Hope Cove last night.

October

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

twitter.com/AshmoleanMuseu…

Tuesday, 2 October 2018 at 16:40

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

twitter.com/CraigClunas/st…

Tuesday, 2 October 2018 at 16:41

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 2 October 2018 at 17:41

Warring States period bronze rhinoceros belt hook inlaid with gold and silver decoration, unearthed in Sichuan in 1954, and photographed by me in 2011 at the National Museum of China in Beijing.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 4 October 2018 at 10:12

Prof. Nie's article discusses three recently-identified Tangut characters used to transcribe Sanskrit "vajra", one of which (𘟰) was added in Unicode 11.0, and the other two are scheduled for inclusion in Unicode 12.0 ...

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 4 October 2018 at 10:14

... of course if he used the Tangut Yinchuan font he would not need to use images for these three characters!

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 4 October 2018 at 12:06

@cosmicore and myself discuss these three characters in detail in Unicode Technical Note #42 "Tangut Character Additions and Glyph Corrections" unicode.org/notes/tn42/

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 18 October 2018 at 09:27

The 1350 Stele of Laosuo 老索 (1188–1260), a Tangut official under the Yuan dynasty, found in 1985 at Baoding, Hebei babelstone.co.uk/Blog/2015/01/t…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 18 October 2018 at 09:28

The 1278 Stele of Xiaoli Qianbu 小李鈐部 (1191–1259), a Tangut official under the Yuan dynasty, found in 2013 at Daming, Hebei babelstone.co.uk/Blog/2015/01/t…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 18 October 2018 at 09:41

Qianbu 鈐部 *kem pu is an alternative transcription of the Tangut title "Army Commander" 𘒏𗩈 *ga mbu (normally transcribed in as Ganbu 甘卜 or 敢不 *gam bu) and is strong evidence that the prenasalized stop reconstructed for 𗩈 by Sofronov (but not by others) is correct.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 18 October 2018 at 16:13

There is a long Chinese inscription dated 1278 on one side, and a short Tangut inscription on the other side:

𘄱𘞽𗥑𗄋𗥼𗴺

𗼽𘝾𘒏𗩈𗿒

"Mother, Madam Tian Fu'er" (Chinese 田氏福兒阿媽)

"The official, Xiaoli Qianbu" (Chinese 小李鈐部大人)

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 19 October 2018 at 19:05

Detail of the front face showing part of the start of the inscription, including 老索，唐兀氏，世為寧夏人 "Laosuo was a Tangut, and his family had lived in Ningxia for generations". (This is the best-preserved part of the inscription, much of the rest is not so clear).

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 20 October 2018 at 19:56

Early 20th-century Japanese copy of a Qin score and lyrics for 'High Peaks' (Gaoshan 高山), on display at the newly reopened Japanese Gallery at the British Museum.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 21 October 2018 at 17:33

The Decree of Pixodaros in the Lycian script (Xanthos, c. 340-334 BC), photographed at the British Museum yesterday.

(Twitter discriminates against Unicode Lycian characters, so the Lycian text is in the next tweet.)

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 21 October 2018 at 17:34

𐊁𐊑𐊏𐊚𐊓𐊆𐊜𐊁[𐊅]𐊀𐊕(𐊀)𐊁𐊋𐊀𐊗

𐊀𐊕𐊑𐊏𐊀𐊖𐊁𐊗𐊍𐊀𐊇𐊀𐊖𐊁𐊓

𐊖𐊁𐊜𐊀𐊅𐊀𐊇𐊙𐊗𐊆𐊎𐊁𐊑𐊏𐊀

..𐊗𐊕𐊒𐊇𐊁𐊛𐊁𐊑𐊏𐊁𐊖𐊁𐊗𐊆

......𐊒𐊗𐊆𐊋𐊂𐊆𐊊𐊁𐊛𐊁𐊅𐊆

..........𐊗𐊆𐊖𐊗𐊇𐊁𐊑𐊗𐊁𐊋

..................𐊆𐊍𐊍𐊆𐊁𐊂

..........................𐊏𐊁

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 21 October 2018 at 17:40

Romanization:

eñnẽ pixe[d]ar(a) ekat

arñna se tlawa se p[ñ]

se xadawãti meñna

..truweheñneseti

......uti kbijehedi

..........tistwe ñte k

..................illieb

..........................ne

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 21 October 2018 at 17:42

The inscription records grants made by Pixedara (Pixodaros) to the Lycian cities of Arñna (Xanthos), Pñ (Pinara), Tlawa (Tlos) and Xadawãti (Kadyanda).

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 24 October 2018 at 09:25

Here's something I've never seen before. A Chinese style carved wooden table with an inscribed slab of rock (10" × 6") embedded in the middle (transcription in next tweet). Found in a junk shop in Cirencester. Anyone got any ideas about when or why the table was made?

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 24 October 2018 at 09:35

The stone is engraved with the well-known Sanskrit Buddhist mantra "oṃ maṇi padme hūṃ, oṃ a hūṃ" in Lantsa script on two lines (oṃ ma ṇi pa dme | hūṃ oṃ a hūṃ).

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 24 October 2018 at 09:38

For comparison, here is a woodblock print of "oṃ maṇi padme hūṃ" in Lantsa script.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Previous in Thread | Next in Thread 1 | Next in Thread 2

Wednesday, 24 October 2018 at 09:59

Lantsa Sanskrit Buddhist inscriptions are found in China during the Yuan dynasty (1271-1368), for example on the Cloud Platform at Juyong Pass (居庸關雲臺) in Beijing.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 24 October 2018 at 10:07

You can learn more about the 14th-century Buddhist inscriptions in Sanskrit, Tibetan, Phags-pa (Mongolian), Old Uyghur, Tangut and Chinese that are engraved on the inside arch of the Cloud Platform in my account of my visits there in 2011 and 2013 babelstone.co.uk/BabelDiary/201…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 24 October 2018 at 11:43

"Added the word “gray”, which is correct. Without the “g” you have no pangram." en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?ti…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 24 October 2018 at 20:44

Recent emoji proposals (⑪/⧜):

Fly emoji unicode.org/L2/L2018/18317…

Ladder Emoji unicode.org/L2/L2018/18320…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 24 October 2018 at 20:53

Flies and ladders, but not a single emoji for playground equipment: no swing, no see-saw, no slide, no merry-go-round, no helter skelter, no climbing frame ... do children not count?

