The Ol Chiki script, the alphabet of the Santali language, to copy letter by letter. First the 30 letters in the six rows of the chart, then the aspirated pairs, the vowels with a mark, the marks and the digits.
Read the full guide
Six rows, each opened by a vowel
The chart has six rows of five. Each row opens with a vowel, ᱚ ᱟ ᱤ ᱩ ᱮ ᱳ, and the four letters after it begin their names with that vowel: ᱚ la, then at, ag, ang and al. A mark is written after its letter, never on it.
A picture in every letter
The script was made in 1925, with letters meant to call up natural shapes. A letter's name is or comes from a Santali word, and its shape is a simple drawing of that word: ᱞ al is a hand holding a pen, and its name, the Ol of Ol Chiki, means writing. The full list has the other pictures.
ᱷ oh after a consonant adds a breath: ᱛᱷ is th and ᱠᱷ is kh.
No full stop is used: it looks like the dot ᱹ. A sentence ends with ᱾, the mucạd.
A device with no Ol Chiki font shows empty boxes in place of the letters.
Questions and answers
How many letters are in the Ol Chiki alphabet?
30: six vowels and 24 consonants. Six marks, two punctuation signs and ten digits bring the Unicode block to 48 characters, and all 48 are on this page.
What does Ol Chiki mean?
Ol means writing and chiki means symbol. The script is also called Ol Chemetʼ, Ol Ciki or just Ol, and it is known as the Santali alphabet.
Is Ol Chiki written left to right?
Yes, from left to right, and there are no capital and small letters. It has a print style and a cursive style for handwriting, and Unicode treats the two as the same letters.
Is Ol Chiki an abugida?
No. Unlike most scripts of India it is a true alphabet: vowels are full letters, equal to the consonants, and no consonant carries a vowel inside it.
Is Ol Chiki in Unicode?
Yes, since version 5.1 of April 2008. The Ol Chiki block runs from U+1C50 to U+1C7F: the digits first, then the 30 letters, the marks and the punctuation.
All 72 letters
Letters 30
ᱡaaj, jU+1C61 Ol Chiki letter aaj. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. Letter 8 of 30: row 2 of the chart, place 3. Sound IPA ɟ. Its shape pictures a person pointing at a third person with the right hand.
ᱠaak, kU+1C60 Ol Chiki letter aak. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. Letter 7 of 30: row 2 of the chart, place 2. Sound IPA k. Its shape pictures a bird.
ᱢaam, mU+1C62 Ol Chiki letter aam. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. Letter 9 of 30: row 2 of the chart, place 4. Sound IPA m. Its shape pictures a person pointing at a second person with the left hand.
ᱣaaw, wU+1C63 Ol Chiki letter aaw. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. Letter 10 of 30: row 2 of the chart, place 5. Sound IPA w, v. Its shape pictures opening lips.
ᱜag, gU+1C5C Ol Chiki letter ag. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. Letter 3 of 30: row 1 of the chart, place 3. Sound IPA g. Its shape pictures a mouth being sick.
Show all 72 letters (67 more)
Letters, continued
ᱞal, lU+1C5E Ol Chiki letter al. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. Letter 5 of 30: row 1 of the chart, place 5. Sound IPA l. Its shape pictures a hand holding a pen, for writing. The name also means writing in Santali.
ᱝang, ṃU+1C5D Ol Chiki letter ang. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. Letter 4 of 30: row 1 of the chart, place 4. Sound IPA ŋ. Its shape pictures blowing air.
ᱛat, tU+1C5B Ol Chiki letter at. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. Letter 2 of 30: row 1 of the chart, place 2. Sound IPA t. Its shape pictures the Earth.
ᱰedd, ḍU+1C70 Ol Chiki letter edd. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. Letter 23 of 30: row 5 of the chart, place 3. Sound IPA ɖ. Its shape pictures a man with both legs drawn up towards his chest.
ᱱen, nU+1C71 Ol Chiki letter en. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. Letter 24 of 30: row 5 of the chart, place 4. Sound IPA n. Its shape pictures threshing grain with both legs.
ᱯep, pU+1C6F Ol Chiki letter ep. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. Letter 22 of 30: row 5 of the chart, place 2. Sound IPA p. Its shape pictures a person receiving with both hands.
