An 'abjad' is a script that has symbols for consonants, but not for vowels. For example, Hebrew: http://www.omniglot.com/writing/hebrew.htm
An abugida, or alphasyllabary, is, by contrast, a script in which diacrits are added to the symbols for consonants, to indicate which vowel is associated with them. For example, devanagari: http://www.omniglot.com/writing/devanagari.htm
A syllabary has symbols representing syllables as a whole. For example, katakana: http://www.omniglot.com/writing/japanese_katakana.htm
The other two main categories of script are, of course, alphabets and the semantic/phonetic scripts with symbols for whole words, such as Chinese.
-- Trotsky Gamer and Skeptic ------------------------------------------------------ Trotsky's RPG website: http://www.ttrotsky.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/
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