Mongolian

ᠮᠣᠩᠭᠣᠯ ᠪᠢᠴᠢᠭ
Mong Top-to-bottom Living Central Asian
Sample Text
ᠰᠠᠢᠨ ᠪᠠᠶᠢᠨᠠ ᠤᠤ

Sample Characters

First 48 characters from Mongolian (U+1800–U+18AA)

About Mongolian

The Mongolian script (ᠮᠣᠩᠭᠣᠯ ᠪᠢᠴᠢᠭ) is one of the few scripts in the world written vertically, from top to bottom, in columns that read from left to right. It was adopted by the Mongols around the 13th century CE from the Old Uyghur script (which itself descended from Sogdian and Aramaic).

The Mongolian script is still used as the official script in Inner Mongolia (China), while Mongolia itself switched to the Cyrillic script under Soviet influence in the 1940s. Efforts to restore the traditional script are ongoing in Mongolia. The script was used to write the Secret History of the Mongols, the oldest surviving Mongol literary work.

Data sourced from the ISO 15924 registry, Unicode CLDR, and the Unicode Character Database.

Script Family & Lineage

Ancestor Chain
Phoenician Imperial Aramaic Sogdian Old Uyghur Mongolian

Languages Using Mongolian 1

Frequently Asked Questions

What type of writing system is Mongolian?
Mongolian is a writing system registered in the ISO 15924 standard under the code Mong.
What direction does Mongolian read?
Mongolian is written Top-to-bottom, meaning text flows from top to bottom in vertical columns.
How many languages use the Mongolian script?
1 language use Mongolian according to Unicode CLDR data.
When was the Mongolian script created?
The Mongolian script originated around 1204 CE.

Compare Mongolian With Another Script

Direction, characters, languages — side by side.

Key Facts

ISO Code
Mong
ISO Number
145
Direction
Top-to-bottom
Status
Living
Region
Central Asian
Characters
168
Introduced
1204 CE
Languages
1

Unicode Ranges

  • Mongolian
    U+1800–U+18AA
  • Mongolian Supplement
    U+11660–U+1166C

Official Use In

MN CN