Thai
Type	Abugida
Spoken languages	Thai
Created by	King Ramkhamhaeng the Great
Time period	1283–present
Parent systems	Proto-Canaanite alphabet  → Phoenician alphabet   → Aramaic alphabet    → Brāhmī     → Pallava      → Khmer       → Thai
Child systems	Lao
Unicode range	U+0E00–U+0E7F
ISO 15924	Thai
Note: This page may contain IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. An abugida ( from Ge‘ez አቡጊዳ ’äbugida or Amharic አቡጊዳ ’abugida is a segmental Writing system which Thai (th ภาษาไทย, transcription: phasa thai, transliteration:; pʰāːsǎːtʰāj is the national and Ramkhamhaeng (c 1239 &ndash 1317 aka Pho Khun Ramkhamhaeng พ่อขุนรามคำแหงมหาราช was the third king of the Phra Ruang dynasty ruling the The Proto-Canaanite alphabet is a consonantal alphabet of twenty-two acrophonic glyphs found in Levantine texts of the Late Bronze Age (from ca The Phoenician alphabet is a continuation of the Proto-Canaanite alphabet, by convention taken to originate around 1050 BC The Aramaic alphabet is an Abjad, a Consonantal Alphabet, used for writing Aramaic. Brāhmī script refers to the oldest members of the Brahmic family of alphabets. Vatteluttu () or "rounded writing" is an Abugida Writing system originating from the Dravidian peoples of Southern India and The Khmer script (អក្ខរក្រមខេមរភាសា âkkhârâkrâm khémârâ phéasa informally aksar Khmer អក្សរខ្មែរ is used to write the The Lao script is used mainly to write the Lao language. The minority languages of Laos are also written in the Lao script and officially it is the only script Unicode ’s ISO 15924, Codes for the representation of names of scripts, defines two sets of codes for a number of Writing systems (scripts In Computing, Unicode is an Industry standard allowing Computers to consistently represent and manipulate text expressed in most of the world's

History of the alphabet
Middle Bronze Age 19 c. The history of the Alphabet begins in Ancient Egypt, more than a millennium into the History of writing. The Middle Bronze Age alphabets are two similar Undeciphered scripts dated to be from the Middle Bronze Age (2000-1500 BCE and believed to be ancestral BCE Ugaritic 15 c. The Ugaritic alphabet is a Cuneiform Abjad (alphabet without vowels used from around 1500 BCE for the Ugaritic language, an extinct BCE Phoenician 14–11 c. The Phoenician alphabet is a continuation of the Proto-Canaanite alphabet, by convention taken to originate around 1050 BC BCE Paleo-Hebrew 10 c. The Paleo-Hebrew alphabet, also know as Ktav Ivri, is an offshoot of the ancient Semitic alphabet (see the akin Phoenician alphabet) BCE Samaritan 6 c. The Samaritan alphabet is a direct descendant of the paleo-Hebrew variety of the Phoenician alphabet. BCE Aramaic 8 c. The Aramaic alphabet is an Abjad, a Consonantal Alphabet, used for writing Aramaic. BCE Brāhmī & Indic 6 c. Brāhmī script refers to the oldest members of the Brahmic family of alphabets. The Brahmic family is a family of syllabaries (writing systems used in South Asia, Southeast Asia, and parts of Central Asia and East Asia, BCE Tibetan 7 c. The Tibetan script is an Abugida of Indic origin used to write the Tibetan language as well as the Dzongkha language, Ladakhi language CE Khmer/Javanese 9 c. The Khmer script (អក្ខរក្រមខេមរភាសា âkkhârâkrâm khémârâ phéasa informally aksar Khmer អក្សរខ្មែរ is used to write the The Javanese script, natively known as Carakan ( Tjarakan) is the script originally used to write Javanese. CE Hebrew 3 c. The Hebrew alphabet (אָלֶף-בֵּית עִבְרִי alephbet ’ivri) consists of 22 letters used for writing the Hebrew language. BCE Syriac 2 c. The Syriac alphabet is a Writing system used to write the Syriac language from around the 2nd century BC. BCE Arabic 4 c. The Arabic alphabet is the script used for writing several languages of Asia and Africa such as Arabic, Persian, and Urdu. CE Pahlavi 3 c. BCE Avestan 4 c. The Avestan alphabet is a writing system developed during the Sassanid era (226-651 in Iran to render the Avestan language. CE Greek 9 c. The Greek alphabet (Ελληνικό αλφάβητο is a set of twenty-four letters that has been used to write the Greek language since the late 9th or early BCE Etruscan 8 c. Old Italic refers to several now extinct Alphabet systems used on the Italian Peninsula in ancient times for various Indo-European (predominantly Italic BCE Latin 7 c. BCE Runic 2 c. CE Gothic 3 c. This article is about the 4th century alphabet of the Gothic bible CE Armenian 405 CE Glagolitic 862 CE Cyrillic 10 c. The Armenian alphabet is an Alphabet that has been used to write the Armenian language since the year 405 or 406. The Glagolitic alphabet or Glagolitsa is the oldest known Slavic Alphabet. The Cyrillic alphabet (səˈrɪlɪk also called azbuka, from the old name of the first two letters is actually a family of Alphabets, subsets of which are used by CE Paleohispanic 7 c. The Paleohispanic scripts are the writing systems created in the Iberian peninsula before the Latin alphabet became the dominant script BCE Epigraphic South Arabian 9 c. The ancient South Arabian alphabet (also known as musnad المُسند branched from the Proto-Sinaitic alphabet in about the 9th century BC. BCE Ge'ez 5–6 c. Ge'ez (gez ግዕዝ) also called Ethiopic, is an Abugida script that was originally developed to write Ge'ez, a Semitic language BCE
Meroitic 3 c. The Meroitic script is an Alphabetic script originally derived from Egyptian hieroglyphs used to write the Meroitic language of the Kingdom of Meroë / BCE
Ogham 4 c. Ogham (ogam ˈɔɣam Modern Irish or, English) is an Early Medieval Alphabet used primarily to represent the Old Irish language (and CE
Hangul 1443 CE
Canadian syllabics 1840 CE
Zhuyin 1913 CE
complete genealogy

