Blackfoot writing systems
Originally, the Blackfoot language used a syllabary, but, nowadays the Latin alphabet is more and more used. It had its own syllabary developed in the 1880s, but it also later used the Plains Cree syllabary.
Blackfoot syllabary
[edit | edit source]The Blackfoot syllabary was developed by John Williams Tims, an Anglican missionary, between 1883 and 1895. It was based on the Ojibwe syllabary developed by James Evans.
Unlike letters of an alphabet, each character in a syllabary represents a syllable. For example, the syllable "pa" written in Latin alphabet uses two letters, "p" and "a", while in the Blackfoot syllabary this syllable is represented by only one character.