Page 170 - The International Journal of the Royal Society of Thailand Vol.XIII-2021

The International Journal of the Royal Society of Thailand
Volume XIII – 2021

The Thai consonant letters corresponding to those of Sanskrit are 33 in
number as shown in the above table. When including ฬ which is used when writing

Pali and Pali loanwords in Thai, the Thai consonant letters will add up to 34 in
number which we call the Indian based consonant letters. The letter ห comes
immediately after the letter ห. There are 10 more consonant letters which are ฃ, ฅ,

ซ, ฎ, ด, บ, ฝ, ฟ, อ, ฮ; mostly represent Proto-Thai consonants which are not found
5
in Sanskrit or any Prakrits . All these letters were invented by an unknown Thai
scholar or scholars and we can notice that there are certain principles in their
design, as follows:

If the Indian based consonant is curved the add-on consonant will have
serration ( ) as follows:
ข ➯ ฃ

ค ➯ ฅ

ช ➯ ซ

On the other hand, if the Indian based consonant has serration, the add-on
consonant will be adapted to curve as follows:

ฏ ➯ ฎ

ต ➯ ด

If the Indian based consonant has a long tail, this tail will be removed such
as

ป ➯ บ

If the Indian based consonant is missing a tail, then the tail will be added

such as

ผ ➯ ฝ

พ ➯ ฟ

5 Prakrits are languages of the uneducated Aryans which contrasts to Sanskrit as the polished, cultivated
and correct speech of Aryans. (Burrow, 2001: 1)

160 The Thai Writing System: Reasons behind Its System