The Thai alphabet (Thai: อักษรไทย) (àk-sŏn thai) is used to write the Thai language and other minority languages in Thailand. Canadian Aboriginal syllabic writing', or simply syllabics, is a family of Abugidas {dubious}} used to write a number of Aboriginal Canadian Nearly all the segmental scripts (loosely " Alphabets " but see below for more precise terminology used around the globe appear to have derived from the An alphabet is a standardized set of letters basic written symbols each of which roughly represents a Phoneme, a Spoken language, either Thai (th ภาษาไทย, transcription: phasa thai, transliteration:; pʰāːsǎːtʰāj is the national and Thai (th ภาษาไทย, transcription: phasa thai, transliteration:; pʰāːsǎːtʰāj is the national and The Kingdom of Thailand (ˈtaɪlænd ราชอาณาจักรไทย, râːtɕʰa-ʔaːnaːtɕɑ̀k-tʰɑj It has forty-four consonants (Thai: พยัญชนะ) (pha-yan-cha-ná), fifteen vowel symbols (Thai: สระ) (sà-rà) that combine into at least twenty-eight vowel forms, and four tone marks (Thai: วรรณยุกต์ or วรรณยุต) (wan-na-yúk or wan-na-yút). Thai (th ภาษาไทย, transcription: phasa thai, transliteration:; pʰāːsǎːtʰāj is the national and Thai (th ภาษาไทย, transcription: phasa thai, transliteration:; pʰāːsǎːtʰāj is the national and Thai (th ภาษาไทย, transcription: phasa thai, transliteration:; pʰāːsǎːtʰāj is the national and

• Consonants ฃ (Unicode U+0E03) and ฅ (Unicode U+0E05) are obsolete, but still appear on many keyboards and in character sets. See discussion below.
• Characters ฤ ฤๅ ฦ are special and mostly considered as vowels. They themselves can be read as a combination of consonant and vowel, equivalent to รึ, รือ, ลึ, ลือ respectively. Moreover, ฤ can act as ริ as an integral part in many words mostly borrowed from Sanskrit such as กฤษณะ (krisna, not kruesna)ฤทธิ์ (rit, not ruet) กฤษดา (krisada, not kruetsada), for example. Sanskrit (sa संस्कृता वाक् saṃskṛtā vāk, for short sa संस्कृतम् saṃskṛtam) is a historical ฦ and ฦๅ are obsolete and no longer used.

Consonants are written horizontally from left to right, with vowels arranged above, below, to the left or to the right of the corresponding consonant.

• This is an Abugida, a writing system in which consonants include an inherent vowel sound. An abugida ( from Ge‘ez አቡጊዳ ’äbugida or Amharic አቡጊዳ ’abugida is a segmental Writing system which Since Abugida is unfamiliar to most students, the inherent vowel is described as an implied “a” or “o,” below.

Thai letters do not have small and capital forms like the Roman alphabet. Capital letters or majuscules pronunciation /məˈdʒʌskyuls ˈmædʒəˌskyuls/ in the Roman alphabet A, B, C, D, Texts are usually written with no space between words, but since most Thai words have only one syllable, it is easy to distinguish words.

• Minor pauses in sentences may be marked by a comma (Thai: จุลภาค or ลูกน้ำ) (chun-la-phâk or lûk-nám), and major pauses by a period (Thai: มหัพภาค or จุด) (ma-hàp-phâk or chùt), but most often are marked by a blank space (Thai: วรรค) (wák). Thai (th ภาษาไทย, transcription: phasa thai, transliteration:; pʰāːsǎːtʰāj is the national and Thai (th ภาษาไทย, transcription: phasa thai, transliteration:; pʰāːsǎːtʰāj is the national and Thai (th ภาษาไทย, transcription: phasa thai, transliteration:; pʰāːsǎːtʰāj is the national and

Thai writing also uses quotation marks (Thai: อัญประกาศ) (an-yá-prà-kàt) and parentheses (Thai: วงเล็บ) (wong lép), but not brackets or braces. Thai (th ภาษาไทย, transcription: phasa thai, transliteration:; pʰāːsǎːtʰāj is the national and Thai (th ภาษาไทย, transcription: phasa thai, transliteration:; pʰāːsǎːtʰāj is the national and A bird's eye (Thai: ตาไก่) (ta-kài) (U+0E4F), officially called (Thai: ฟองมัน) (fong-man), formerly indicated paragraphs, but is obsolete. Thai (th ภาษาไทย, transcription: phasa thai, transliteration:; pʰāːsǎːtʰāj is the national and Thai (th ภาษาไทย, transcription: phasa thai, transliteration:; pʰāːsǎːtʰāj is the national and

Thai has its own set of Thai numerals (ตัวเลขไทย) (tua-lek-thai), but Hindu-Arabic numerals (ตัวเลขฮินดูอารบิก) (tua lek hindu arabik) are also commonly used. Thai numerals (เลขไทย are a set of numerals traditionally used in Thailand, although the Arabic numerals are more common The arabic numerals (often capitalized are the ten Digits (0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 which—along with the system

