Manchu

The system was written cursively with ink brush, at the time even beginning to compete with Chinese logograms for calligraphy and official purposes. The alphabet contained a series of extra letters to represent Mandarin phonemes and tones, so it was also an accurate representation of Chinese. Like Mongolian, Manchu characters could have up to four forms; initial, medial, final, and separate. There were also several ligatures for writing common short words. Diacritics were used to distinguish certain similar looking letters and unique circumstances such as a nasal phoneme before a vowel or affrictives.

Man*chu" (?), a. [Written also Manchoo, Mantchoo, etc.]

Of or pertaining to Manchuria or its inhabitants.

n.

A native or inhabitant of Manchuria; also, the language spoken by the Manchus.

© Webster 1913.