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 24 October 2018 at 21:02

A much better picture of the Sanskrit inscription, with transcription by Ananda Maharjan facebook.com/photo.php?fbid…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 25 October 2018 at 00:49

The earliest Western printed description of Xiangqi (Chinese chess) in Thomas Hyde's 1694 De Ludis Orientalibus.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 25 October 2018 at 01:08

And Hyde's depiction of a Weiqi (Go) board, with an explanation of eyes and how stones are captured.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 25 October 2018 at 01:09

Maybe Hoy kî 囬碁 here is a mistake for the Japanese simplified characters for igo 囲碁 (weiqi 圍碁).

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 25 October 2018 at 01:20

Some of the game-related Chinese vocabulary that Hyde records. But I don't know what 小麥 (wheat), 大麥 (barley) and 馬料麥 (oats?) have to do with anything.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 25 October 2018 at 01:22

Hyde also described some other Chinese games that I know nothing about.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 25 October 2018 at 01:33

Hyde's pièce de résistance is the large drawing of the Shengguantu 陞官圖 diagram — or Snakes and Ladders for Mandarins. babelstone.co.uk/Ludus/DeLudisO…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 25 October 2018 at 10:20

Holding an early 11th-century lead spindle whorl with Norse runic inscription mentioning the gods Óðinn and Heimdallr, found at Saltfleetby St Clement, Lincolnshire in 2010 finds.org.uk/database/artef… twitter.com/findsorguk/sta…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 25 October 2018 at 23:01

This evening I attended the preview of my friend Adrian Bradshaw's exhibition of photographs from 1980s China at Oxford Brookes University brookes.ac.uk/public-art/gla…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 25 October 2018 at 23:06

This the photographer, Adrian Bradshaw, who went to China in 1984 as a 2nd year SOAS student, and stayed there for thirty years ...

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 25 October 2018 at 23:25

... and here is a rather badly-aged photograph by me of the artist as a young man (we were roomies at the Beijing Language Institute 北京语言学院 1984-1985).

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 25 October 2018 at 23:57

Adrian mostly documented everyday Chinese life in a changing China, but also got to photograph celebrities such as Deng Xiaoping (see top of thread) and Muhammad Ali.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 26 October 2018 at 16:20

A hundred years later a more detailed account of Xiangqi is given by Eyles Irwin, based on information received from "Tinqua, a Soldier Mandarin of the Province of Fokien" (Transactions of the Royal Irish Academy vol. V 1793-1794). babelstone.co.uk/Ludus/Irwin179…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 26 October 2018 at 16:29

Irwin seems ignorant of Hyde's work, and the only antecedent English source he refers to is Chamber's Cyclopædia which "mentions it to be the favourite pastime of the ladies, but quotes no authority for the assertion" (entry for Chess from 1728 ed. v. 1 p. 359 shown).

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 26 October 2018 at 18:11

It's only fair that I post Then and Now photos of myself, so here's an original Adrian Bradshaw photo of me at Chengde in 1985 wearing a hat decorated with a plastic lobster ...

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 26 October 2018 at 18:19

... and here I am yesterday evening at Adrian's photo exhibition at the @glass_tank with Steve, another of the SOAS 1984/1985 contingent of 落后分子 (Steve, as some of you probably already know, was the most backward of all backward elements).

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 26 October 2018 at 18:23

I only wear my Taijiquan Panda T-shirt for the most important occasions, such as when I visited the dead city of Kharakhoto in 2016 twitter.com/i/moments/7978…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 00:16

The Lianhui Tang edition of Sanguo Yanyi is an old friend of mine from my PhD days babelstone.co.uk/Publications/B… twitter.com/shugeorg/statu…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 16:59

Beautifully produced new edition of Jackson's 1937 translation of the Outlaws of the Marsh 水滸傳 foliosociety.com/uk/outlaws-of-…, one of my favourite of the four great Ming novels ... twitter.com/xuetingni/stat…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 17:13

Like many of my generation I was introduced to the novel as a teenager through the wonderful Japanese television series of the Water Margin, first broadcast on BBC in 1976-1978 ...

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 17:25

But I really got to know the novel through Sidney Shapiro's English translation of Outlaws of the Marsh, published in 1980 by Foreign Languages Press, which I read shortly after it was published during my lost years ...

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 17:32

Like the other translations of classical Chinese novels published by the Foreign Language Press, which I eagerly devoured in the years before I applied to study Chinese at SOAS, Outlaws of the Marsh was issued in fine cardboard cases ...

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 17:50

When I got to Beijing in 1984 one of the first things I did was buy Chinese editions of these novels. Here is my well-worn copy of the Shanghai Guji Chubanshe 1984 edition of Shuihu Quanzhuan 水浒全传 that accompanied me on many long train journeys across China ...

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 18:01

And here is my copy of the Collected Commentary Edition 水浒传会评本 published by Beijing University Press in 1987 ...

