Well, what to say. Khmer may be simple in terms of grammar (which does not necessarily equal “ easy” , but that’s another story) but its writing system is really quite complicated, and very intimidating for anyone starting out in this language. What kind of difficulties does it pose for the learner, you wonder? With this post I will try to shed a little light on this subject.
Let’s start with the consonants. The unphonetic nature of the script starts here, at its very foundation:
ក ខ គ ឃ ង
k kh k kh ŋ
ច ឆ ជ ឈ ញ
c ch c ch ñ
ដ ឋ ឌ ឍ ណ
d th d th n
ត ថ ទ ធ ន
t th t th n
ប ផ ព ភ ម
b ph p ph m
យ រ ល វ
y r l v
ស ហ ឡ អ
s h l ‘
You’ll immediately notice that a lot of these letters have a “double” that is pronounced exactly the same: ក-គ, ន-ណ, ឡ-ល, and so on (th has four – ឋ-ឍ-ថ-ធ, but thankfully the first two are rarely used).
(You’ll also notice that a lot of the letters look frighteningly similar, with only a slight flourish making the difference: យ-ឃ, ក-គ-ត-ភ, ច-ថ, ជ-ផ-ធ…but this is really not so hard, is it? Sort of like telling the difference between c and e, right?)
The reason for this is that Khmer inherited its alphabet from Sanskrit/Pali, where each consonant has its own pronunciation. Though many of these sounds have one “double” that is used more frequently than the other (ល occurs much more frequently than ឡ) it still makes spelling a problem.
So why have 33 letters when you only need 20 of them? One reason is, naturally, to preserve the historical spelling of Sanskrit/Pali words. But there is another reason for keeping them, as the consonants are not really consonants per se, but syllables, each with an inherent vowel:
ក ខ គ ឃ ង
kââ khââ kôô khôô ŋôô
ច ឆ ជ ឈ ញ
cââ chââ côô chôô ñôô
ដ ឋ ឌ ឍ ណ
dââ thââ dôô thôô nââ
ត ថ ទ ធ ន
tââ thââ tôô thôô nôô
ប ផ ព ភ ម
bââ phââ pôô phôô môô
យ រ ល វ
yôô rôô lôô vôô
ស ហ ឡ អ
sââ hââ lââ ‘ââ
The origin of this split between first register (inherent vowel ââ) and second register (ôô) is likely the result of “breathy phonation” of the second series, that still exists in other languages of the Mon-Khmer family (more about this here)
In Khmer the breathy phonation was lost, but the schizophrenic pronunciation in the vowels remains, with the result that almost all the vowel signs (apart from three – អួ, អៀ and អឿ) have two separate pronunciations, depending on the consonant they are attached to:
1st Series – 2nd Series
កា kaa – គា kiə
កិ ke – គិ ki
កី kəy – កី kii
កើ kaə – គើ kəə
etc.
If this were all there was to it, then Khmer would be, if not easy, then at least manageable. But this is far from the end of it…
Some of the consonants, lacking a counterpart in the other series, can be changed to this series by means of special signs:
ស sââ (1st series); ស៊ sôô (2nd series)
ហ hââ (1st series); ហ៊ hôô (2nd series)
រ rôô (2nd series); រ៉ rââ (1st series)
វ vôô (2nd series); វ៉ vââ (1st series)
(There is one exception here, ប៉ pââ, which simply makes this the 1st series counterpart of ព pôô)
To further add to the confusion, when adding vowels that go on top of these letters the sign disappears and becomes a អុ, placed below the letter:
សី səy; ស៊+អី=ស៊ី sii.
Which alone would be read as a vowel sign: សុ so.
There are other signs, which are not vowels, but which nevertheless cause vowel changes to occur:
អ់, which in the first series merely shortens the vowel
អត âât; អត់ ât
អាត aat; អាត់ at
But in the second series something strange happens:
អ៊ត ôôt; អ៊ត់ uət
អ៊ាត iət; អ៊ាត់ oət
And this is by no means the only one. There are enough of them that some vowels can be spelled in a number of ways:
អិច អឹច អេច; all pronounced əc.
The first and last one is due to the final ច. Final consonants can also change the quality of a vowel, in អេច the final ច turns the vowel អេ ee into អេច əc.
Some more examples:
the uə in អ៊ត់ turns into u when the final consonant is labial (ប, ព etc): អ៊ប់ up. អ៊ាត់ oət; អ៊ាក់ eəq
Then you have the independent vowels, which are rarely used, but turn up often enough, and things get even more complicated:
ឦ = អី əy
ឪ = អូវ əw
ឲ = អោ ao
Some have more than one possible pronunciation, which must be learned with each word:
ឥ អិ ə – ឥត ət (not), អ៊ ı – ឥន្ទុ qıntu, អី əy, ឥឡូវ əyləw (now).
And even after learning all these extra signs, rules, side-rules and exceptions, there’s still some words that don’t seem to conform to any rule:
សត្វ sat “animal” (spelled sââtv and not pronounced sâât or sât as expected – since final subscripts can often act as អ់)
ធំ thom “big” (and not thum)
ភូមិ phuum “village” (and not phuumi)
ស្នេហា snaehaa “love” (and not sneehaa, it also has a shortened counterpart ស្នេហ៍snae, where the អ៍ “kills” the ហ)
ហឹរ həl (where the “silent r” gets pronounced l)
កណ្ដុរ kândao or kândol (and not kândo)
A lot of the problems are the result of loan words from Pali/Sanskrit, which kept their original spelling but whose pronunciation got transformed in the mouths of Khmers:
ពណ៌ poə “ colour” (in Sanskrit “ varna” , where the អ៌ symbol is the “ lost” r sound)
សួគ៌ suə “ heaven” (Sanskrit “ svarga” – v got turned into អួ uə, and the rest became silent)
And this isn’t taking into account the reduced pronunciations that occur in spoken Khmer, and which require learning a whole other battery of rules to determine how their literary pronunciations transform into their colloquial equivalents (not counting the exceptions, of course).
In spite of all this, the Khmer script is surprisingly phonetic, in the sense that you can correctly guess the pronunciation of words about 80-90% of the time knowing all the “rules”. (If this sounds ridiculous, just think of the illogical spelling of English, with all the different pronunciations for “ough”)
So how to tackle the beast? You can try doing what I did, by printing out some “cheat sheets” (How to Read and Write Khmer has some good ones), writing the phonetics (and the exceptions…) underneath the letters, and start learning words and reading with them.
Or, if you prefer to do it the slow, careful way, you can use the Green Book and its programmed reading exercises (part 2, starting at page 87).
I thought of writing lessons here but really, I can’t think of a better way to do it. Use this book, and then start reading – the other Huffman books are an excellent starting point.
And don’t forget Seasite Khmer, which has a whole section devoted to the writing system, and reading passages with sound.
(Note – the .pdf only contains parts 1 and 2 of the book, the 3rd one containing the reading passages has been left out. However there is someone who is painstakingly typing out part 3 and publishing it online. Visit his site.)
