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A dot above a letter suppressing its vowel.
Also known as: Tamil virama, Tamil vowel killer
In Tamil the pulli is a dot placed above a consonant to suppress its inherent vowel. It is Tamil's virama, and unlike most Brahmic scripts Tamil writes it as a dot above rather than a stroke below.
Suppresses the inherent vowel of the Tamil consonant it sits above.
Contexts: Language and transcription
Is written above the letter where most Brahmic scripts write their virama below, one of several ways Tamil's orthography stands apart within the family.
Contexts: Language and transcription
Belongs to the device that makes an abugida work at all: in these scripts a consonant letter carries an inherent vowel, and without a mark to suppress it no consonant cluster and no word-final consonant could be written.
Contexts: Language and transcription
A single small dot placed centrally above the consonant letter it modifies.