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 18:24

The earliest English translation of the Outlaws of the Marsh (水滸傳), under the title All Men Are Brothers, was made by Pearl S. Buck in 1933. 70 years ago an edition with vibrant colour illustrations by Miguel Covarrubias (1904-1957) was published by the Heritage Press ... 0/32

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 18:32

Frontispiece. Liang Shan P'o, The Robbers' Lair (梁山泊) 1/32

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 18:36

Prologue. The Commander Hung, in heedlessness, frees the spirits (洪太尉誤走妖魔) 2/32

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 18:53

Chapter 2. Captain Lu kills the bully of Kuangsi with his fists (魯提轄拳打鎮關西) 3/32

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 18:58

Chapter 3. Lu the Priest makes a mighty turmoil [on The Five Crested Mountain] (魯智深大鬧五臺山) 4/32

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 19:05

Chapter 5. The Nine Dragoned Shih Chin turns robber [in The Forest of Red Pines] (九紋龍翦徑赤松林) 5/32

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 19:09

Chapter 6. The Tattooed Priest pulls up the weeping willow (花和尚倒拔垂楊柳) 6/32

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 19:14

Chapter 7. Ling Ch'ung is branded and sent into exile (林教頭刺配滄州道) 7/32

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 19:17

Chapter 11. Yang Chi goes to the capital [city to sell his knife] (汴京城楊志賣刀) 8/32

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 19:38

Chapter 12. The Eager Vanguard struggles for glory [in The Northern Capital] (急先鋒東郭爭功) 9/32

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 19:44

Chapter 13. The Redheaded Devil sleeps drunken in the temple (赤髮鬼醉臥靈官殿) 10/32

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 19:49

Chapter 14. Wu Yung exhorts the brothers (吳學究說三阮撞籌) 11/32

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 19:50

Chapter 14. The Three Juan Brothers join the robber band (吳學究說三阮撞籌) 12/32

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 19:51

Chapter 14. Kung Sung Sheng fulfills The Prophesy Of The Seven Stars (公孫胜應七星聚義) 13/32

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 19:54

Chapter 17. The Beautiful Bearded [traps The Winged Tiger by guile] (美髯公智穩插翅虎) 14/32

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 19:57

Chapter 18. Ling Ch'ung kills a comrade in The Robbers' Lair (林沖水寨大並火) 15/32

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 19:57

Chapter 20. Sung Chiang in his wrath kills P'o Hsi (宋江怒殺閻婆惜) 16/32

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 20:16

Chapter 21. Chu T'ung allows Sung Chiang to go free (朱仝義釋宋公明) 17/32

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 20:21

Chapter 22. Wu Sung kills The Great Tiger of Ching Yang Ridge (景陽岡武松打虎) 18/32

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 20:21

Chapter 26. Wu Sung meets Chang Ch'ing [at The Cross Roads Ridge] (武都頭十字坡遇張青) 19/32

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 20:22

Chapter 30. Wu Sung walks by night [on Centipede Hill] (武行者夜走蜈蚣嶺) 20/32

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 20:32

Chapter 33. The Fire In The Thunder Clap (霹靂火夜走瓦礫場) 21/32

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 20:43

Chapter 34. Hua Yung shoots a wild goose [with his arrow] (小李廣梁山射雁) 22/32

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 20:48

Chapter 37. The Black Whirlwind fights with White Stripe [In The Waves] (黑旋風展浪里白條) 23/32

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 20:49

Chapter 40. Li K'uei [swings his broadaxes] (宋江智取無為軍) 24/32

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 21:06

Chapter 41. Sung Chiang sees The Goddess Of The Ninth Heaven (宋公明遇九天玄女) 25/32

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 21:12

Chapter 43. Yang Hsiung [meets Shih Hsiu upon a market street] (病關索長街遇石秀) 26/32

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 21:13

Chapter 47. The Ten Foot Green Snake captures Wang The Dwarf Tiger (一丈青單捉王矮虎) 27/32

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 21:13

Chapter 47. The Ten Foot Green Snake and Wang (一丈青單捉王矮虎) 28/32

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 21:19

Chapter 60. Wu Yung beguiles The Jade [Ch'i Lin] (吳用智賺玉麒麟) 29/32

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 21:20

Chapter 62. Sung Chiang and his fighting men attack Ta Ming Fu (宋江兵打大名城) 30/32

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 21:22

Chapter 62. Kuan Sheng seeks a way [to seize The Robbers' Lair] (關勝議取梁山泊) 31/32

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 21:24

Chapter 68. Sung Chiang sets free The Warrior Of The Two Spears (宋公明義釋雙槍將) 32/32

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 27 October 2018 at 21:30

Finally, here are all the illustrations by Miguel Covarrubias (1904-1957) for a 1948 Heritage Press edition of Pearl Buck's 1933 translation of All Men Are Brothers twitter.com/BabelStone/sta…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 28 October 2018 at 00:51

And as a postscript, I should not forget these two signed copies of Shuihu studies by Prof. Yau-Woon Ma 馬幼垣, which sit on the other end of my Water Margin shelf. They contain images of many different editions of Shuihuzhuan, including ...

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 28 October 2018 at 00:56

... a fragmentary page (held at the Shanghai Library) from an edition of Shuihuzhuan titled 京本忠義傳 that is thought to date to the Jiajing era (1522-1567), and may be the earliest surviving exemplar of the novel.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 30 October 2018 at 09:53

Bodhisattva Benzaiten 弁財天 playing the biwa 琵琶 (Chinese pipa, a type of four-stringed lute) on a silk scroll of c. 1300-1400 hanging in the newly-reopened Japanese Gallery at the British Museum.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 30 October 2018 at 11:42

Benzaiten's biwa is virtually identical to this example preserved in the Shōsō-in (正倉院) treasure house at Nara, which dates to the Tempyō period (729-749) and may have been imported from Tang China.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 30 October 2018 at 11:45

Here is another example from the Shōsō-in. Note the four frets on the neck, which are indicative of the traditional medieval biwa/pipa (the modern pipa is quite a different instrument, with up to 26 frets running all the way down the body).

