Old Hylian syllabary

Origin

The Hylian syllabary is a script used in the computer games, Legend of Zelda, specifically the game The Legend of Zelda; The Ocarina of time and The Legend of Zelda; Majora's Mask. An unknown graphics artist developed the script for the Ninitendo games for the purpose of writing signs and other written elements in the game in its own unique script. Most of the translated signs are written in Japanese which probably influenced the design of the script.

Notable features

The Script is a syllabic cipher code of the Japanese kana syllabaries and consists of C and CV syllables.
Unlike the kana syllabaries the script has no system of diacritcs indicating voiced consonants, the are just written with the voiceless characters. Similarly the Cy and double consonant combination (with 'tsu') are not graphically distinguished by shrinking the y and tsu characters.
The script is primarily written horizontally left to right, top to bottom, but can also be reversed and written in the opposite direction: right to left with the letters flipped horizontally.
Some of the letters in the syllabary are related in shape and form to their kana and romaji counterparts though most of the letters are uniquely designed.
There are no spaces between words, only sentences.

Used to write

Hylian (Hairugo). A form of Japanese, spoken in the fictional land of Hyrule.

Hylian syllabary

Cy consonant combinations, extra letters and notes

Sample text

Transliteration - Zeruda no Densetsu: Taimu no Okarina
Translation - The Legend of Zelda: the Ocarina of Time

The information on this page was put together by Greig Isles with additional information from Pipian. If you have any questions about the Hylian script, please contact Greig at: greig_isles@yahoo.co.uk

Download an Old hylian font (47K)