Sample Characters
First 48 characters from Adlam (U+1E900–U+1E95F)
About Adlam
The Adlam script (𞤀𞤣𞤤𞤢𞤥, Fulfulde: 𞤀𞤣𞤤𞤢𞤥) was created in the 1980s by brothers Ibrahima and Abdoulaye Barry of Guinea to write the Fula (Fulfulde) language, one of West Africa's most widely spoken languages. The name ADLAM is an acronym from the Fula phrase meaning 'the alphabet that will protect the peoples from extinction.'
Adlam is a right-to-left script with 28 letters and was designed specifically for Fula phonology. It was added to Unicode in 2016 and is gaining adoption through smartphone apps and digital literacy campaigns across West and Central Africa.
Data sourced from the ISO 15924 registry, Unicode CLDR, and the Unicode Character Database.
Script Family & Lineage
Frequently Asked Questions
What type of writing system is Adlam?
What direction does Adlam read?
How many languages use the Adlam script?
When was the Adlam script created?
Compare Adlam With Another Script
Direction, characters, languages — side by side.
Key Facts
- ISO Code
- Adlm
- ISO Number
- 166
- Script Type
- Alphabet
- Direction
- Right-to-left
- Status
- Living
- Region
- African
- Characters
- 88
- Introduced
- 1958 CE
- Languages
- 0
Unicode Ranges
-
AdlamU+1E900–U+1E95F