The earliest traces of
epigraphy in the
Indian Subcontinent are found in the undeciphered inscriptions of the
Indus Valley Civilization (
Indus script), which date back to the early 3rd millennium BC. Two other important archeological classes of symbols are found from the 1st millennium BCE,
Megalithic Graffiti Symbols and symbols on
punch-marked coins, though most scholars do not consider these to constitute fully linguistic scripts, and their
semiotic functions are not well understood. The earliest deciphered epigraphic inscriptions of significant length are the
Edicts of Ashoka of the 3rd century BCE, written in forms of
Prakrit in the
Brahmi script.
Jain inscriptions in
Sri Lanka and
South India written in
Tamil-Brahmi,
Bhattiprolu alphabet and the
Kadamba alphabet are also of relatively early date, though not as old as the Ashoka inscriptions. Short Brahmi inscriptions on potsherds from the 4th century BCE have been reported from the ruins of
Anuradhapura and are the only pre-Ashokan examples of Brahmi that have received any scholarly acceptance, though reports have appeared in the Indian press claiming potsherd inscriptions from an even earlier period (6th to 4th century BCE).