The Samaritan alphabet is a direct descendant of the paleo-Hebrew variety of the Phoenician alphabet, the more commonly known Hebrew alphabet having been adapted from the Aramaic alphabet under the Persian Empire. Large parts of the Old Testament were originally penned in this script. Among the Jews it saw a short revival during the Hasmonean Kingdom. The Tetragrammaton was often still written in this script for some time after the current Hebrew alphabet was adopted among the Jews.
Today, it is used by the Samaritans for religious writings, including their (slightly different) version of the Pentateuch. It is used by them for writings in their dialect of Hebrew and also for commentaries and translations in Samaritan Aramaic and even Arabic.
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