The following table demonstrates this on four words:

	Without tone mark	MAI EEK	MAI THOO
1.	กอ [ga:w-- ] clump, cluster (of vegetation)	ก่อ [ga:w\ ] build, construct	ก้อ [ga:w/\ ] swagger
2.	เสือ [seu:a\/ ] tiger	เสื่อ [seu:a\ ] mat	เสื้อ [seu:a/\ ] shirt
3.	ขาว [kha:u\/] white	ข่าว [kha:u\] news	ข้าว [kha:u/\] rice
4.	เขา [khau\/] he, she	เข่า [khau\] knee	เข้า [khau/\] enter

In these examples the tone marks alone determines, how a word must be spoken, in order to give the desired meaning.

In other words, it may be that they are spelled differently but have the same sounds. While listening to so they can be classified correctly only by the sound:

tief	mittel	hoch	steigend	fallend
หม่า [ma:\] brew, ferment	มา [ma:--] come	ม้า [ma:/] horse	หมา [ma:\/] dog	ม่า [ma:/\] mother (chin.)

 

These examples demonstrate the importance of correct pronunciation including tone pitches. If a word is pronounced incorrectly, their meaning changes completely. A wrong emphasis does somtimes lead to embarrassing or cheerful situations. Because the set of Thai tone rules seems to be difficult manageable at the beginning, I can only recommend to listen to the examples over and over again, until the words as a whole, ie including the correct pronunciation are learned

 

 

The smallest unit of speech in Thai is the syllable. The intonation has to be therefore calculated on syllables.

A syllable can be spoken in high, low, rising, falling or in a medium tone. More about the pitch can be found here.

How a given syllable is pronounced can be derived on the basis of fixed rules of the written word. There are however several factors that need to be considered for a determination of the pitch. It is therefore necessary to examine:

 

1. What is the class of the initial consonant?
   Consonant classes are described here. Further details will follow on this page below.
2. Is it a short or a long vowel?
   Details on vowels are described here.
3. Is it a living or a dead syllable?
   What is this, see below on this page.
4. Is a tone mark to take into account?
   More about tone marks here. How they are applied is the topic of this page.

 

 

In principle, any Thai syllable starts with (at least) one consonant. For now, we restrict to those syllables that have only a single initial consonant.

One of the criteria by which the emphasis of syllables is determined is the membership of initial consonants to one of three classes: Middle, High or Low.

 

The three consonant classes
1. mid		ก จ ฎ ฏ ด ต บ ป อ
2. high		ข ฃ ฉ ฐ ถ ผ ฝ ศ ษ ส ห
3. low	3.1	ค ฅ ฆ ช ฌ ฑ ฒ ท ธ พ ภ ฟ ซ ฮ
	3.2	ง ญ ณ น ม ย ร ล ฬ ว

More about consonant classes here.

Listen to each one of the first consonant of the three classes in the table, paying attention to the first part before the epithet. The ga:w of ga:w gai (mid class) and the kha:w of kha:w khway (low class) are spoken in a mid-level pitch, but the kha:w of kha:w khay (high class) in a rising pitch. This is already a function of the consonants class.

If consonants are referred to individually they are spoken together with a long a:w. Thus the answer to criterion 2 is "long". A "living" syllable is it also (criterion 3), and a tone mark (criterion 4) does not exist. Thus the emphasis is such, as you have heard before by listening to the consonants.

I am aware that here I had to prejudge the criteria 2-4, we have not yet discussed. Therefore, now the rest of the definitions.

 

Length of the vowel (2)

 

Most vowels exists in a short and a long version. To determine the vocal length we would probably make the least difficulty. Together with an initial consonant from the low class (and only there) a syllable may be pronounced differently depending on the length of the vowel. We'll come back to this point.

 

 

Das hört sich vielleicht ein wenig grausam an. Sie werden jedoch nie in die Verlegenheit kommen, eine lebende Silbe totschlagen zu müssen - sie können jederzeit eine nehmen, die schon fix und fertig tot ist.

