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Nowadays, katakana tends to be used for gairaigo and onomatopoeia, while
hiragana tends to be used for native Japanese words. This is a slight
simplification - more information is available
[here](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/a/3987/91).

However, English loanwords weren't a major concern when they were originally
created. What were the main motivations for creating the two kana (or possibly
more?) rather than just one?
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history kana hiragana katakana
Why was both katakana and hiragana created?
There was a really interesting program on TV recently about the development
about the Japanese language, both written and spoken. Some details I remember
off the top of my head regarding this is that it was young women who preferred
writing hiragana and warlords preferred katakana. Their reasons seemed to be
pretty similar. Women liked hiragana because they were easier than kanji and
warlords used katakana because it was quicker.

Well let me not bore you with just describing it in words. I actually
apparently found a video link to the whole episode. Highly recommended to
people on this site.

<http://veohdownload.blog37.fc2.com/blog-entry-12588.html>
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_Potentially controversial answer_

From what I remember being told (by a Japanese friend of mine), all of the
Kana where invented by a single woman or a small group of women. I'm not sure
on the validity of this, as it seems to be a hot topic with Japanese scholars.

As far as I'm aware, the Kana where both developed to aid in the study of
Kanji. Since most kanji have multiple readings, it would make it easier for
novice learners to remember the phonetic pronunciations of Kanji using a
simple key.

**PERSONAL OPINION SECTION STARTS HERE**

I feel as though Hiragana uses shapes that are very similar to some elementary
Kanji. Since Kunyomi readings seem to be the simpler ones to remember (your
experience may differ), I'd say that shapes resembling the kanji where chosen
for Hiragana for that purpose.

**PERSONAL OPINION SECTION ENDS HERE**

This might be why most systems use Katakan for onyomi readings and Hiragana
for kunyomi readings - at least, that's how I view it.

Looking at most of the Hiragana characters, it's easy to see why women would
have used them for writing, whereas Men would have used Katakana + Kanji (as
has been pointed out by others)

The other thing to remember - as with most cultures - the skill of reading was
usually taught to those who had the ability to pay to be taught (it was,
usually seen as more of a privilege than a right, as it is these days). Thus,
children who were born to families with the means to educate them, and the
desire for them to reach high standing would pay for their children to study.

The consensus back then was that women had no place in the court, and the only
place for someone who was educated was - you guessed it - at court. So, men
would have be taught Kanji as part of their education in Chinese classics,
Confucianism, Buddhism and history; whereas Women would have not have been
taught such things.

I've no idea when, but at some point someone decided to invent a written
script so that they could communicate - which is where the theory that it was
a woman comes in. This implies that the person (or people) who invented the
Kana where of high standing (otherwise they'd have to toil all day), and that
they needed to communicate, in writing, with someone who was educated -
probably a Husband or Father, due to the history of "Kidnapping" one's
opponent's family members (again, this is speculation on my part).

this would also enable the Wives, Sisters and Mothers of the men of the court
to educate eat other, and learn to read Kanji, This, in and of itself, would
give rise to women being able to read and write - which gave rise to things
like "The Tale of Genji".

I realise this answer is a little ramble-o-matic in nature, that I may have
skated around the topic, and that I haven't quoted any sources (I'm at work at
the minute, but I'll edit later on as and when I find evidence); so I
apologise if this isn't of a high enough standard to answer the original
question.
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As I understand the Japanese wikipedia articles:

Hiragana and katakana were both developed from 万葉仮名【まんようがな】, itself a phonetic
script using kanji for their readings. For hiragana, there was an intermediate
stage, 草仮名【そうがな】, a cursive style of 万葉仮名, and the continued simplification of
these characters lead to hiragana. Katakana, on the other hand, was initially
developed by Buddhist monks for a specific purpose: to provide annotations to
explain how to read Chinese texts in Japanese (和読【わどく】).

In some cases, both were used. For example, in 周易抄【しゅうえき】 (a text from 897年),
草仮名 were used for for annotations to do with meaning, whereas katakana were
used to provide readings. Because katakana was primarily used early on by
scholars as an aid to reading kanji, it gained a scholarly feel. Conversely
hiragana became used for poetry and personal material like letters.

The actual word 平仮名【ひらがな】 appears from the 16th century onwards and in fact 平
here takes the meaning of 普通【ふつう】, to differentiate it from 片仮名【かたかな】。 There
were also initially a number of variant forms of the kana, but these were
eventually standardised in 1900. The alternative forms are called
変体仮名【へんたいがな】.

