Gallifreyan (language)

Various forms of written Gallifreyan have appeared. By the time of the Doctor, the archaic Old High Gallifreyan language spoken in the days of Rassilon had given way to a more contemporary form of the language. (DW: The Five Doctors)

This later "vulgate" was presumably the Doctor's native language.

File:Written gallifreyan1.jpg

An example of Gallifreyan script written by the Fourth Doctor. (DW: The Deadly Assassin)

File:Home-box.jpg

The Home Box discovered by The Eleventh Doctor. (DW: The Time of Angels)

Examples

Old High Gallifreyan

Main article: High Gallifreyan

• Two Time Lords looked at a visual archival of information on the Third Doctor which displayed both a photo and writing. (DW: Colony in Space)
• A vaguely Arabic-looking script, in a letter written by the Fourth Doctor to warn the High Council of an assassination. (DW: The Deadly Assassin)

An example of the second type of writing: interlocking/overlapping circles. (Note the Tenth Doctor's handwritten note in the upper right corner.) (DW: Utopia)

• The Seventh Doctor left a note for the Supreme Dalek in a script other than English. This included the Doctor's "name" Theta Sigma in Greek. (DW: Remembrance of the Daleks)

This implies that the Renegade Daleks would know how to interpret Gallifreyan writing.

• The Eleventh Doctor finds a Home Box in a museum with symbols carved into it, which he describes as Old High Gallifreyan. He states the message reads "Hello Sweetie" (DW: The Time of Angels)

Circular Gallifreyan

• A complex system of interlocking circles was used by the Doctor's TARDIS output screens in "coral desktop theme" mode and was the one seen in the notes that the Doctor scattered around the console room. (DW: Rose onwards)

Previous to this, we had seen the TARDIS' displays, when they appeared, in English.

• Simpler handwritten circles appear on The Doctor's Betamax tape used to trap The Wire, and are scribbled over, presumably saying what the contents of the tape were at one time. (DW: The Idiot's Lantern)
• The Visionary wrote interlocking circles, which Rassilon and the other Time Lords could understand. One of the words was "Earth" (DW: The End of Time)

External links

• "Old High Gallifreyan", an article by Jon Preddle on Gallifreyan writing as it appeared in the series pre-2005