ᱲerr, ṛU+1C72 Ol Chiki letter err. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. Letter 25 of 30: row 5 of the chart, place 5. Sound IPA ɽ. Its shape pictures a path bending round an obstacle.
ᱦih, ẖU+1C66 Ol Chiki letter ih. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. Letter 13 of 30: row 3 of the chart, place 3. Sound IPA ʔ, h. Its shape pictures hands held up.
ᱧiny, ñU+1C67 Ol Chiki letter iny. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. Letter 14 of 30: row 3 of the chart, place 4. Sound IPA ɲ. Its shape pictures a person pointing at themselves with the left hand.
ᱨir, rU+1C68 Ol Chiki letter ir. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. Letter 15 of 30: row 3 of the chart, place 5. Sound IPA r. Its shape pictures a sickle.
ᱥis, sU+1C65 Ol Chiki letter is. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. Letter 12 of 30: row 3 of the chart, place 2. Sound IPA s. Its shape pictures a plough.
ᱚla, aU+1C5A Ol Chiki letter la. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. Letter 1 of 30: row 1 of the chart, the vowel that opens it. Sound IPA ɔ. Its shape pictures a burning fire.
ᱟlaa, āU+1C5F Ol Chiki letter laa. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. Letter 6 of 30: row 2 of the chart, the vowel that opens it. Sound IPA a. Its shape pictures work in a field with a spade.
ᱮle, eU+1C6E Ol Chiki letter le. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. Letter 21 of 30: row 5 of the chart, the vowel that opens it. Sound IPA e. Its shape pictures a river that overflows and changes course.
ᱤli, iU+1C64 Ol Chiki letter li. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. Letter 11 of 30: row 3 of the chart, the vowel that opens it. Sound IPA i. Its shape pictures a bending tree.
ᱳlo, oU+1C73 Ol Chiki letter lo. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. Letter 26 of 30: row 6 of the chart, the vowel that opens it. Sound IPA o. Its shape pictures the mouth as it says the letter.
ᱩlu, uU+1C69 Ol Chiki letter lu. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. Letter 16 of 30: row 4 of the chart, the vowel that opens it. Sound IPA u. Its shape pictures a vessel for preparing food.
ᱵob, bU+1C75 Ol Chiki letter ob. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. Letter 28 of 30: row 6 of the chart, place 3. Sound IPA b. Its shape pictures curly hair.
ᱷoh, hU+1C77 Ol Chiki letter oh. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. Letter 30 of 30: row 6 of the chart, place 5. Sound IPA ʰ. Its shape pictures a man who throws something one-handed. After a consonant it writes aspiration: ᱛᱷ is th.
ᱴott, ṭU+1C74 Ol Chiki letter ott. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. Letter 27 of 30: row 6 of the chart, place 2. Sound IPA ʈ. Its shape pictures a camel's hump.
ᱶov, ṅU+1C76 Ol Chiki letter ov. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. Letter 29 of 30: row 6 of the chart, place 4. Sound IPA w̃. A nasal sound.
ᱪuch, cU+1C6A Ol Chiki letter uc. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. Letter 17 of 30: row 4 of the chart, place 2. The article spells the name uch; Unicode has uc. Sound IPA c. Its shape pictures a mountain peak.
ᱫud, dU+1C6B Ol Chiki letter ud. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. Letter 18 of 30: row 4 of the chart, place 3. Sound IPA d. Its shape pictures a mushroom or an umbrella.
ᱬunn, ṇU+1C6C Ol Chiki letter unn. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. Letter 19 of 30: row 4 of the chart, place 4. Sound IPA ɳ. Its shape pictures a flying bee.
ᱭuy, yU+1C6D Ol Chiki letter uy. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. Letter 20 of 30: row 4 of the chart, place 5. Sound IPA j. Its shape pictures a man bending to the ground to cut something.
Aspirated pairs 11
ᱵᱷbhU+1C75 U+1C77. Ol Chiki letter ob and Ol Chiki letter oh, written one after the other. Sound IPA bʱ.
ᱪᱷchU+1C6A U+1C77. Ol Chiki letter uc and Ol Chiki letter oh, written one after the other. Sound IPA cʰ.
ᱫᱷdhU+1C6B U+1C77. Ol Chiki letter ud and Ol Chiki letter oh, written one after the other. Sound IPA dʱ.
ᱰᱷḍhU+1C70 U+1C77. Ol Chiki letter edd and Ol Chiki letter oh, written one after the other. Sound IPA ɖʱ.
