Gha (Indic)

← Ga	Gha			Nga →
Devanagari	Bengali	Gurmukhi	Gujarati	Oriya
		ਘ	ઘ
Tamil	Telugu	Kannada	Malayalam	Sinhala
-	ఘ	ಘ	ഘ	ඝ
Thai	Lao	Tibetan	Burmese	Khmer
ฆ	-	གྷ	ဃ	ឃ
Baybayin	Hanunoo	Buhid	Tagbanwa	Lontara
-	-	-	-	-
Balinese	Sundanese	Limbu	Tai Le	New Tai Lue
ᬖ	-	ᤄ	-	-
Lepcha	Saurashtra	Rejang	Javanese	Cham
-	ꢕ	-	ꦓ	ꨉ
Tai Tham	Tai Viet	Kayah Li	Phags-pa	Siddhaṃ
ᨥ	--	-	-
Mahajani	Khojki	Khudabadi	Syloti	Meitei
𑅘	𑈌	𑊾	ꠊ	ꯘ
Modi	Tirhuta	Kaithi	Sora	Grantha
𑘑	𑒒	𑂐	-	𑌘
Chakma	Sharada	Takri	Kharoshthi	Brahmi
𑄊	𑆔	𑚍	𐨓
Phonemic representation:			/gʱ/
IAST transliteration:			gha
ISCII code point:			B6 (182)

Gha is the fourth consonant of Indic abugidas. In modern Indic scripts, gha is derived from the Brahmi letter , which is probably derived from the Aramaic ("H/X") after having gone through the Gupta letter .

Āryabhaṭa numeration

Aryabhata used Devanagari letters for numbers, very similar to the Greek numerals, even after the invention of Indian numerals. The values of the different forms of घ are:^[1]

• घ [gʱə] = 4 (४)
• घि [gʱɪ] = 400 (४००)
• घु [gʱʊ] = 40,000 (४० ०००)
• घृ [gʱri] = 4,000,000 (४० ०० ०००)
• घॢ [gʱlə] = 4×10⁸ (४०^८)
• घे [gʱe] = 4×10¹⁰ (४०^१०)
• घै [gʱɛː] = 4×10¹² (४०^१२)
• घो [gʱoː] = 4×10¹⁴ (४०^१४)
• घौ [gʱɔː] = 4×10¹⁶ (४०^१६)

Devanagari script

Gha (घ) is the fourth consonant of the Devanagari abugida. In all languages, घ is pronounced as [gʱə] or [gʱ] when appropriate. Letters that derive from it are the Gujarati letter ઘ and the Modi letter 𑘑.

Bengali script

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

Gurmukhi script

Kagaa [kə̀gːɑ] (ਘ) is the ninth letter of the Gurmukhi alphabet. Its name is [kʰəkʰːɑ] and pronounced as /kə̀/. To differentiate between consonants, the Punjabi tonal consonant kà is often transliterated in the way of the Hindi voiced aspirate consonants gha although Punjabi does not have this sound. It is derived from the Laṇḍā letter gha, and ultimately from the Brahmi ga. Gurmukhi kagaa does not have a special pairin or addha (reduced) form for making conjuncts, and in modern Punjabi texts do not take a half form or halant to indicate the bare consonant /k/, although Gurmukhi Sanskrit texts may use an explicit halant.

Gujarati script

Gha (ઘ) is the fourth consonant of the Gujarati script. It is derived from 16th century Devanagari letter dha (ध) with the top bar (shiro rekha) removed. Like most Gujarati letters, it forms conjunct clusters with a half-form, where the vertical stem on the right is dropped and the remaining letter body appended to the following letter. ઘ (gha) is similar in appearance to ધ (dha).

Thai script

Kho ra-khang (ฆ) is the sixth letter of the Thai script. It falls under the low class of Thai consonants. In IPA, kho ra-khang is pronounced as [kʰ] at the beginning of a syllable and is pronounced as [k̚] at the end of a syllable. The second and third letters of the alphabet, kho khai (ข) and kho khuat (ฃ), are also named kho, however, they all fall under the high class of Thai consonants. The fourth and the fifth letters of the alphabet, kho khwai (ค), kho khon (ฅ), and kho ra-khang (ฆ), are also named kho and fall under the low class of Thai consonants. Unlike many Indic scripts, Thai consonants do not form conjunct ligatures, and use the pinthu—an explicit virama with a dot shape—to indicate bare consonants. In the acrophony of the Thai script, ra-khang (ระฆัง) means ‘bell’. Kho ra-khang corresponds to the Sanskrit character ‘घ’.

See also

• Heth

References

1. Ifrah, Georges (2000). The Universal History of Numbers. From Prehistory to the Invention of the Computer. New York: John Wiley & Sons. pp. 447–450. ISBN 0-471-39340-1.

• Kurt Elfering: Die Mathematik des Aryabhata I. Text, Übersetzung aus dem Sanskrit und Kommentar. Wilhelm Fink Verlag, München, 1975, ISBN 3-7705-1326-6
• Georges Ifrah: The Universal History of Numbers. From Prehistory to the Invention of the Computer. John Wiley & Sons, New York, 2000, ISBN 0-471-39340-1.
• B. L. van der Waerden: Erwachende Wissenschaft. Ägyptische, babylonische und griechische Mathematik. Birkhäuser-Verlag, Basel Stuttgart, 1966, ISBN 3-7643-0399-9
• Fleet, J. F. (January 1911). "Aryabhata's System of Expressing Numbers". Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland: 109–126. ISSN 0035-869X. JSTOR 25189823.
• Fleet, J. F. (1911). "Aryabhata's System of Expressing Numbers". The Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland (Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland) 43: 109–126. doi:10.1017/S0035869X00040995. JSTOR 25189823.