--- In qalam@yahoogroups.com, Patrick Chew <patchew@...> wrote:

> Richard Wordingham wrote:

This post is best viewed in UTF-8.

> Well, in actuality, the thanthakhat/karan doesn't *only* kill the

final

> Pali-Sanskrit -a#, since other words like พันธุ์ทิพย /bandhudibya/ (<
> bandhudivya) [phanthíp] also exists, cf: -ศาสตร /śaastra/ [sa:t]

-ology,

> etc.

Surely this word would be ทิพ(ย)พันธุ์ <diba(ya)bandhu\> /thípphá(yá)phan/
if it were a Pali-Sanskrit compound? /phanthíp/ is a Thai compound of
/phan/ 'family' and /thíp/ 'heavenly'.

> The whole syllable lopping seems to have a lot of input from Khmer
> reduction as well... Although, I think it really has a lot more to do
> with the usual fit of a monosyllabic/sesquisyllabic language

schrunching

> a polysyllabic language's loans...

The Khmer reduction might account for it all. The Khmer lopping would
be explained by the restriction of short vowels to closed syllables
and the presyllables of sesquisyllables. A final short vowel would
not fit the metrical structure of Khmer words. This also explains all
the silent final <i>'s and <u>'s that litter Thai - also present in
Khmer​(e.g. áž"áŸ'រវតáŸ'តិ <prawatti> /prÉ`wŏət/ [short monophthong, but the
proper rendering can go seriously wrong] 'history' < Pali _pavatti_).
Long vowels are not subject to this lopping, and they seem to come
through unscathed.

There need not be any Thai input to this at all. Final glottal stops
seem to go far back in Thai (they're definitely present in Lao,
Central Thai and Northern Thai), for all I now as far back as
Proto-S.W. Tai. Thai would have been able to accept final short
vowels by suffixing a final glottal stop, as it does today with the
Pali-Sanskrit words 'ending in a short vowel'.

This solution was not available to Khmer, for there is no contrast
between final /k/ and final glottal stop in Khmer.

Does Mon have any bearing on the issue?

Incidentally, is there any evidence that final /h/ was ever pronounced
in Thai? If it was, it may have been restricted to Ayutthayan Thai
under Khmer influence. Such a phenomenon would account for the
spelling and pronunciation of words like สนเท่ห์ <sante1h\> /so+ntê:/
'astonishment' from P/S _santeha_ and เสน่ห์ <sne1h\> /sànè:/ 'charm,
spell' from Sanskrit _sneha_ 'oiliness, oil, affection', Pali
_s(i)neha_ 'id. + love, lust'. ( \ = thanthakhat, and I use + for a
rising tone as vowel + caron will fail to display for many readers.)
As those who read Thai will know, tone mark number 1 ('mai ek') has
the same effect on the tone of a long vowel as a following unsilenced
obstruent letter. It is very unusual for a Thai word derived from
Pali or Sanskrit to have (or even to need) a tonemark.

Richard.