The Kannada script (IAST: Kannaḍa lipi; obsolete: Kanarese or Canarese script in English) is an abugida of the Brahmic family, used to write Kannada, one of the Dravidian languages of South India especially in the state of Karnataka. It is one of the official scripts of the Indian Republic. Kannada script is also widely used for writing Sanskrit texts in Karnataka. Several minor languages, such as Tulu, Konkani, Kodava, Sanketi and Beary, also use alphabets based on the Kannada script. The Kannada and Telugu scripts share very high mutual intellegibility with each other, and are often considered to be regional variants of single script. Other scripts similar to Kannada script are Sinhala script (which included some elements from the Kadamba script), and Old Peguan script (used in Burma). The Kannada script ( akṣaramāle or varṇamāle) is a phonemic abugida of forty-nine letters. The character set is almost identical to that of other Brahmic scripts. Consonantal letters imply an inherent vowel. Letters representing consonants are combined to form digraphs ( ottakṣara) when there is no intervening vowel. Otherwise, each letter corresponds to a syllable. The letters are classified into three categories: svara (vowels), vyañjana (consonants), and yōgavāhaka (semiconsonants). The Kannada words for a letter of the script are akshara, akkara, and varṇa. Each letter has its own form ( ākāra) and sound ( śabda), providing the visible and audible representations, respectively. Kannada is written from left to right. History The Brahmi script evolved into the Kadamba script by the 5th century, which in turn developed into the Kannada-Telugu script (or 'Old Kannada script') in the 7th century. The Kannada and Telugu scripts then separated by around 1300 C.E. Over the centuries some changes have been made to the Kannada script. These changes consist of: Modification of existing glyphs: In the early Kannada script, no orthographic distinction was made between the short mid , and long mid , . However, distinct signs were employed to denote the special consonants viz. the trill the retroflex lateral and the retroflex rhotic , by the 5th century. Introduction of new characters: Kannada script includes characters like , , , , , , , , , , and mahāprāṇa characters like , , , , , , , , , . The introduction was done so that Sanskrit (and loanwords into the Kannada language from the donor language Sanskrit) could be written using the Kannada script.