Gemeint ist damit, ob eine Silbe abrupt beendet wird (tote Silbe) oder nachklingen kann (lebende Silbe). Nachklingen kann eine Silbe zum Beispiel, wenn sie auf einen langen Vokal endet. Ob Sie kha: sagen oder khaaaaa: - es bleibt ein langer Vokal.

Nach einem kurzen Vokal wie in kha ist aber recht schnell Schluss, weil daraus sonst ein langer Vokal würde. Eine Silbe mit kurzem Vokal und ohne Endkonsonant ist daher "tot".

Nachklingen kann eine Silbe auch, wenn sie als Endkonsonant einen sog. Sonoranten hat: น, ณ, ม oder ง. Bei einem Wort wie na:m könnten Sie das Schluss-m beliebig weiter "summen", ohne dass sich an der bedeutung etwas ändern würde.

Richtig "tot" wird eine Silbe auch, wenn sie mit einem sog. Verschlusslaut beendet wird. Nach einem K-, P- oder T-Laut ist Schluss am Silbenende, da lässt sich nichts "in die Länge ziehen".

In der folgenden Tabelle sind ausführliche Beispiele für die beiden Silbentypen aufgeführt. Achten Sie darauf, dass in einer Zeile durchaus unterschiedliche Töne auftauchen können. Der Silbentyp ist eben nur eines von mehreren Kriterien.

คำเป็น [kham-- pen--] Living syllable	1. Consonant + long vowel: มา [ma:--] come มี [mi:--] have มือ [mü:--] hand ดู [du:--] look   2. Consonant + special vowel: (ำ, ใ, ไ, เ-า): ทำ [tam--] do ใจ [djai--] heart ไป [bpai--] go เอา [au--] take   3. Consonant + vowel + nasal (น ณ ม ง) or semivowel (ย ว): บัง [bang--] hide บาง [ba:ng--] thin พัน [phan--] thousand พาน [pha:n--] tray with pedestal คุย [kui--] talk หิว [hiu\/] hungry
คำตาย [kham-- ta:y--] Dead syllable	1. Consonant + short vowel: จะ [dja\] werden ดุ [du\] schimpfen จุ [dju\] reichlich โต๊ะ [to/] Tisch และ [lä/] und เพราะ [phrô/] weil   2. Consonant + vowel + plosive (K-P-T) ปัก [bpak\] embroider วัด [wat/] temple ถัด [that\] move สัก [sak\] tattoo ปาก [bpa:k\] mouth วาด [wa:t/\] draw ถาด [tha:t\] tray สาก [sa:k\] rough

 

A syllable may or may not have a tone mark. Only at initial consonants of the middle group, all four tone marks are used. For the high and low consonants are only the first two applicable (MAI EEK and MAI THOO).

MAI EEK	MAI THOO	MAI TRII	MAI DSCHATAWA
่ ไม้เอก [may/e:k\] low or falling pitch*	้ ไม้โท [may/tho:--] falling or high pitch*	๊ ไม้ตรี [may/tri:--] high pitch**	๋ ไม้จัตวา [may/ jat\ ta\ wa:--] rising pitch**

* Depending on the class of the initial consonant
** Only for middle-class consonants

 

The following generally applies: If an tone mark is given, then it determines the pitch together with the class of the initial consonant. If none exists, type of the syllable and vowel length must be considered too.

 

 

After we have clarified the terms in the previous sections, here is a table that addresses all four criteria. There are examples of each listed.

