Imatto-canna

Imatto-canna (also written Imatto canna or Jamatto canna) was a false Japanese syllabary reported by the German traveller Engelbert Kaempfer in his book Amoenitatum exoticarum politico-physico-medicarum fasciculi V. (1712).

He wrote that Japan had three syllabaries: firo-canna (hiragana) and catta-canna (katakana), both used by commons, and imatto-canna, used by nobles.

However, the imatto-canna he believed to exist were just variant forms of hiragana called hentaigana.

Being hentaigana, they did not make up a cohesive or independent writing system, and were in often free variation with other hiragana characters.

Imatto-canna was probably his transliteration of the word yamato-gana, which actually means kana in general, both hiragana and katakana.