Contents 1 History 2 Alphabet listing 2.1 Consonants 2.2 Vowels 2.3 Diacritics 3 Other symbols 4 Sanskrit and Pali 4.1 Plosives (วรรค vargaḥ) 4.2 Non-plosives (อวรรค avargaḥ) 4.2.1 Sibilants (เสียดแทรก) 4.2.2 Voiced h (มีหนักมีลม) 4.3 Vowels (สระ) 4.4 Other symbols 4.4.1 Nikhahit นิคหิตฺ (anusvāra) 4.4.2 Pinthu พินทุ (virāma) 4.4.3 Yamakkan ยามักการ 4.4.4 Visarga 5 Thai in Unicode 6 See also 7 References 8 External links

History

The Thai alphabet is probably derived from the Old Khmer script (อักขระเขมร) (akchara khamen), which is a southern Brahmic style of writing called Vatteluttu. The Khmer script (អក្ខរក្រមខេមរភាសា âkkhârâkrâm khémârâ phéasa informally aksar Khmer អក្សរខ្មែរ is used to write the Brāhmī script refers to the oldest members of the Brahmic family of alphabets. Vatteluttu () or "rounded writing" is an Abugida Writing system originating from the Dravidian peoples of Southern India and Vatteluttu was also commonly known as the Pallava script by scholars of Southeast Asian studies such as George Coedes. Southeast Asian Studies refers to research and education on the language culture and history of the different States and Ethnic groups of Southeast Asia George Cœdès (1886-1969 was a 20th century scholar of Southeast Asian Archaeology and History. According to tradition it was created in 1283 by King Ramkhamhaeng the Great (พ่อขุนรามคำแหงมหาราช). Ramkhamhaeng (c 1239 &ndash 1317 aka Pho Khun Ramkhamhaeng พ่อขุนรามคำแหงมหาราช was the third king of the Phra Ruang dynasty ruling the

Alphabet listing

You will need a Unicode-capable browser and font that contains the Thai alphabet to view the Thai letters below.

Consonants

There are 44 consonants representing 21 distinct consonant sounds. Duplicate consonants represent different Sanskrit and Pali consonants pronounced identically in Thai (although the distinction between the consonants is retained in spoken Khmer). Sanskrit (sa संस्कृता वाक् saṃskṛtā vāk, for short sa संस्कृतम् saṃskṛtam) is a historical Pali ( ISO 15919 / ALA-LC: Pāḷi is a Middle Indo-Aryan language or Prakrit of India. The consonants are divided into three classes - low (siang tam เสียงต่ำ), middle (siang klang เสียงกลาง) and high (siang sung เสียงสูง) - which determine the tone of the following vowel. There are in addition four consonant-vowel combination characters not included in the tally of 44.

To aid learning, each consonant is traditionally associated with a Thai word that either starts with the same sound, or features it prominently. For example, the name of the letter ข is kho khai (ข ไข่), in which kho is the sound it represents, and khai (ไข่) is a word which starts with the same sound and means "egg".

Two of the consonants, ฃ (kho khuat) and ฅ (kho khon), are not used in written Thai anymore. Some say ^[1] that when the first Thai typewriter was developed by Edwin Hunter McFarland in 1892, there was simply no space for all characters, thus two had to be left out. Year 1892 ( MDCCCXCII) was a Leap year starting on Friday (link will display the full calendar of the Gregorian Calendar (or a Leap year Also, neither of these two letters correspond to a Sanskrit or Pali letter, and each of them, being a modified form of the letter that precedes it (compare ข and ค), has the same pronunciation and the same consonant class as the preceding letter. This makes them redundant.

Equivalents for romanisation are shown in the table below. Many consonants are pronounced differently at the beginning and at the end of a syllable. The entries in columns initial and final indicate the pronunciation for that consonant in the corresponding positions in a syllable. Where the entry is "-", the consonant may not be used to close a syllable. Where a combination of consonants ends a written syllable, only the first is pronounced; possible closing consonant sounds are limited to 'k', 'm', 'n', 'ng', 'p' and 't'.

Although an official standard for romanisation is defined by the Royal Thai Institute, many publications use different Romanisation systems. The Royal Thai General System of Transcription ( RTGS) is the official system for rendering Thai language words in the Latin alphabet. In daily practice, a bewildering variety of Romanisations are used, making it difficult to know how to pronounce a word, or to judge if two words (e. g. on a map and a street sign) are actually the same. For more precise information, an equivalent from the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) is given as well. The International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA is a system of phonetic notation based on the Latin alphabet, devised by the International Phonetic

Each consonant is assigned to a "class" (Low, Middle, High), which plays a role in determining the tone with which the syllable is pronounced.

