Whatever Happened to Kharosthi?

The Fate of a Forgotten Indic Script

Abstract

The Kharosthi script tends to be viewed as a minor node on the family tree of Indian scripts; a sort of stepsister to the much better known and more influential complex of scripts that are conventionally grouped under the name ‘Brahmi’. However more evidence is emerging that this script was the medium for quite a voluminous Buddhist literature as well as being employed in bureaucratic contexts.