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 30 October 2018 at 14:02

The Shōsō-in treasure house in Nara also houses a fragmentary sheet of lute music (天平琵琶譜), dated to circa 738, for a tune entitled Fanjia Chong 番假崇 in the "huangzhong diao" 黃鐘調 mode.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 30 October 2018 at 14:19

The system of tablature used in the Tempyō Lute Score derives from China, where it is attested in three Dunhuang manuscripts held in Paris. The back of Pelliot chinois 3719 (idp.bl.uk/database/oo_lo…) shows a fragment of a single tune, Huànxīshā 浣溪沙 "Washing in the Stream".

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 30 October 2018 at 14:26

Pelliot chinois 3539 (idp.bl.uk/database/oo_lo…) lists the twenty tablature signs used for the four-stringed lute (open string and four frets for four strings equals twenty possible finger positions).

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Previous in Thread | Next in Thread 1 | Next in Thread 2

Tuesday, 30 October 2018 at 14:35

And Pelliot chinois 3808 (idp.bl.uk/database/oo_lo…) is a long scroll comprising 25 tunes written in two hands (Tunes 20-23 shown).

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 30 October 2018 at 14:45

No other examples of this system of pipa lute notation are known from China, although it is attested in some later Japanese manuscripts (9th through 14th centuries). For more information see my blog post One to Twenty in Jurchen, Khitan and Lute (babelstone.co.uk/Blog/2012/12/o…) ...

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 30 October 2018 at 14:48

... and my 2017 preliminary proposal to encode this system of musical notation in Unicode unicode.org/L2/L2017/17311…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 30 October 2018 at 15:17

There are many Chinese depictions of musicians playing the pipa, either solo or more commonly as part of an orchestral ensemble, on Dunhuang and Yulin murals, in Tang paintings, and as tomb figurines (Dunhuang mural shown).

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 30 October 2018 at 15:20

Sometimes the virtuoso feat of playing the pipa behind the back is depicted, as in this scene from a Dunhuang mural.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 30 October 2018 at 15:26

Another example from Dunhuang, showing a group of male musicians (playing on either side of a female dancer who is not shown here).

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 30 October 2018 at 15:27

And this example from the Tang dynasty caves at Yulin.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 30 October 2018 at 15:31

"Palace Concert" by an unknown Tang dynasty artist shows palace ladies at a

banquet playing various musical instruments (pipa at top of the table).

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 30 October 2018 at 15:36

And the most famous Chinese painting depicting a lutenist is this scene from Night Revels of Han Xizai by Gu Hongzhong 顧閎中 (937–975).

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 30 October 2018 at 16:15

Tang dynasty silk painting from Dunhuang dated 897 showing the Tejaprabhā Buddha and the Five Planets (熾盛光佛並五星圖), with Venus playing the pipa. britishmuseum.org/research/colle…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 30 October 2018 at 17:31

Liao dynasty (907-1125) tomb mural in Inner Mongolia showing a Flutist and Lutenist.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 30 October 2018 at 19:21

The pipa is not a native Chinese musical instrument but came to China from Central Asia, probably during the Northern Wei (386–535). By the Tang it was firmly established as a favourite, as evidenced by tomb figurines of orchestral ensembles such as this (metmuseum.org/art/collection…)

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 30 October 2018 at 19:27

This set of Tang tomb figurines of musicians and dancers at the Miho Museum (miho.or.jp/booth/html/art…) includes a 4-stringed lute (bent neck) on the left and a 5-stringed lute (straight neck) on the right.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 30 October 2018 at 19:34

This very similar set of eight musicians from a tomb in Anyang dates to the Sui dynasty (581-618), and also includes both a 4-stringed pipa (left) and and 5-stringed pipa (right) ...

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 30 October 2018 at 19:36

... and here is a photograph of the player of the 4-stringed pipa that I picked up from the internet somewhere.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 30 October 2018 at 19:44

And a Tang figurine of a standing pipa-player (but I can't remember where it was found or where it is now).

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 30 October 2018 at 19:55

And finally, a group of Tang dynasty tomb figurines of four musicians and a dancer that I saw at the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford last Thursday ...

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 30 October 2018 at 20:02

... I originally thought it was a five-stringed pipa because of the straight neck, but it clearly shows only four strings, so perhaps the bent pegboard has broken off.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 31 October 2018 at 10:08

Tangut glossary of stringed musical instruments.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 31 October 2018 at 15:10

The Tangut character meaning "four" (𗝝 ngwə̣) in the name of the pipa is not the ordinary Tangut (Tibeto-Burman) word for "four" (𗥃 ldi̯ẹ), but belongs to a mysterious alternative set of numbers which some scholars believe represent a linguistic substratum ...

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 31 October 2018 at 15:25

... for an unknown language that is mixed in with the Tibeto-Burman language that accounts for the majority of Tangut vocabulary in surviving texts. Unfortunately, no cognates for the substratum vocabulary have been found in any other language ...

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 31 October 2018 at 15:26

... and the words for "four" (𗝝 ngwə̣) and "seven" (𗸨 ngwə̣) in this mysterious sub-Tangut language are exact homophones. What language pronounces "four" and "seven" identically?!

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

amritas.com/110903.htm#083…

Wednesday, 31 October 2018 at 15:48

For further reading see Marc Miyake's 13-part series "Revisiting the Tangut ritual language" from 2011:

amritas.com/110910.htm#091…

amritas.com/110917.htm#091…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 31 October 2018 at 16:26

Five-stringed pipa are not as frequently represented in art as the four-stringed variety, but here is an apsara (飛天) on a Dunhuang mural playing one.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 31 October 2018 at 16:42

Here's a drawing of a five-stringed pipa (I've forgotten the source). It has a straight neck, and compared with the four-stringed pipa it has an extra string, an extra peg, and an extra fret (not obvious here) ...

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 31 October 2018 at 16:51

... the extra fret is called the "lonely fret" and is only used with the fifth string, so the five-stringed lute has 26 finger positions, and its musical notation requires 26 tablature signs ...