Symbol	Name	Royal Thai		IPA		Class
		Initial	Final	Initial	Final	Class
ก	ko kai (chicken)	k	k	k	k	M
ข	kho khai (egg)	kh	k	kʰ	k	H
ฃ	kho khuat (bottle) [obsolete]	kh	k	kʰ	k	H
ค	kho khwai (water buffalo)	kh	k	kʰ	k	L
ฅ	kho khon (person) [obsolete]	kh	k	kʰ	k	L
ฆ	kho ra-khang (bell)	kh	k	kʰ	k	L
ง	ngo ngu (snake)	ng	ng	ŋ	ŋ	L
จ	cho chan (plate)	ch	t	tɕ	t	M
ฉ	cho ching (cymbals)	ch	-	tɕʰ	-	H
ช	cho chang (elephant)	ch	t	tɕʰ	t	L
ซ	so so (chain)	s	t	s	t	L
ฌ	cho choe (bush)	ch	-	tɕʰ	-	L
ญ	yo ying (woman)	y	n	j	n	L
ฎ	do cha-da (headdress)	d	t	d	t	M
ฏ	to pa-tak (goad)	t	t	t	t	M
ฐ	tho san-than (base)	th	t	tʰ	t	H
ฑ	tho nangmon-tho (dancer)	th	t	tʰ	t	L
ฒ	tho phu-thao (old person)	th	t	tʰ	t	L
ณ	no nen (novice monk)	n	n	n	n	L
ด	do dek (child)	d	t	d	t	M
ต	to tao (turtle)	t	t	t	t	M
ถ	tho thung (sack)	th	t	tʰ	t	H
ท	tho thahan (soldier)	th	t	tʰ	t	L
ธ	tho thong (flag)	th	t	tʰ	t	L
น	no nu (mouse)	n	n	n	n	L
บ	bo baimai (leaf)	b	p	b	p	M
ป	po plaa (fish)	p	p	p	p	M
ผ	pho phueng (bee)	ph	-	pʰ	-	H
ฝ	fo fa (lid)	f	-	f	-	H
พ	pho phan (tray)	ph	p	pʰ	p	L
ฟ	fo fan (teeth)	f	p	f	p	L
ภ	pho sam-phao (sailboat)	ph	p	pʰ	p	L
ม	mo ma (horse)	m	m	m	m	L
ย	yo yak (giant)	y	y	j	j	L
ร	ro ruea (boat)	r	n	r	n	L
ล	lo ling (monkey)	l	n	l	n	L
ว	wo waen (ring)	w	w	w	w	L
ศ	so sala (pavilion)	s	t	s	t	H
ษ	so rue-si (hermit)	s	t	s	t	H
ส	so suea (tiger)	s	t	s	t	H
ห	ho hip (chest)	h	-	h	-	H
ฬ	lo chu-la (kite)	l	n	l	n	L
อ	o ang (basin)	**	-	ʔ	-	M
ฮ	ho nok-huk (owl)	h	-	h	-	L

* Consonant-vowel combination characters, not members of any group. Kho Khuat (ฃ ขวด is the third letter of the Thai alphabet.

** อ is a special case in that at the beginning of a word it is used as a silent initial for syllables that start with a vowel (all vowels are written relative to a consonant — see below). The same symbol is used as a vowel in non-initial position.

Vowels

Thai vowel sounds and diphthongs are written using a mixture of vowel symbols, consonants, and combinations of vowel symbols. Each vowel is shown in its correct position relative to an initial consonant (indicated by a dash "–") and sometimes a final consonant as well (second dash). Note that vowels can go above, below, left of or right of the consonant, or combinations of these places. If a vowel has parts before and after the initial consonant, and the syllable starts with a consonant cluster, the split will go around the whole cluster.

The pronunciation is indicated by the International Phonetic Alphabet and the Romanisation according to the Royal Thai Institute as well as several variant Romanisations often encountered. The International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA is a system of phonetic notation based on the Latin alphabet, devised by the International Phonetic The Royal Thai General System of Transcription ( RTGS) is the official system for rendering Thai language words in the Latin alphabet. A very approximate equivalent is given for various regions of English speakers and surrounding areas.

Symbol	Name	IPA	Royal	Variants	Sound
–	implied a	a	a	u	u in "nut"
– –	implied o	o	o		oa in "boat"
–รร–	ro han *	ɑ	a	u	u in "nut"
–ว–	wo waen *	ua	ua	uar	ewe in "newer"
–วย	sara uai	uɛj	uai	uay	uoy in "buoy"
–อ	sara o	ɔː	o	or, aw	aw in "saw"
–อย	sara oi	ɔːj	oi	oy	oy in "boy"
–ะ	sara a	aʔ	a	u	u in "nut"
–ั –	mai han-akat	a	a	u	u in "nut"
–ัย	sara ai	ɑj	ai		i in "hi"
–ัว	sara ua	ua	ua		ewe in "newer"
–ัวะ	sara ua	uaʔ	ua		ewe in "sewer"
–า	sara a	aː	a	ah, ar, aa	a in "father"
–าย	sara ai	aːj	ai	aai, aay, ay	ye in "bye"
–าว	sara ao	aːw	ao	au	ow in "now"
–ำ	sara am	ɑm	am	um	um in "sum"
–ิ	sara i	i	i		y in "greedy"
–ิว	sara io	iw	io	ew	ew in "new"
–ี	sara i	iː	i	ee, ii, y	ee in "see"
–ึ	sara ue	ɯ	ue	eu, u, uh	u in French "du" (short)
–ื	sara ue	ɯː	ue	eu, u	u in French "dur" (long)
–ุ	sara u	u	u	oo	oo in "look"
–ู	sara u	uː	u	oo, uu	oo in "too"
เ–	sara e	eː	e	ay, a, ae, ai, ei	a in "lame"
เ–็ –	sara e	e	e		e in "neck"
เ–ะ	sara e	eʔ	e	eh	e in "neck"
เ–ย	sara oei	ɤːj	oei	oey	u in "burn" + y in "boy"
เ–อ	sara oe	ɤː	oe	er, eu, ur	u in "burn"
เ–อะ	sara oe	ɤʔ	oe	eu	e in "the"
เ–ิ –	sara oe	ɤ	oe	eu, u	e in "the"
เ–ว	sara eo	eːw	eo	eu, ew	ai + ow in "rainbow"
เ–า	sara ao	aw	ao	aw, au, ow	ow in "cow"
เ–าะ	sara o	ɔʔ	o	orh, oh, or	o in "not"
เ–ีย	sara ia	iːa	ia	ear, ere, ie	ea in "ear"
เ–ียะ	sara ia	iaʔ	ia	iah, ear, ie	ea in "ear" with glottal stop
เ–ียว	sara iao	io	iao	eaw, iew, iow	io in "trio"
เ–ือ	sara uea	ɯːa	uea	eua, ua, ue	ure in "pure"
เ–ือะ	sara uea	ɯaʔ	uea	eua, ua	ure in "pure"
แ–	sara ae	ɛː	ae	a	a in "ham"
แ–ะ	sara ae	ɛʔ	ae	aeh, a	a in "at"
แ–็ –	sara ae	ɛ	ae	aeh, a	a in "at"
แ–ว	sara aeo	ɛːw	aeo	aew, eo	a in "ham" + ow in "low"
โ–	sara o	oː	o	or, oh, ô	o in "go"
โ–ะ	sara o	oʔ	o	oh	o in "poke"
ใ–	sara ai mai muan	ɑj	ai	ay, y	i in "I"
ไ–	sara ai mai malai	ɑj	ai	ay, y	i in "I"
ฤ	ro rue (short) *	rɯ	rue	ru, ri	ri in "Krishna"
ฤๅ	ro rue (long) *	rɯː	rue	ruu
ฦ	lo lue (short) *	lɯ	lue	lu, li	li in "Lima"
ฦๅ	lo lue (long) *	lɯː	lue	lu