 

Class	Initial consonant	Without tone mark			With tone mark
		Living syllable คำเป็น	Death syllable คำตาย		่	้	๊	๋
1	ก จ ฎ ฏ ด ต บ ป อ	กา [ga:--] กัน [gan--] กาน [ga:n--]	กะ [ga\] กับ [gap\]] กาบ [ga:p\]		ก่า [ga:\]	ก้า [ga:/\]	ก๊า [ga:/]	ก๋า [ga:\/]
2	ข ฃ ฉ ฐ ถ ผ ฝ ศ ษ ส ห	ขา [kha:\/] ขัน [khan\/] ขาน [kha:n\/]	ขะ [kha\] ขับ [khap\] ขาบ [kha:p\]		ข่า [kha:\]	ข้า [kha:/\]	--
			Long vowel	Short vowel
3.1	ค ฅ ฆ ช ฌ ฑ ฒ ท ธ พ ภ ฟ ซ ฮ	คา [kha:--] คัน [khan--] คาน [kha:n--]	คาก [kha:k/\]	คะ [kha:/] คัก [khak/]	ค่า [kha:/\]	ค้า [kha:/]
3.2	ง ญ ณ น ม ย ร ล ฬ ว	มา [ma:--] มัน [man--] มาน [ma:n--]	มาก [ma:k/\]	มะ [ma:/] มัก [mak/]	ม่า [ma:/\]	ม้า [ma:/]

Here you can see that the tone rules for the 3rd Class are uniformly, no matter whether they are paired or unpaired consonants. They are therefore listed separately because only the consonants of group 3.2 (unpaired consonants) can be preceded by HO HIP or O ANG, and are treated then as if they were part of their classes.

Preceding	in front of consonants from group 3.2	Tone rules same as class	Without tone mark		With tone mark
			Living syllable	Death syllable	่	้
อ	ย	1	--	อยาก [ja:k \]	อยู่ [yu:\] อย่า [ya:\] อย่าง [ya:ng\]	--
ห	ง ญ น ม ย ร ล ว	2	หมา [ma:\/]	หมะ [ma\] หมัก [mak\] หมาก [ma:k\]	หม่า [ma: \]	หม้า [ma:/\]

The four examples in a preceding O ANG are the only words with this prefix.

 

 

With double initial consonants a distiction is made between preceding and consecutive consonants. The difference is whether the two consonants together can be pronounced or not. Preceding HO HIP or O ANG from previous section ar not included here, because they are not pronounced as consonants. Learn more about double initial consonants here.

With consecutive consonants these combinations are meant, either spoken together (true cluster) or changed as a single sound (false cluster).

Only if the first consonant of a cluster is one out of ก, ข, ค, ต, ป, ผ or พ followed by ร, ล or วthey can be true clusters. But even here, not all combinations are possible, as the following table shows:

	ร	ล	ว
ก	เกรง [gre:ng--]	เกล็น [glen--]	กว่า [gwa:\]
ข	ขรึม [khreum\/]	ขลุ่ย [khluy\]	ขวัญ [khwan\/]
ค	เครื่อง [khreu:ang/\]	คลอง [khla:wng--]	ความ [khwa:m--]
ต	ตระกูล [dtra\gu:n--]	-	-
ป	เปรียบ [bpri:ap\]	ปลา [bpla:--]	-
ผ	-	ผลัด [phlat\]	-
พ	พระ [phra/]	พลอย [phla:wi--]	-

These true clusters are handled by the tone rules of the first consonant.

For false clusters like these in the following table the tone rules of the spoken consonant are valid:

Written	Pronounced	Examples
ทร	ซ	ทราบ [sa:p/\]
ทร	ท	โทร [tho:-- ra/]
สร / ศร	ส / ศ	สร้าง [sa:ng/\] ศราทธ์ [sa:t\]
ซร	ซ	ไซร้ [say/]
จร	จ	จริง [jing--]

 

All other cases of double initial consonants are prefixed consonants. Such syllables are pronounced in two syllables, after the first consonant a short "a" is inserted. The following tone rules for such clusters are determined:

• If consonants of the classes 1 or 2 preceding on of the consonants 3.2, the tone rules of the first consonant are valid for both syllables.
• For other combinations of consonants within the three classes: Tone rules according to the class of the first consonant for the first syllable and the tone rules according to the class of the second consonant for the second syllable speech.

 

 

 

 

 

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