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 31 October 2018 at 16:53

The only surviving score for the 5-stringed biwa (Gogen Kinfu 五弦琴譜, a Japanese manuscript dated 842) uses the 20 pipa tablature signs plus the kanji 子 zǐ “son”, 九 jiǔ “nine”, 中 zhōng “middle”, 四 sì “four”, 五 wǔ “five” and 小 xiǎo “little” for the fifth string positions.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 31 October 2018 at 16:57

As you may have guessed by now, the Shōsō-in (正倉院) treasure house at Nara holds a stunningly beautiful five-stringed biwa (with five frets), which dates to the Tempyō period (729-749) and may have been imported from Tang China.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 31 October 2018 at 17:06

The Shōsōin is ceremoniously unsealed once a year, and a few precious objects are taken out to be put on display at the Nara National Museum for just a couple of weeks every autumn — if you are in Japan go there right now! twitter.com/tkasasagi/stat…

November

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Previous in Thread | Next in Thread 1 | Next in Thread 2

Thursday, 1 November 2018 at 16:54

The Shōsō-in (正倉院) treasure house at Nara holds one more Tempyō period (729-749) stringed musical instrument from Tang China, a ruanxian 阮咸 (or ruan 阮), a type of moon lute (yueqin 月琴), with four strings and 14 frets (in this example).

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 1 November 2018 at 16:59

Here is a picture on a Dunhuang mural of the ruan moon lute being played (without a plectrum, unlike the medieval pipa which was always played with a plectrum).

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 1 November 2018 at 17:08

BTW, the source for my pictures of Shōsōin musical instruments is "Shōsōin no gakki" 正倉院の楽器 (Tokyo, 1967). It also has some interesting photos of flutes, but perhaps I should save those for another thread on another day.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 1 November 2018 at 17:52

This painted brick from the Wei-Jin period (220-419) tombs near Jiayuguan, Gansu shows two male musicians, one playing a ruanxian lute with a round body and long neck, and one playing on a long bamboo flute (九節尺八長笛).

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 1 November 2018 at 17:56

And this painted brick from the same Wei-Jin period (220-419) tombs at Jiayuguan shows an ensemble of female and male musicians playing drums, long flute, ruanxian lute with a pear-shaped body, and a qin (was the qin reserved for male musicians only?).

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 1 November 2018 at 23:08

Arthur Cooper's introduction to Chinese and Japanese Characters, "The Other Greek", edited by Imre Galambos, has just been posthumously published by Brill brill.com/abstract/title…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 1 November 2018 at 23:52

Arthur Cooper is perhaps best remembered for his translations of the poems of Li Bo and Du Fu (penguin.co.uk/books/34928/po…). Along with G. W. Robinson's Poems of Wang Wei, and A. C. Graham's Poems of the Late T'ang, these were my introduction to Tang poetry in the late 1970s.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

twitter.com/CJKType/status…

Friday, 2 November 2018 at 22:38

Kim Jong-un: My name is always printed in bold, how about yours?

Xi Jinping: Um, yeah, of course ... [aside: Make it so!]

twitter.com/FakeUnicode/st… twitter.com/CraigClunas/st…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 5 November 2018 at 11:36

David Helliwell's first blog post for this year discusses a recently rediscovered leaf from a 1597 Ming edition of a popular encyclopedia which was presented to Anna Maria van Schurman by Adreas Colvius in 1637. Great reading as always! serica.blog/2018/11/05/chi…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 9 November 2018 at 09:08

The entire translation is wrong, the date is impossible, there are more than two known examples of round paizi with this Phags-pa text, and the fact that it does not have a Kirtimukha loop at the top like the other examples means it is probably not original ...

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 9 November 2018 at 09:19

The example at The Met is double-sided, with the inscription mirrored on one side (for use in stamping the text on documents). metmuseum.org/art/collection…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 9 November 2018 at 09:25

The silver example at the Inner Mongolia Museum (unfortunately not on display when I visited last year) has the same text but in a cursive style of Phags-pa calligraphy. zeno.ru/showphoto.php?…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 9 November 2018 at 18:54

The man behind the Genghis Khan collection is Don Lessem en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don_Lessem who is an author of popular books on dinosaurs, and more a showman than a serious collector historical artefacts ...

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 9 November 2018 at 18:56

'Lessem found one very rare passport that is written in a secret language. "There's only one guy in the Western World who could translate it, basically says "I am the emissary of the Khan, if you defy me you die."' …ngolschinaandthesilkroad.blogspot.com/2015/07/ghengi…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 10 November 2018 at 11:42

Here is the Phags-pa text of the paizi ("passport") in plain text Unicode:

ꡏꡡꡃ ꡁ ꡊꡠꡃ ꡘꡞ

ꡗꡞꡋ ꡁꡟ ꡅꡟꡋ ꡊꡟꡘ

ꡢꡖ ꡋꡟ ꡆꡘ ꡙꡞꡢ ꡁꡦꡋ

ꡠ ꡛꡦ ꡎꡟ ꡚꡞ ꡘꡖꡦ ꡛꡟ

ꡝꡙ ꡊ ꡉꡟ ꡢꡗꡞ

Note that the original reads vertically in columns running left-to-right.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 10 November 2018 at 11:44

This is a transliteration of the Phags-pa text, with transcription into Mongolian in parentheses:

mong kha deng ri (möngke tengri)

yin khu chun dur (yin küčün dür)

qa· nu jar liq khėn (qaɣan-u ǰarliɣ ken)

e sė bu shi r·ė su (ese bišire-esu)

'al da thu qayi (alda-tuɣai)

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 10 November 2018 at 11:47

And this is my translation:

"Through the power of eternal heaven, [this is] an order of the Emperor (Khan). Whoever does not show respect [to the bearer] will be guilty of an offence."