* vowels or diphthongs written with consonant symbols

Diacritics

Diacritics are used with the Thai alphabet to indicate modifications of the values of the letters.

Thai is a tonal language and the script gives full information on the tones. Tones are realised in the vowels, but indicated in the script by a combination of the class of the initial consonant (high, mid or low), vowel length (long or short), closing consonant (unvoiced/plosive or voiced/sonorant) and sometimes one of four tone marks. In Linguistics, vowel length is the perceived duration of a Vowel sound Voice or voicing is a term used in Phonetics and Phonology to characterize speech sounds, with sounds described as either voiceless A stop, plosive, or occlusive is a Consonant sound produced by stopping the airflow in the Vocal tract. Voice or voicing is a term used in Phonetics and Phonology to characterize speech sounds, with sounds described as either voiceless In Phonetics and Phonology, a sonorant is a Speech sound that is produced without turbulent airflow in the Vocal tract. A diacritic ( also called a diacritic or diacritical mark, point, or sign, is a small sign added to a letter to alter pronunciation The names and signs of the tone marks are derived from the numbers one, two, three and four in an Indic language. The rules for denoting tones are shown in the following chart:

tone of syllable				initial consonant
sign	Thai	RTGS	syllable composition	high class	mid class	low class
	(เปล่า)	(none)	long vowel or vowel plus sonorant	rising	mid	mid
	(เปล่า)	(none)	long vowel plus plosive	low	low	falling
	(เปล่า)	(none)	short vowel at end or plus plosive	low	low	high
–่	ไม้เอก	mai ek	any	low	low	falling
–้	ไม้โท	mai tho	any	falling	falling	high
–๊	ไม้ตรี	mai tri	any	-	high	-
–๋	ไม้จัตวา	mai chattawa	any	-	rising	-

Mai chattawa and mai tri are only used with mid-class consonants. The Royal Thai General System of Transcription ( RTGS) is the official system for rendering Thai language words in the Latin alphabet.

The letter ห (high class) is used as a silent letter before certain low-class consonants (Nasals ง, ญ, น and ม; and non-plosives ว, ย, ร and ล; all of which have no corresponding high-class phonetic match) to give that consonant the tone properties of a high-class consonant. In polysyllabic words, an initial high class consonant with an implicit vowel renders the following syllable also high class. In four cases, อ (mid-class) is placed before ย (low-class) to give mid-class tone rules.

There are a few exceptions to this system, notably the pronouns chan and khao, which are both pronounced with a high tone rather than the rising tone indicated by the script (in an informal conversation; generally when these words are recited or read in public, they are pronounced in rising tone).

Other diacritics are used to indicate short vowels and silent consonants:

sign	name	meaning
–็	mai taikhu	shortens vowel
–์์	thanthakhat, mai karan	indicates silent letter

Other symbols

Symbol	Name	Meaning
ฯ	paiyaan noi	preceding word is abbreviated
ฯลฯ	paiyaan yai	etc.
ๆ	mai yamok	preceding word or phrase is repeated

Sanskrit and Pali

The Brahmic script and its descendants

Brāhmī Northern Brahmic Kusan Gupta Śāradā Landa Old Kashmiri Gurmukhī Takri Dogri Chameali Siddhaṃ Nāgarī Devanāgarī Nandināgarī Gujarati Proto-Bengali Eastern Nagari Bengali Assamese Mithilakshar Oriya Nepal Bhujimol Ranjana Tibetan ’Phagspa Southern Brahmic Tamil Brahmi Vatteluttu Tamil Pallava Grantha Malayalam Tulu Khmer Thai Lao Old Kawi Balinese Javanese Mon Burmese Kalinga Kadamba Old Kannada Kannada Telugu Sinhala

