Philippine Scripts - Characteristics

Characteristics

The most interesting paleographic peculiar characteristic of ancient Philippine scripts is its being traditionally written from bottom to top, with the succeeding lines following on the right. However, when the Spaniards attempted to use the script in their desire to spread Roman Catholicism, like printing the Doctrina Cristiana in the Tagalog language and script, the direction of writing was changed and consequently the axis of the symbols also changed. These changes may be described in brief: "the direction of writing proceeded from left to right, with the succeeding lines written below the previous line; while the axis of the symbols was rotated to a ninety degree position, in which the symbols for i and u in composition with any consonant became above and below, respectively. In the traditional position, the i and u were on the right and left, respectively, of the consonant with which they are composed."

In general, there are two observable features of the ancient Philippine scripts. These include:

• the curvi-linear character -
  • Tagbanwa alphabet
  • Tagalog script
  • Iloko
• the lineo-angular trait -
• Hanunó'o script

The scripts found in the Samar-Leyte area as reported by Alzina straddle the two categories-they show both lineo-angular and curvi-linear features.