Note that the actual khan who issued it is not named, so it is not certain to be Kublai Khan.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 10 November 2018 at 11:51

Although it may seem a mystical script to modern eyes, Phags-pa was originally not a "secret language", but intended as a common unifying script for writing the various languages used throughout the Mongol empire ... so in fact the opposite of a secret language!

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 12 November 2018 at 00:05

David Helliwell barely disguises his contempt for the exhibition on Shen Fuzong, the first Chinese visitor to Oxford in Autumn 1687, now open at the China Centre in St Hugh’s College serica.blog/2018/11/11/she…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 13 November 2018 at 18:54

It is a shame that I missed this workshop on recent research and discoveries related to Bodhgaya, held at the British Museum today, with @MarcMiyake discussing Old Mon Tablets from Bodhgaya. soas.ac.uk/south-asia-ins…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 14 November 2018 at 22:47

Letter from Qi Yuzhen 祁育真 (Member of the Shantou Christian Association 汕头市基督教联合会 in the 1950s) to Prof. Evangeline D. Edwards (1888-1957) at SOAS, dated 23 December 1932 (in the papers of Charles Otto Blagden) digital.soas.ac.uk/BL00000059

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 14 November 2018 at 23:07

老師：

你還能記得十二年前的一個小學生否，現在她在這國中快住到一年的工夫了，可是在最近的日期内才打听着你老人家的一個住址，故此，敬草几字特候台安，如上帝許可，深聁望在囘中國之先能見您的面，不尽歡言，希再談：

生祁育真拜十二月廿三

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 14 November 2018 at 23:11

Photograph of Qi Yuzhen c. 1932

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 14 November 2018 at 23:42

Various designs drawn by Charles Otto Blagden (1864-1949) digital.soas.ac.uk/blagden/all/br…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 14 November 2018 at 23:43

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 14 November 2018 at 23:43

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 14 November 2018 at 23:44

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 14 November 2018 at 23:44

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 14 November 2018 at 23:45

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 14 November 2018 at 23:46

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 14 November 2018 at 23:46

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 15 November 2018 at 00:59

Evangeline D. Edwards (1888-1957), Professor of Chinese and Head of Department of the Far East at SOAS, and Acting Head of the Percival David Foundation of Chinese Art, 1921-1955

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 15 November 2018 at 11:30

The #Wikipedia elves saw this photograph, and magically there is now a Wikipedia article for her! en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evangelin…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 16 November 2018 at 09:05

Recent emoji proposals (Ⅻ/⧜):

Wrapped Food in Leaf emoji unicode.org/L2/L2018/18325…

Hook emoji unicode.org/L2/L2018/18327…

Fondue emoji unicode.org/L2/L2018/18328…

Elevator and Flight of Stairs emoji unicode.org/L2/L2018/18329…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 16 November 2018 at 13:12

Photograph of staff and students of the @SOAS Far East department in 1943 soasalumni.org/Document.Doc?i… with Prof. Eve Edwards barely visible at ⑨

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 16 November 2018 at 16:24

It is difficult to understand how something with such intricate decoration, which someone obviously spent a lot of time and effort making, could have G and S written reversed ... twitter.com/NWales_FLO/sta…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 16 November 2018 at 16:29

... and equally hard to understand how the record for this object (finds.org.uk/database/artef…) states that the N is also reversed (I'm looking at my keyboard, and I'm 90% sure that N is written the right way round) ...

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 16 November 2018 at 16:31

... the record does not make it clear what the final letter is, but I think it is an & (not written reversed as the record states).

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 21 November 2018 at 10:37

Folke Bergman's photo of the northwest corner of Khara-khoto in January 1931 (jarringcollection.se/travel/travels… via @csen_nomads) ...

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 21 November 2018 at 10:45

My photo from about the same spot when I visited in August 2016 with @cosmicore — the stupa on the left of Bergman's photo has disappeared but a new stupa has grown up on the right ...

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 21 November 2018 at 11:06

Aurel Stein's photos of Khara-khoto taken in May 1914 show only the single large stupa at the northwest corner, and the stupa rising from the sands on the left of Bergman's 1931 photo is nowhere to be seen (and not indicated on Stein's plans) ...

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 21 November 2018 at 11:15

Stupas are fast growing, and as of 2016 there is now a family of five stupas living on the northwest corner of Khara-khoto ...

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 21 November 2018 at 11:22

And maybe when I next visit Khara-khoto there will be even more stupas, as workers were busy repairing or renovating the east wall during a mild sandstorm when we arrived.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 22 November 2018 at 00:19

Excavations of a Liao dynasty imperial mausoleum in the vicinity of Yiwulü Mountain 醫巫閭山 northwest of Beizhen city in Liaoning have uncovered pieces of jade tablets inscribed with Khitan Small Script. kaogu.cssn.cn/ywb/news/new_d… (@cosmicore)

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 22 November 2018 at 00:34

This is my initial reading of the jade fragment shown. The middle block of two characters, reconstructed as reading "mó'er", is a common Khitan word meaning "mother, wife, woman, lady".

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 22 November 2018 at 00:43

(The reading of "ren" for the first character is not a phonetic reconstruction, but a transcription convention because the Khitan character looks like the Chinese character 刄 rèn — I should have replaced it with a question mark in my transcription.)

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 22 November 2018 at 01:39

Corrected transcription, with thanks to @cosmicore for pointing out my misreading of the second character of the first block (but I am responsible for any remaining errors).

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 22 November 2018 at 17:20

Nobody knows exactly what the difference in use between Khitan Small Script and Khitan Large Script is, but the use of KSS on the jade tablets could be predicted from this map where yellow = KLS monuments, green = KSS monuments, and location of jade tablets is marked in purple.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 23 November 2018 at 21:23

Ce matin j'étais à Arras avec @Romain_Tangoute @vauzhao et des autres tangutologues pour un colloque international «Recontre de Tangoutologie» ...

