Geʼez

ግዕዝ ፊደል

Abugida · 34 letters

Each consonant carries an implied vowel — ka, not k — and marks hung above, below or around it change that vowel. You learn the consonants, then the vowel marks, then the combinations: three steps instead of one. Every script of India, plus Thai and Khmer.

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What pays off on the road

• Two countries write it, Ethiopia and Eritrea, and it looks like no other: recognising it places the photo.
• ከተማ city, መንገድ road, ክልል region: three words that cut up a sign.
• Reading a name: the seven orders, shown on a single letter — once seen, all two hundred and thirty-one signs read.

How it works

Seven shapes per consonant, and nothing to learn by heart

Ge'ez has two hundred and thirty-one signs, which is frightening, and thirty-four letters, which is not frightening at all. Both figures are right: each consonant exists in seven shapes, one per vowel.

Here are the seven shapes of "h": ሀ ሁ ሂ ሃ ሄ ህ ሆ. The first is the bare letter; the other six add a stroke, shorten a leg or open a loop. The same modifications hold for the other thirty-three consonants.

So there are not two hundred and thirty-one drawings to memorise, but thirty-four letters and seven ways of folding them — and it is the only script in this section that keeps that promise.

The sixth order is not pronounced

Of the seven shapes, the sixth adds no vowel: it notes the bare consonant, or an "e" so brief it is not written. አዲስ ends with a sixth-order ስ, and reads "adis", not "adisi".

This is the same role as the Indian virama or the Tamil pulli, except that it is not an added mark: it is a shape of the letter. Ge'ez has no floating signs — everything is in the drawing of the character.

What the script does not say

Gemination is written nowhere. አዲስ አበባ transliterates as "adis ababa" where the map says "Addis Abeba": nothing in the sign says the "d" is doubled, and you learn it by ear or from a dictionary.

The first-order vowel has no settled Latin equivalent either: መቀሌ is written "Mekele" on our maps and "Maqale" elsewhere, and both can be defended.

Measured over the two hundred and twenty-two names in our packs, a mechanical transliteration gets thirty-seven per cent right. So there is no place name quiz here — better one exercise less than an exercise that teaches something false.

Where it is read, and what it answers

Ge'ez serves only Ethiopia and Eritrea. It is the only script native to sub-Saharan Africa still in everyday use, and it resembles no other.

For a player that is nearly enough: recognising it places the photo in two countries, one of which is fifteen times more populous than the other. The rest — reading the suffixes, spotting a cardinal point — refines.

Cheat sheet

The seven orders, on one letter

The whole system, shown on "h". The same modifications hold for the other thirty-three consonants: once these seven shapes are seen, you read all two hundred and thirty-one.

The thirty-four consonants

In the first order, that is, bare. Each then folds in the other six ways, and that is all that remains to know.

The words on signs

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