The Thai script (like all Indic scripts) uses a number of modifications to write Sanskrit and related languages (in particular, Pali). The Brahmic family is a family of syllabaries (writing systems used in South Asia, Southeast Asia, and parts of Central Asia and East Asia, Brāhmī script refers to the oldest members of the Brahmic family of alphabets. The Gupta script (or Gupta Brahmi) was used for writing Sanskrit and is associated with the Gupta Empire of India which was a period of material The Śāradā, or Sharada, script (sa शारदा is an Abugida writing system of the Brahmic family of scripts developed from ca The Laṇḍā script ( Gurmukhi: ਲੰਡਾ meaning an alphabet "without tail" is a Punjabi word used to refer to scripts in Northern India Kashmiri (कॉशुर کٲشُر Koshur) is a Dardic language spoken primarily in the valley of Kashmir, a region situated in the Indian state Gurmukhī (ਗੁਰਮੁਖੀ Shahmukhi:) is the most common script used for writing the Punjabi language. The Takri script (sometimes called Tankri) is an Abugida writing system of the Brahmic family of scripts Not to be confused with the Dogrib language. Dogri (डोगरी or ڈوگرى is an Indo-Aryan Language spoken by Siddhaṃ ( Sanskrit सिद्धं "accomplished" or "perfected" — is the name of a North Indian script used for writing Sanskrit during the period The Nāgarī script appeared in ancient India around the 8th century CE as an eastern variant of the Gupta script (whereas Śāradā was the western The Gujarati script (ગુજરાતી લિપિ, Gujǎrātī Lipi) which like all Nāgarī writing systems is strictly speaking an Abugida rather The Eastern Nagari script (also known as the Eastern Neo-Brahmic script or the Purvi Script) is an Abugida system of writing The Bengali script ( Bengali: বাংলা লিপি Bangla lipi) is a variant of the Eastern Nagari script also used for Assamese and The Assamese script (অসমীয়া আখৰ Ôxômiya Akhôr) is a variant of the Eastern Nagari script also used for Bengali and Bishnupriya Mithilakshar ( Devanagari script मिथिलाक्षर mithilākṣar; Eastern Nagari script: মিথিলাক্ষর or Tirhuta The Oriya script is used to write the Oriya language, and can be used for several other Indian languages for example Sanskrit. Nepal script ( Nepal Bhasa:नेपाल लिपि is a group of scripts that developed from Brahmi script and are used primarily in Nepal Bhasa. Bhujimol is the name of the most ancient form of the Nepal script. The Ranjana script (syn Kutila, Lantsa) is an Abugida writing system developed as a derivate of Brāhmī in 11th century The Tibetan script is an Abugida of Indic origin used to write the Tibetan language as well as the Dzongkha language, Ladakhi language The ’Phagspa script (дөрвөлжин үсэг dörvöljin üseg "square script" Tibetan: hor gsar yig "new Mongolian script" Tamil-Brahmi was an early variant of the Brahmi script used to write Tamil characters Vatteluttu () or "rounded writing" is an Abugida Writing system originating from the Dravidian peoples of Southern India and The Grantha ( Tamil: கிரந்த ௭ழுத்து Bengali: গ্রন্থলিপি Malayalam: ml ഗ്രന്ഥലിപി Sanskrit The Malayalam script is an Abugida of the Brahmic family, used to write the Malayalam language. The Tulu script, also known as the Tigalari script, strongly resembles the script of Malayalam language The Khmer script (អក្ខរក្រមខេមរភាសា âkkhârâkrâm khémârâ phéasa informally aksar Khmer អក្សរខ្មែរ is used to write the The Lao script is used mainly to write the Lao language. The minority languages of Laos are also written in the Lao script and officially it is the only script The Balinese script is an Abugida that was used to write the Balinese language, an Austronesian language spoken by about three million people on the The Javanese script, natively known as Carakan ( Tjarakan) is the script originally used to write Javanese. The Mon language is an Austroasiatic language spoken by the Mon, who live in Burma and Thailand. The Burmese abugida ( Burmese: မြန်မာအက္ခရာ mjànmà eʔkʰəyà is a script in the Brahmic family used in Burma for writing Kalinga script (Dravidi is one of many descendants of the ancient Brāhmī script used in territory of modern Orissa. The Kadamba Dynasty ( Kannada:ಕದಂಬರು (345 - 525 CE was an ancient royal family of Karnataka that ruled from Banavasi in present Kannada (kn [[wiktಕನ್ನಡ ಕನ್ನಡ]] Kannaḍa) is one of the major Dravidian languages of India, spoken predominantly in the state The Kannada script is a Syllabary (of the type sometimes called an Abugida) of the Brahmic family, primarily to write the Kannada language Telugu script, an Abugida from the Brahmic family of scripts is used to write Telugu language, a Dravidian Language found in the Southern The Sinhala script is an Abugida script used in Sri Lanka to write the Official language Sinhala and also sometimes the Liturgical The Brahmic family is a family of syllabaries (writing systems used in South Asia, Southeast Asia, and parts of Central Asia and East Asia, Pali is very closely related to Sanskrit and is the liturgical language of Thai Buddhism. Pali ( ISO 15919 / ALA-LC: Pāḷi is a Middle Indo-Aryan language or Prakrit of India. In Thailand, Pali is written and studied using a slightly modified Thai script. The main difference is that each consonant is followed by an implied short a (อะ), not the 'o', or 'ə' of Thai: this short a is never omitted in pronunciation, and if the vowel is not to be pronounced, then a specific symbol must be used, the pinthu อฺ (a solid dot under the consonant). This means that sara a (อะ) is never used when writing Pali, because it is always implied. For example, namo is written นะโม in Thai, but in Pali it is written as นโม, because the อะ is redundant. The Sanskrit word 'mantra' is written มนตร์ in Thai (and therefore pronounced mon), but is written มนฺตฺร in Sanskrit (and therefore pronounced mantra). When writing Pali, only 33 consonants and 12 vowels are used.

This is an example of a Pali text written using the Thai Sanskrit orthography: อรหํ สมฺมาสมฺพุทฺโธ ภควา [arahaṃ sammāsambuddho bhagavā]. Written in modern Thai orthography, this becomes อะระหัง สัมมาสัมพุทโธ ภะคะวา arahang sammasamputtho phakhawa.

