Standardized tone marking was not achieved until the 18th century. Much of the orthography in written Burmese today can be traced back to Middle Burmese. (Both Mon and Pyu scripts are derivatives of the Brāhmī script.) Burmese orthography originally followed a square format but the cursive format took hold from the 17th century when popular writing led to the wider use of palm leaves and folded paper known as parabaiks. The script was developed from either the Mon script in 1058 or the Pyu script in the 10th century. Written Burmese dates to the early Pagan period. Orthographic changes followed shifts in phonology rather than transformations in Burmese grammatical structure and phonology, which has not changed much from Old Burmese language to modern Burmese. Old Burmese dates from the 11th to the 16th century (Pagan and Ava dynasties) Middle Burmese from the 16th to the 18th century (Toungoo to early Konbaung dynasties) modern Burmese from the mid-18th century to the present. The development of the script followed that of the Burmese language translation, which is generally divided into Old Burmese, Middle Burmese and modern Burmese. Tone markings and vowel modifications are written as diacritics placed to the left, right, top, and bottom of letters. The consonants are arranged into six consonant groups based on articulation, like other Brahmi scripts. Characterized by its circular letters and diacritics, the script is an abugida, with all letters having an inherent vowel.

It requires no spaces between words, although modern writing usually contains spaces after each clause to enhance readability. The Burmese alphabet consists of 33 letters and 12 vowels, and is written from left to right.

Bengali alphabet with burmese