Tata-tonga

Tata-tonga (Mongolian: Тататунга, Mongolian script: ᠲᠠᠲᠠᠲᠤᠩᠭ᠎ᠠ, Tatatungү‑a; Uyghur: تاتاتوڭا‎; Chinese: 塔塔统阿; pinyin: Tǎtǎ-tǒng'ā) was a Yugur man involved in bringing and adapting the Old Uyghur alphabet to Mongolia in the Mongolian script (Mongol bichig or hudum bichig). He was captured by Genghis Khan in the 13th century and soon taught the Old Uyghur alphabet to members of the court and adapted it to Khalkha Mongolian, although Genghis himself never learned it.

The Uyghur script was used in Mongolia until its independence from Qing China at the beginning of the 20th century and few years before Russia introduced the Cyrillic script. It is still used mainly in Inner Mongolia. In current day Mongolia, Cyrillic is the official script for the Mongolian language and the traditional script is referred to as the Old Mongol script (Mongolian: Хуучин монгол бичиг). Today, an estimated six million Mongolian people in China can still read the traditional Mongolian script but only three million from Mongolia.

The Manchu alphabet was derived since the very end of the 16th century from this Mongolian script.

Sources

• de Hartog, Leo "Genghis Khan, Conqueror of the World"