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 23 November 2018 at 21:36

Mathieu Beaudouin, Gong Xun et Arakawa Shintarō discutent de la particule négative de tangoute.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 23 November 2018 at 21:49

Romain Lefebvre, Arakawa Shintarō et Wang Rongfei during the third session.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 23 November 2018 at 21:56

Tai Chung-pui from Hong Kong presents his research with @cosmicore on the Tibetan phonetic glosses on fragments of a Tangut manuscript which until 1922-1923 formed the cover of a Tangut book from Khara-khoto.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 25 November 2018 at 00:49

Here is the programme for Rencontre de Tangoutologie, held at the Université d'Artois in Arras on Friday, and continued at the the École normale supérieure in Paris yesterday morning transfers.ens.fr/rencontre-de-t…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 25 November 2018 at 00:55

After the conference we went to the Bibliothèque nationale de France to examine Tangut fragments and other treasures. Here is me and Prof. Arakawa Shintarō looking at an unidentified Tangut dharani (I left my reading glasses in the cloakroom, so it is all a bit of a blur for me!)

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 25 November 2018 at 01:03

And here we are looking at an unidentified gāthā from a fragment of a Tangut printed text.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 25 November 2018 at 01:23

Here is a BnF fragment of a Tangut text printed using movable type. Notice the uneven inking, irregular size and ragged layout of characters, which are distinctive features of movable type printing.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 25 November 2018 at 01:36

And this is a fragment of an Old Uyghur manuscript from the Pelliot collection (gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv…) for @dmatsui1217

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 25 November 2018 at 01:38

"Le mot burxan, comme les noms βı̊ročan et Ločana, ainsi que deux points dans chaque groupe de quatre points servant de ponctuation, figurent partout à l'encre rouge, parfois surchargée sur de l'encre noire pâle" (archivesetmanuscrits.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/cc1…) @vauzhao

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 25 November 2018 at 02:15

By far the most exciting moment of my visit to the Bibliothèque nationale de France came when I saw this scroll being unrolled, and I immediately recognised it as the unique Tang dynasty manuscript of pipa lute notation for 25 tunes.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 25 November 2018 at 02:17

Less than a month ago I posted a picture of this manuscript on a long thread about the pipa/biwa lute in medieval China and Japan twitter.com/BabelStone/sta… but I never imagined in my wildest dreams that I would ever get to see it in person!

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 25 November 2018 at 02:25

After studying Tangut for ten years, today was the first time I have ever had an opportunity to see an original Tangut text in person (and not behind a glass screen in a museum) so my visit to the BnF today has seen the fulfillment of a long-held wish ...

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 25 November 2018 at 02:41

... but there are many thousands of Tangut texts in collections around the world. On the other hand, this single manuscript scroll is the only surviving Tang dynasty manuscript that preserves complete tunes in pipa musical notation so seeing it was a thousand times more exciting!

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 25 November 2018 at 23:56

Many thanks to Laurent Hericher (pictured), the Chief Curator of the Oriental manuscripts division, for showing us some truly marvellous items from the collection at the Bibliothèque nationale de France! And many thanks to @Romain_Tangoute for organizing the visit!

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 26 November 2018 at 00:07

The credit for all the photographs in this thread goes to my good friend Tai Chung-pui who saved the day after I accidentally left my camera at the hotel. To finish off, here are two sheets of practice drawings of Buddhist figures in various poses from the Pelliot collection.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 26 November 2018 at 12:01

The Tangut fragments from the Pelliot collection at BnF can be viewed online on the gallica site (gallica.bnf.fr) by searching for "Pelliot xixia" (in quotes). This is the Tangut dharani fragment I was looking at at the start of this thread (gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv…).

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Thursday, 29 November 2018 at 10:32

I've just published a blog post on the Khitan Jade from the Liao Mausoleum at Yiwulü Mountain babelstone.co.uk/Blog/2018/11/y…

December

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Saturday, 1 December 2018 at 10:12

More detailed discussion of this Khitan inscription babelstone.co.uk/Blog/2018/11/y…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 4 December 2018 at 12:03

If you have legacy CJK-encoded Tangut data using the XXZT font, I have just created a tool that will convert it to Unicode Tangut babelstone.co.uk/Unicode/xxzt.h…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

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Tuesday, 4 December 2018 at 12:10

This is what the contents of the top box is (it looks like Tangut when XXZT font is applied):

修 = 崇 tśhjɨ j, bottom

眩 = 纳 pha, left

裀 = 緈 bjịj, right

衈 = 蛃 njij, middle

萨 = 饲 iọ, rim

The contents of the bottom box is real Unicode Tangut.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 4 December 2018 at 12:19

Next I need to create a conversion tool for Mojikyo Tangut, but that is horrible because Mojikyo uses two fonts (M202 and M203) for Tangut, and 360 code points in both fonts are mapped to different Tangut characters, so it is impossible to do a simple plain text conversion.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 4 December 2018 at 12:29

This is a real world example, where I copied text from the PDF of an article published recently journals.sagepub.com/toc/cwsa/2/3 (6 of the 8 papers use CJK-mapped XXZT font; only the papers by myself and Tai Chung-pui use Unicode Tangut).

