One of the most pervasive religious symbols in traditional Thailand culture is the "unalom" (อุณาโลม). I was wondering whether it might be appropriate to encode this in Unicode.
Visually, it looks like KHOMUT U+0E58, rotated 90 degrees counterclockwise, and then reflected about its vertical axis (so that the spiral is right-handed rather than left-handed). However, the semantics are unrelated. KHOMUT marks the end of a chapter or document, whereas unalom is a religious, auspicious symbol. More specifically, unalom represents the tuft of white hair curling from a mole between the eyebrows of the Buddha [1], and thus symbolises enlightenment. It is related to the concept of a third eye. The word อุณาโลม is a compound of อุณา, derived from the Sanskrit word urna, and Pali word unna, which literally mean wool but are also used to refer to auspicious marks on the forehead of the Buddha. The unalom is widespread in Thailand. For example, the Thai Red Cross Society was originally founded as the Red Unalom Society, and its logo was a red Unalom combined with a cross. It forms the main component of the seal of Rama I (founder of the current Thai Royal dynasty). It is even part of the logo for the Royal Thai Army. The unalom used in Thai Buddhist culture in similar ways to how a cross is used in Western Christian culture. The Royal Institute Thai Dictionary (the authoritative dictionary for the Thai language) has an entry for unalom showing the symbol: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BrdB2IsCYAAu4gP.jpg:large One issue is whether this ought to be encoded in the Thai block or as a non-script specific symbol. The concept of an auspicious mark on the forehead of the Buddha is common feature of Buddhist art and culture. However, the exact form of the mark varies: sometimes is a circular dot and sometimes a spiral. The Thai form of the unalom is also found in other South-East Asian countries bordering Thailand (Laos, Myanmar, Cambodia). My inclination would be to include it in the Thai block, on the basis that it needs to harmonize typographically with U+0E58, and that Khmer has its own separate version of khomut (U+17DA). Devanagari om U+0950 is a precedent for encoding a religious symbol in a script block. In fact, some scholars consider the unalom or urna to be representation of the om sound [1]. Since it is not a character (in the sense of being part of the Thai writing system), the name should probably be "THAI UNALOM". James [1] Buddhist Sculpture of Northern Thailand, Carol Stratton http://books.google.com/books?id=EVpSSigMi4cC&lpg=PA50&ots=v8uqIcyyFX&dq=urna%20unalom&pg=PA50#v=onepage&q&f=false
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