In Thailand, Sanskrit is read out using the Thai values for all the consonants (so ค is read as kha and not [ga]), which makes Thai spoken Sanskrit incomprehensible to sanskritists not trained in Thailand. The Sanskrit values are used in transliteration (without the diacritics), but these values are never actually used when Sanskrit is read out loud in Thailand. A diacritic ( also called a diacritic or diacritical mark, point, or sign, is a small sign added to a letter to alter pronunciation The vowels used in Thai are identical to Sanskrit, with the exception of ฤ, ฤๅ, ฦ, and ฦๅ, which are read using their Thai values, not their Sanskrit values. Sanskrit and Pali are not tonal languages, but in Thailand, the Thai tones are used when reading these languages out loud.

In the tables in this section, the Thai value (transliterated according to the Royal Thai system) of each letter is listed first, followed by the IAST value of each letter in square brackets. The International Alphabet of Sanskrit Transliteration ( IAST) is a popular Transliteration scheme that allows a lossless Romanization of Indic Remember that in Thailand, the IAST values are never used in pronunciation, but only sometimes in transcriptions (with the diacritics omitted). This disjoint between transcription and spoken value explains the romanisation for Sanskrit names in Thailand that many foreigners find confusing. For example, สุวรรณภูมิ is romanised as Suvarnabhumi, but pronounced su-wan-na-pum. Suvarnabhumi Airport (ท่าอากาศยานสุวรรณภูมิ pronounced /sùwannápʰūːm/, also known as (New Bangkok International Airport ศรีนครินทร์ is romanised as Srinagarindra but pronounced si-nakha-rin. Srinagarindra (ศรีนครินทรา ( 21 October 1900 – 18 July 1995) (pronounced See-nakarin was the late Princess

Plosives (วรรค vargaḥ)

The plosives (also called stops) are listed in their traditional Sanskrit order. The Thai value is given first, and then the IAST value in square brackets.

class	unaspirated unvoiced	aspirated	voiced	aspirated voiced	nasal
velar	ก kà [ka]	ข khà [kha]	ค khá [ga]	ฆ khá [gha]	ง ngá [ṅa]
palatal	จ cà [ca]	ฉ chà [cha]	ช chá [ja]	ฌ chá [jha]	ญ yá [ña]
retroflex	ฏ tà [ṭa]	ฐ thà [ṭha]	ฑ thá [ḍa]	ฒ thá [ḍha]	ณ ná [ṇa]
dental	ต tà [ta]	ถ thà [tha]	ท thá [da]	ธ thá [dha]	น ná [na]
labial	ป pà [pa]	ผ phà [pha]	พ phá [ba]	ภ phá [bha]	ม má [ma]
tone class	M	H	L	L	L

While letters are listed here according to their class in Sanskrit, Thai has lost the distinction between many of the consonants. So, while there is a clear distinction between ช and ฌ in Sanskrit, in Thai these two consonants are pronounced identically (including tone). Likewise, Thais are unable to tell the difference between the retroflex and dental classes, because Thai has no retroflex consonants and all the retroflex consonants are in fact pronounced as if they are dental: thus ฏ is pronounced like ต, and ฐ is pronounced like ถ, and so forth.

The Sanskrit unaspirated unvoiced plosives are pronounced as unaspirated unvoiced, while the Sanskrit aspirated, voiced, and aspirated voiced plosives are pronounced as aspirated unvoiced, except in the retroflex class where the Sanskrit voiced and aspirated voiced plosive are pronounced as unaspirated unvoiced. None of the Sanskrit plosives are pronounced as the Thai voiced plosives.

Non-plosives (อวรรค avargaḥ)

Semivowels and liquids (กี่งสระ)

series	symbol	value	related vowels
palatal	ย	ya [yá]	อิ and อี
retroflex	ร	ra [rá]	ฤ and ฤๅ
dental	ล	la [lá]	ฦ and ฦๅ
labial	ว	wa [wá]	อุ and อู

The 'zero' consonant, อ is unique to the Indic alphabets descended from Khmer. Semivowels — also known as glides or non-syllabic vowels —are Vowels that form Diphthongs with full syllabic vowels Liquid consonants, or liquids, are Approximant Consonants that are not classified as Semivowels (glides because they do not correspond phonetically When it occurs in Sanskrit, it is always the 'zero' consonant and never the vowel o [ɔː]. Its use in Sanskrit is therefore to write vowels that cannot be otherwise written alone: e. g. , อา or อี. When อ is written on its own, then it is a carrier for the implied vowel, a [a] (equivalent to อะ in Thai).

Sibilants (เสียดแทรก)

series	symbol	value
palatal	ศ	sà [śa]
retroflex	ษ	sà [ṣa]
dental	ส	sà [sa]

Like Sanskrit, Thai has no voiced siblant (so no 'z' or 'zh'). In modern Thai, the distinction between the three consonants has been lost and all three are pronounced 'sà'; however, foreign words with an sh-sound may still be transcribed as if the Sanskrit values still hold (e. g. , ang-grit อังกฤษ for English instead of อังกฤส, say).

The consonant ฬ (lo chu-la) is only used to write Pali words, where it is used to represent the Pali consonant [ḷh] (IPA: [ɭʰ]). Pali ( ISO 15919 / ALA-LC: Pāḷi is a Middle Indo-Aryan language or Prakrit of India. In modern Thai it is pronounced l.

Voiced h (มีหนักมีลม)

symbol	value
ห	ha

Like modern Hindi, the voicing has disappeared, and the letter is now pronounced like English 'h'. Like Sanskrit, this letter may only be used to start a syllable, but may not end it.

