Tamil-Brahmi · the script of the earliest Tamil inscriptions

Brahmi Lab

Type a name or any text in Tamil, English letters, Hindi, Telugu, Malayalam or other scripts — see it in Tamil-Brahmi. Paste Brahmi to read it back in Tamil. Everything runs in your browser; nothing is uploaded.

1 · Your text

Reads as

Early style: no pulli (as in the oldest inscriptions) Tamil sounds only (fold Sanskrit letters) Keep word spaces

Typing tips for English letters

Use th for த, zh for ழ, sh for ஷ, ng for ங, nj for ஞ. Capitals inside a word give the retroflex letters: N ண, L ள, R ற, T ட, and long vowels A E I O U (or aa ee oo). Scholarly marks work too: ā ī ū ē ō ṭ ṇ ḷ ḻ ṟ ṅ ñ ṣ ś. Example: Cōḻa → சோழ, kaNNan → கண்ணன். You can always fix the Tamil line below and re-convert.

2 · Tamil-Brahmi

Read as

Word by word

You typed	Tamil	Brahmi

Letter by letter — Unicode code points

Glyph	Code	Unicode name

Reference

The Tamil-Brahmi syllable chart

Every Tamil consonant with every vowel. Click a cell to copy that Brahmi syllable; hover for the Tamil and its Latin reading. In the earliest inscriptions the pulli (dot that removes the vowel) wasn’t used yet — an unmarked letter could be read with or without its “a”.

Vowels, extra letters & numerals

How this works — and where it’s simplified

Honest notes

Text is converted sound-by-sound, not translated: it doesn’t turn English words into Tamil words, it writes the sounds of your name in Tamil-Brahmi letters. To render a sentence, translate it into Tamil first, then paste the Tamil here.

The output uses Unicode’s Brahmi block (U+11000–1107F), which includes dedicated Old Tamil letters (ழ, ற, ன, ள, short எ/ஒ) and the Old Tamil pulli. The engine reads Tamil, the other Indic scripts (all map letter-for-letter), and Latin, Cyrillic and Greek by sound.

Simplifications: real inscriptions vary by region and century, used no spaces, and wrote geminate consonants and clusters inconsistently. Use this for learning, names and art — not as an epigraphic transcription. Letters Tamil doesn’t have (ஜ ஷ ஸ ஹ, aspirates) are kept by default, or folded into native Tamil letters with “Tamil sounds only”.

You need a font that draws Brahmi. This site loads the free Semmozhi Brahmi font automatically; on your own documents, download it first.