ᱜᱷghU+1C5C U+1C77. Ol Chiki letter ag and Ol Chiki letter oh, written one after the other. Sound IPA gʱ.
ᱡᱷjhU+1C61 U+1C77. Ol Chiki letter aaj and Ol Chiki letter oh, written one after the other. Sound IPA jʱ.
ᱠᱷkhU+1C60 U+1C77. Ol Chiki letter aak and Ol Chiki letter oh, written one after the other. Sound IPA kʰ.
ᱯᱷphU+1C6F U+1C77. Ol Chiki letter ep and Ol Chiki letter oh, written one after the other. Sound IPA pʰ.
ᱲᱷṛhU+1C72 U+1C77. Ol Chiki letter err and Ol Chiki letter oh, written one after the other. Sound IPA ɽʱ.
ᱛᱷthU+1C5B U+1C77. Ol Chiki letter at and Ol Chiki letter oh, written one after the other. Sound IPA tʰ.
ᱴᱷṭhU+1C74 U+1C77. Ol Chiki letter ott and Ol Chiki letter oh, written one after the other. Sound IPA ʈʰ.
Vowels with a mark 13
ᱚᱹDotted laU+1C5A U+1C79. Ol Chiki letter la and the baseline dot, Ol Chiki gaahlaa ttuddaag. An extra vowel of the Santal Parganas dialect, written o̠. Sound IPA ɔ. Rarely used.
ᱟᱹDotted laaU+1C5F U+1C79. Ol Chiki letter laa and the baseline dot, Ol Chiki gaahlaa ttuddaag. An extra vowel of the Santal Parganas dialect, written ạ. Sound IPA ə.
ᱮᱹDotted leU+1C6E U+1C79. Ol Chiki letter le and the baseline dot, Ol Chiki gaahlaa ttuddaag. An extra vowel of the Santal Parganas dialect, written e̠. Sound IPA ɛ.
ᱮᱻLong leU+1C6E U+1C7B. Ol Chiki letter le and the length mark, Ol Chiki relaa. Sound IPA eː. The mark can follow any vowel, nasal or not.
ᱚᱺNasal dotted laU+1C5A U+1C7A. Ol Chiki letter la and the double dot, Ol Chiki mu-gaahlaa ttuddaag: the extra vowel made nasal. Sound IPA ɔ̃.
ᱟᱺNasal dotted laaU+1C5F U+1C7A. Ol Chiki letter laa and the double dot, Ol Chiki mu-gaahlaa ttuddaag: the extra vowel made nasal. Sound IPA ə̃.
ᱮᱺNasal dotted leU+1C6E U+1C7A. Ol Chiki letter le and the double dot, Ol Chiki mu-gaahlaa ttuddaag: the extra vowel made nasal. Sound IPA ɛ̃.
ᱚᱸNasal laU+1C5A U+1C78. Ol Chiki letter la and the raised dot, Ol Chiki mu ttuddag, which makes the vowel nasal. Sound IPA ɔ̃. ALA-LC writes am̐.
ᱟᱸNasal laaU+1C5F U+1C78. Ol Chiki letter laa and the raised dot, Ol Chiki mu ttuddag, which makes the vowel nasal. Sound IPA ã. ALA-LC writes ām̐.
ᱮᱸNasal leU+1C6E U+1C78. Ol Chiki letter le and the raised dot, Ol Chiki mu ttuddag, which makes the vowel nasal. Sound IPA ẽ. ALA-LC writes em̐.
ᱤᱸNasal liU+1C64 U+1C78. Ol Chiki letter li and the raised dot, Ol Chiki mu ttuddag, which makes the vowel nasal. Sound IPA ĩ. ALA-LC writes im̐.
ᱳᱸNasal loU+1C73 U+1C78. Ol Chiki letter lo and the raised dot, Ol Chiki mu ttuddag, which makes the vowel nasal. Sound IPA õ. ALA-LC writes om̐.
ᱩᱸNasal luU+1C69 U+1C78. Ol Chiki letter lu and the raised dot, Ol Chiki mu ttuddag, which makes the vowel nasal. Sound IPA ũ. ALA-LC writes um̐.
Marks 8
ᱽAhadU+1C7D Ol Chiki ahad. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. Written after ag, aaj, ih, ud or ob. At the end of a word ᱜ alone is a checked k, and ᱜᱽ is a voiced g. ALA-LC writes it as an apostrophe.