Vowels (สระ)

Thai Sanskrit has only 12 vowels.

symbol	value
อ	a [a]
อา	a [ā]
อิ	i [i]
อี	i [ī]
อุ	u [u]
อู	u [ū]
เอ	e [e]
โอ	o [o]
ฤ	ru [ṛ]
ฤๅ	ru [ṝ]
ฦ	lu [ḷ]
ฦๅ	lu [ḹ]

All consonants have an inherent 'a' sound, and therefore there is no need to use the ะ symbol when writing Sanskrit. The Thai vowels อื, ไอ, ใอ, and so forth, are not used in Sanskrit. The 'zero' consonant, อ is unique to the Indic alphabets descended from Khmer. When it occurs in Sanskrit, it is always the 'zero' consonant and never the vowel o [ɔː]. Its use in Sanskrit is therefore to write vowels that cannot be otherwise written alone: e. g. , อา or อี. When อ is written on its own, then it is a carrier for the implied vowel, a [a] (equivalent to อะ in Thai).

The vowels อำ and อึ occur in Sanskrit, but only as the combination of the pure vowels sara a อา or sara i อิ with nikhahit อํ.

Other symbols

There are a number of additional symbols only used to write Sanskrit or Pali, and not used in writing Thai.

Nikhahit นิคหิตฺ (anusvāra)

Symbol	IAST
อํ	ṃ

In Sanskrit, the anusvāra indicates that the preceding vowel be nasalised. Anusvara (Dev अनुस्वार anusvāra) is the diacritic used to mark a type of Nasalization used in a number of Indic languages. In Thai this is written as an open circle above the consonant. Nasalisation does not occur in Thai, therefore, a nasal consonant is substituted instead: e. g. ตํ taṃ, is pronounced as ตัง tang by Thai sanskritists. Sanskritism is a term used to indicate words that are coined out of Sanskrit for modern usage in India, Sri Lanka and elsewhere or Neologisms If nikhahit occurs before a consonant, then Thai uses a nasal consonant of the same class: e. g. สํสฺกฺฤตา [saṃskṛta] is read as สันสกฤตา san-si-ki-ta (The ส following the nikhahit is a dental class consonant, therefore the dental class nasal consonant น is used). For this reason, it has been suggested that in Thai, nikhahit should be listed as a consonant. ^[2] Nikhahit นิคหิต occurs as part of the vowels sara am อำ and sara ue อึ.

Pinthu พินทุ (virāma)

อฺ

Because the Thai script is an abugida, a symbol (equivalent to virāma in devanagari) needs to be added to indicate that the implied vowel is not to be pronounced. An abugida ( from Ge‘ez አቡጊዳ ’äbugida or Amharic አቡጊዳ ’abugida is a segmental Writing system which Virama is a generic term for the Diacritic character in many Brahmic scripts that is used to suppress an inherent Vowel sound that occurs with every consonant This is the pinthu, which is a solid dot below the consonant.

Yamakkan ยามักการ

อ๎

Yamakkan is an obsolete symbol used to mark the beginning of consonant clusters: e. g. พ๎ราห๎มณ phramana [brāhmaṇa]. Without the yamakkan, this word would be pronounced pharahamana [barāhamaṇa] instead. This is a feature unique to the Thai script (other Indic scripts use a combination of ligatures, conjuncts or virāma to convey the same information). The symbol is obsolete because pinthu may be used to achieve the same effect: พฺราหฺมณ.

Visarga

The means of recording visarga (final voiceless 'h') in Thai has been lost. Visarga ( visarga) is a Sanskrit word meaning "sending forth discharge"

Thai in Unicode

The Unicode range for Thai is U+0E00–U+0E7F. In Computing, Unicode is an Industry standard allowing Computers to consistently represent and manipulate text expressed in most of the world's This area is a verbatim copy of the older TIS-620 character set which encodes the vowels เ แ โ ใ ไ before the consonants they follow, and thus is the only Unicode script using visual order instead of logical order. Thai Industrial Standard 620-2533, commonly referred to as TIS-620, is the most common Character set and Character encoding for the Thai language Grey areas indicate non-assigned code points.

Thai Unicode.org chart (PDF)

0

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

A

B

C

D

E

F

U+0E0x

ก

ข

ฃ

ค

ฅ

ฆ

ง

จ

ฉ

ช

ซ

ฌ

ญ

ฎ

ฏ

U+0E1x

ฐ

ฑ

ฒ

ณ

ด

ต

ถ

ท

ธ

น

บ

ป

ผ

ฝ

พ

ฟ

U+0E2x

ภ

ม

ย

ร

ฤ

ล

ฦ

ว

ศ

ษ

ส

ห

ฬ

อ

ฮ

ฯ

U+0E3x

ะ

ั

า

ำ

ิ

ี

ึ

ื

ุ

ู

ฺ

฿

U+0E4x

เ

แ

โ

ใ

ไ

ๅ

ๆ

็

่

้

๊

๋

์

ํ

๎

๏

U+0E5x

๐

๑

๒

๓

๔

๕

๖

๗

๘

๙

๚

๛

U+0E6x

U+0E7x

See also

• Thai language
• Thai language: Script: Transliteration
  • Royal Thai General System of Transcription
  • ISO 11940
• Thai numerals
• Thailand

References

External links

• Omniglot - Thai
• Virtual Thai Keyboard Freeware for the Windows operating system
• Thai Alphabet
• Transliterations for Thai Vowels, Thai Consonants, and Alternative Presentation of Thai Consonants, by Richard Wordingham
• Thai vowels
• Thai consonants

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