Daily Talk Forum

I have no idea of Asian languages. Which (if any), is the closest language to Thai anyone? Phil will probably be able to answer this one. :wink:

Hmmm, although I can speak, read and write a fair amount of Thai, I am not 100% sure of the origins. Khmer, Lao and I would assume Burmese are quite similar. Thailand is mainly a Buddhist Country and I suspect that Thai may have come from the ancient Indian Languages of Bali and Sanskrit

I will try to find out for you Geoff :wink:

Quote:History of the Thai language

Thai is the national language of Thailand, spoken by around eighty percent of the sixty million residents of the South-East Asian country. Linguists consider it an "uninflected, primarily monosyllabic, tonal language" in the "Ka-Tai group." The spoken language is believed to have originated in the area which is now the border between Vietnam and China, an idea which provides clues to the origin of the Thai people, an area of continued scholarly debate. Linguistically, the language is related to languages spoken in eastern Burma, northern Vietnam, Yunnan, and Laos.

The written Thai Language was introduced by the third Sukothai period king, Ramkamhaeng, in 1283. This writing system has undergone little change since its introduction, so inscriptions from the Sukothai era can be read by modern Thai readers. The writing was based on Pali, Sanskrit, and Indian concepts, and many Mon and Khmer words entered the language.

Quote:Alphabet, tones, and grammar

The Thai alphabet uses forty-four consonants and fifteen basic vowel characters. These are horizontally placed, left to right, with no intervening space, to form syllables, words, and sentences. Vowels are written above, below, before, or after the consonant they modify, although the consonant always sounds first when the syllable is spoken. The vowel characters (and a few consonants) can be combined in various ways to produce numerous compound vowels (dipthongs and tripthongs).

Unlike the Chinese language, the system is alphabetic, so pronunciation of a word is independent of its meaning (English is also an alphabetic language). On the other hand, Thai is tonal, like Chinese and unlike English. This means that each word has a certain pitch characteristic with which it must be spoken to be properly understood. The Thai language uses five tones, called mid, low, high, rising, and falling.

For more details, please visit

http://www.thai-language.com/

Good looking site, Phil. I see that Thailand has roughly the same population as the UK -

Quote:Introduction

Thai is the primary language of Thailand, a country in Southeast-Asia with a population of around 60 million people. This website is provides information for English-speakers with any level of interest in Thailand, its language and culture—from beginners who wish to learn a few phrases before their vacation to advanced students who may want to live or work in Thailand someday. Be sure to check out the message boards, or if you just need to look up a word, head for the online dictionary.