The Maritese alphabet

The Maritese alphabet (maritēsi omēya, ꭒʚɔᴜȴɞ̃ʃᴜ oꭒɞ̃ȷʚ) is an alphabetic writing system used to write Maritese, the only surviving language of the Xayandic language family.

It is modelled after the Xayandic proto-writing system, which eventually became alphabetic and cursive owing to the invention and popularity of the papyrus, giving shape to the script's current letter shapes.

The Maritese alphabet has 40 letters, which are the following:


In addition, two diacritics are used: the tilde (  ̃) is used for primary stress, whereas the diaeresis (  ̈) denotes secondary stress. All Maritese words display at least the tilde, except for those which are monosyllabical. Exceptionally long words use the diaeresis as well, as there are multiple stresses within them. In Latin-alphabet renderings of Maritese, the tilde is replaced with a macron (  ̄), whereas the diaeresis is used in both alphabetical renderings.

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