᱿Double mucạdU+1C7F Ol Chiki punctuation double mucaad. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. A major break, used in verse.
ᱹGạhlạ ṭuḍạgU+1C79 Ol Chiki gaahlaa ttuddaag. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. A baseline dot after la, laa or le: one of the three extra vowels of the Santal Parganas dialect.
ᱺMũ gạhlạ ṭuḍạgU+1C7A Ol Chiki mu-gaahlaa ttuddaag. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. Both dots in one sign: an extra vowel made nasal.
ᱸMũ ṭuḍạgU+1C78 Ol Chiki mu ttuddag. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. A raised dot after a vowel: the vowel is nasal.
᱾MucạdU+1C7E Ol Chiki punctuation mucaad. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. Ends a sentence in place of a full stop, which is not used because it looks like the baseline dot. The article calls it a minor break.
ᱼPharkaU+1C7C Ol Chiki phaarkaa. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. A short line after ag, aaj, ud or ob: the letter keeps its checked sound, even at the start of a word.
ᱻRelaU+1C7B Ol Chiki relaa. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. A wavy line after a vowel: the vowel is long.
Digits 10
᱐Ol Chiki 0U+1C50 Ol Chiki digit zero. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. The digit 0.
᱑Ol Chiki 1U+1C51 Ol Chiki digit one. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. The digit 1.
᱒Ol Chiki 2U+1C52 Ol Chiki digit two. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. The digit 2.
᱓Ol Chiki 3U+1C53 Ol Chiki digit three. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. The digit 3.
᱔Ol Chiki 4U+1C54 Ol Chiki digit four. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. The digit 4.
᱕Ol Chiki 5U+1C55 Ol Chiki digit five. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. The digit 5.
᱖Ol Chiki 6U+1C56 Ol Chiki digit six. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. The digit 6.
᱗Ol Chiki 7U+1C57 Ol Chiki digit seven. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. The digit 7.
᱘Ol Chiki 8U+1C58 Ol Chiki digit eight. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. The digit 8.
᱙Ol Chiki 9U+1C59 Ol Chiki digit nine. Ol Chiki block, Unicode 5.1. The digit 9.
How this list was compiled: Every character was checked against UnicodeData.txt, version 18.0.0 (https://www.unicode.org/Public/18.0.0/ucd/UnicodeData.txt): the code points and the character names in the notes come from that file, names in sentence case. Block names come from Blocks.txt (https://www.unicode.org/Public/18.0.0/ucd/Blocks.txt) and the Unicode version each character arrived in from DerivedAge.txt (https://www.unicode.org/Public/18.0.0/ucd/DerivedAge.txt), both version 18.0.0. Other names of a character come from NamesList.txt, version 18.0.0 (https://www.unicode.org/Public/18.0.0/ucd/NamesList.txt). The 30 letters stand in the order of their code points, which is the order of the chart: the proposal that brought the script into Unicode, document L2/05-243R (https://www.unicode.org/L2/L2005/05243r-n2984-ol-chiki.pdf), says the characters are arranged in a matrix of five by six and that the first character of each row is a vowel. The exemplar characters of CLDR's Santali locale (https://github.com/unicode-org/cldr/blob/main/common/main/sat.xml) are the same 30 letters in the same order, followed by the six marks, and its number characters are the ten digits. The name of each letter, its sound in the International Phonetic Alphabet, the Latin letter beside the name, which is the ALA-LC romanization, and what the shape of the letter pictures follow the letter table of Wikipedia's Ol Chiki script article (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ol_Chiki_script); the pictures are restated in this site's own words. One name differs: the article has uch where Unicode has uc. The 11 aspirated pairs, the vowels with a mark and their sounds, the names of the marks and what each mark does follow the same article, checked against section 13.10 of the Unicode Standard, version 17.0 (https://www.unicode.org/versions/Unicode17.0.0/core-spec/chapter-13/). The Latin spelling of an aspirated pair is the ALA-LC letter of its first letter and h. Every character of the Ol Chiki block, U+1C50 to U+1C7F, is on the page. The tile names of the vowels with a mark, of the digits and the grouping are this site's own. Each tile was drawn on 2026-10-09 before it was kept, and all of them drew. All sources were read on 2026-10-09. Licence: own work