The Sarati was an alphabet and writing system invented in Valinor by Rúmil of Tirion. In later years, Fëanor modeled the ubiquitous Tengwar script on the Sarati. Unlike the Tengwar and the Cirth, the Sarati is written in several different directions, though the most prominent is from top to bottom. Others are left to right, right to left, and boustrophedon.
Each full character represents a consonant and, as in Tengwar, vowels are represented with diacritics. These vowel signs are written to the left (or sometimes right) of the consonants in vertical writing, above (and sometimes below) in horizontal writing. J.R.R. Tolkien stated that consonants were considered more salient than vowels, which were regarded as merely modifiers. When writing Quenya, the sign for "a", the most common Quenyan vowel, is usually omitted, technically make the Sarati an abugida with "a" as an inherent vowel.