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 4 December 2018 at 22:04

The Mojikyo Tangut to Unicode conversion tool is now available at babelstone.co.uk/Unicode/mojiky…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 9 December 2018 at 17:54

Strong sense of déjà vu In August 2005 SOAS made the Chinese and Japanese/Korean subject librarians redundant (theguardian.com/education/2005…), and they were only reinstated in November 2005 after a vigorous campaign (theguardian.com/education/2005…). twitter.com/SaveSOASLibrar…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 9 December 2018 at 20:02

Four Girls in Harmony is a stunning CD of sacred and secular music from the 16th through 20th centuries, sung by the Girls' Quartet from the Choir of St Thomas-on-The Bourne (including my daughter) — great Christmas present! babelstone.co.uk/Music/Quartet2… 💿🎁🎶

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Sunday, 9 December 2018 at 23:51

I've now written a blog post about the Khitan Fragments from the Tomb of Yelü Pugu babelstone.co.uk/Blog/2018/12/y…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 10 December 2018 at 12:34

Sample tracks from this and other CDs from the choir of St Thomas-on-The Bourne are available from thebourne.org.uk/media/index.php

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 10 December 2018 at 21:39

My Catalogue of the Morrison Collection of Chinese Books was published 20 years ago, in December 1998, when I was working at @SOASLibrary

SOAS Library is now threatened with devastating staff cuts change.org/p/soas-univers…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 10 December 2018 at 21:41

The catalogue has now been digitized and made available by SOAS on a CC BY-NC license digital.soas.ac.uk/LOAA003467/

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 14 December 2018 at 19:36

Today I received my complimentary author's copy of the September 2018 issue of Journal of Chinese Writing Systems, with my paper on the Tangut Homonyms (one of two papers in this issue that are devoted to this newly-discovered text).

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 14 December 2018 at 19:46

Now also available, On Christmas Night, a feast of carols from the choirs of St Thomas-on-The Bourne babelstone.co.uk/Music/Christma…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Friday, 14 December 2018 at 22:20

Proposal to encode LISU LETTER YHA ... but Lisu block is full and BMP is nearly full. Suggested location of 0870..087F is not possible as this range is reserved for RTL characters. Only possibility is 2FE0..2FEF in the CJK area. unicode.org/L2/L2018/18338…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 24 December 2018 at 02:07

མྱི་ཁྱོད་གི་རོགས་ནི་ལྷ་ཨི་ཤི་མྱི་ཤི་ཧ་ཞེས་བྱ་སྟེ་། །ཕྱག་ན་རྡོ་རྗེ་དཔལ་ཤག་ཀྱ་ཐུབ་པ་བྱེད་དེ་། ...

"i shi myi shi ha" = "Jesus Messiah" twitter.com/Lhatseri/statu…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 24 December 2018 at 02:24

"Man, your ally is the god called 'Jesus Messiah'. He acts as Vajrapāṇi and Śrī Śākyamuni. ..." — see earlytibet.com/2007/12/02/chr… for discussion of Christianity in early Tibet by @sam_vanschaik

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 24 December 2018 at 02:33

Sam's article is translated into Tibetan at tsanpo.com/debate/25898.h… which gives a transcription of the passage in red (but ཨི་ཤི་མྱི་ཤི་ཧ་ is misspelled as ཨི་ཤི་མྱི་ཞི་ཧ་)

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 24 December 2018 at 13:19

And in the earliest Chinese Christian text (7th century), the name of Jesus is bizarrely transcribed as 移鼠 [yí shǔ], literally "moving mouse" twitter.com/BabelStone/sta…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 24 December 2018 at 13:30

天尊當使涼風向一童女，名為末豔。涼風即入末豔腹內。…末豔懷後產一男，名為移鼠。

God thereupon caused a cool wind to blow towards a virgin named Maryam. The cool wind immediately entered into Maryam's belly. ... After her pregnancy Maryam gave birth to a boy whose name was Jesus.

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 24 December 2018 at 13:33

... from the Sutra of Hearing the Messiah 序聽迷詩所經 tripitaka.cbeta.org/T54n2142 en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sutra_of_…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Tuesday, 25 December 2018 at 22:15

The St Thomas-on-The Bourne choirs singing the traditional Ukrainian Carol Of The Bells from their Christmas CD is available on YouTube. Pictured at Christ Church, Oxford during their 2013 tour. youtube.com/watch?v=WdtI29…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Wednesday, 26 December 2018 at 14:32

This morning I checked Wikipedia, and unexpectedly there was no article for Wang Quanzhang — now there is! en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wang_Quan… twitter.com/ChuBailiang/st…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 31 December 2018 at 12:54

My highlight for 2018 was getting to see this manuscript in person at the Bibliothèque nationale de France twitter.com/BabelStone/sta…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 31 December 2018 at 14:25

No New Year's resolutions; no predictions for 2019; no complaints about what I failed to achieve this year; just my highlights of 2018 in eight tweets:

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 31 December 2018 at 14:27

March 31: In my first blog post in more than two years I look at a newly-identified Jurchen inscription on the bank of the River Arkhara in Russia twitter.com/BabelStone/sta…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 31 December 2018 at 14:29

April 15: For my second blog post of the year I explore the fascinating history of the discovery, loss, and rediscovery of a Tangut Buddhist manuscript written in gold ink twitter.com/BabelStone/sta…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

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Monday, 31 December 2018 at 14:34

June 6: A translation into Chinese of my preliminary study of a newly-discovered Tangut wordbook (《新见西夏字书初探》) is published in Tangut Research (my first publication since 2012) twitter.com/BabelStone/sta…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 31 December 2018 at 14:35

June 22: I get to see the earliest extant fragment of a Middle Cornish text at the British Library with @Evertype twitter.com/BabelStone/sta…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 31 December 2018 at 14:39

August 17: My second paper on the recently-discovered Tangut Homonyms text is published in the Journal of Chinese Writing Systems twitter.com/BabelStone/sta…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 31 December 2018 at 14:41

November 25: I am privileged to examine Tangut texts and the Dunhuang pipa manuscript scroll at the Bibliothèque nationale de France with @vauzhao and others twitter.com/BabelStone/sta…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone

Monday, 31 December 2018 at 14:43

November 29: I write a blog post about a fragment of Khitan Small Script engraved on a piece of jade from a recently-discovered Liao dynasty imperial mausoleum twitter.com/BabelStone/sta…

Andrew West 魏安 @BabelStone