As to other forms:

合略仮名【ごうりゃくがな】 : characters made by combining two or more kana, for example より
or こと, into a single unit. Used from the Edo period but use discontinued after
1900.
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It isn't 100 percent clear, but the following is the “well-established”
theory:

# Hiragana (平仮名)

As noted in your [other
question](https://japanese.stackexchange.com/questions/4958/were-women-unable-
to-learn-kanji-during-the-heian-era), hiragana was originally called 女手{おんなで}.
In the late Nara, early Heian periods,
[万葉仮名{まんようがな}](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Man%27y%C5%8Dgana) written in 草書体
(sosho style) was used for “unofficial” texts such as Japanese poems (和歌{わか}),
etc. From this 万葉仮名, women in the imperial courts (宮中の女官達) developed the
simplified writing style (女手 or what is now called “hiragana”). Originally, it
was mainly used by women (hence the name 女手), but because of its ease of use
compared to Chinese characters, men also began using it when writing. However,
“official” writing still used Chinese characters and hiragana was used mainly
among commoners (non-governmental people) and in poems and short stories, etc.
Also, the 平 of 平仮名 also comes from its “simplicity” and “general use”. You can
see it in words like 平易、平凡、平素, etc.

# Katakana (片仮名)

Now, katakana also originates from 万葉仮名, however it came into use first by
Buddhist monks. Also, unlike hiragana, it was not used as a separate writing
system from Chinese characters, but rather together with Chinese characters.
In order to read those difficult Buddhist scriptures (お経), Buddhist monks
would use katakana as a form of shorthand or annotation (called
[訓点](http://www.aozora.gr.jp/annotation/kunten.html)) as a supplement to the
Chinese characters. In this way, katakana became used in official documents
and for scholars, as Buddhism, 学問 and government was very closely related.
Since it mainly was used by men, some people referred to Chinese characters
and katakana as 男手 in contrast with hiragana (女手). Also, the 片 of 片仮名 comes
from the fact that “pieces” of Chinese characters were taken to develop the
writing system (and also there is implication that katakana is “temporary” in
the sense that it is only to supplement the Chinese characters).

So to answer your question, the reason that the two exist is because they were
created separately out of need at the time and they were originally used for
two different purposes ― hiragana for a common language separate from the
official writings (which used Chinese characters) and katakana as a supplement
to official writing (and other text that used Chinese characters).

# References

  * [日本語の起源](http://www.snap-tck.com/room04/c01/nihon/nihon04.html) << This site explains it way better than I do, so if someone took the time to translate this...
  * [なぜひらがなとカタカナと漢字が存在するのでしょうか](http://detail.chiebukuro.yahoo.co.jp/qa/question_detail/q139479478)
  * [Wikipedia-Man'yōgana](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Man%27y%C5%8Dgana)
  * [Wikipedia-Hiragana](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hiragana)
  * [Wikipedia-Katakana](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katakana)
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I think it is largely a myth that women invented _hiragana_. This myth likely
comes from the fact that the script was called 女手 _onnade_ or "women's hand",
and _katakana_ was called 男手 _otokode_ or "men's hand". _Hiragana_ was
probably called 女手 not because it was invented by women, but because they used
it exclusively to write — like in the Tale of Genji — because as you
mentioned, they were not literate in _kanji_.

We see many documents written by men at the time that mix _kanji_ , _katakana_
, and _hiragana_ , so _hiragana_ was not only used by women, but women only
knew how to use _hiragana_. The reason I say that women probably didn't invent
_hiragana_ is that were gradually simplified forms of _kanji_ called
_man'yōgana_ , and women didn't know _kanji_ , so how would they know how
those _kanji_ were pronounced?

Also, the Buddhist monk Kūkai is generally credited with making the _kana_.
While we know this isn't true, and that the creation of _hiragana_ was a
gradual process, he greatly sped up the process of making _kana_ by
introducing the first purely phonetic script, Siddham (still used in some
Buddhist temples in Japan today). By introducing Japan to the idea of
completely phonetic characters that didn't have any separate meaning attached,
the _kanji_ that had been used phonetically ( _man'yōgana_ ) could be
simplified and used as purely phonetic characters without any meaning attached
or alternative readings.
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