Tamil Alphabet Chart - Learning Tamil Through English/hindi (Page 10 of 38) in pdf

The Tamil Compound Letters

i. Remember that the dots placed above the Tamil Characters are NOT the Anusvara Nasal Dots. A dot

above any Tamil letter means the letter below that dot is MUTE, half or without the inherent vowel a

(A). A Tamil letter with a dot over it is equivalent of the Sanskrit or Hindi half letter or a letter with

+ அ = ம (ma` + A = ma) etc.

= ma` , ta` , k‘ etc. Thus,

the Halant slash under it e.g.

ii. A consonant can not be pronounced without any vowel to it. Thus like Sanskrit or Hindi, vowel அ a

A is considered inherent in each full consonant. Without it, the consonant is considered mute or half.

iii. Unlike Sanskrit or Hindi, the Tamil letters of a compound characters are written one after another.

ல = Kk, ppa, pLa, etc.

க,

ப,

They are not written with half letter attached to full letter. e.g.

Thus, the Sanskrit (and Hindi) compound letters will be written in Tamil as shown below :

F, Û, Ta, £, %a, §, ®, ^, ª, &,

¯, OaR ,

xa, Xa Œ

த,

ர,

த,

ட,

ர,

ப,

ய,

த,

ம,

ர,

ஞ ஓ

The Devanagari Anusvara and Visarga in Tamil

1. The Anusvara Nasal Dot :

In Tamil writing there are no Anusva@ r a Nasal dot like the Hindi writing has. But, like Sanskrit, for

writing nasal pronunciations in the words, the ‘Kindred’ or Class Nasal Consonants are used. The

following chart of Devanagari Class Consonants helps understanding how the Nasals work in Tamil as

well as in Sanskrit, because both are exactly same (for detailed discussion on this aspect, please refer to

my “Learn Sanskrit through English Medium” Lesson 3.2).

TABLE 2 : The Devanagari Class Consonants and Nasals in relation to the Tamil Nasals :

Devanagari Class

Sanskrit Class Characters

Equivalent Tamil

Kindered Nasal

that may come after the

Character that may come

Characters

Kindered Nasal

after the Kindered Nasal

Sanskrit & Tamil

Characters

shown in the last colomn.

1 k Class k vaga| :

k (Sa ga za) k (kh g gh)

க

G ng ங

k Class

ca (C ja Ja ) c (ch j jh)

2 ch Class ca vaga| :

Øa n~ y ஞ

ச ch Class

3 t>

@ (# D $) t> (t> h d< d< h )

Na n< ண

ட t Class (retroflex)

Class @ vaga| :

Class ta vaga| :

ta (Ya d Za) t (th d dh)

4 t

த th Class

ந

na n

5 p Class pa vaga| :

pa (f ba Ba) p (ph b bh)

ப p Class

pa m ம

6 Non-class

ya r La va oa Pa sa h <

A> m~ ங

ய ர ல வ

Characters

s{ h s< h s h

y r l v

ஷ ஸ ஹ

This Table is developed by Sanskrit Hindi Research Institute for “Learn Tamil Through English/Hindi” by Ratnakar Narale.

RangaRakes

Tamil Alphabet Chart - Learning Tamil Through English/hindi Page 10

Related Articles

Related forms

Related Categories