นบพระภูมิบาล บุญดิเรก

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Gregjam
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นบพระภูมิบาล บุญดิเรก

Post by Gregjam »

I am away at work now and it is a good chance for me to try to improve my reading skills. As I am reasonably conversant with the National Anthem I am trying to learn the Royal Anthem and the phrase in the title is transliterated as 'Nop Phra Phummi Ban Bunya Direk' which I find confusing.
In particular บุญ equates to Bhun and ดิเรก as Direk. I assume that the 'ya' allows an easy link between the words but is this something that occurs often in Thai language, is there a rule or is it just a case of learning where this happens.
Can someone explain this please as transliterations are not always to hand and I get strange looks from the family (who don't speak English) when I try to ask about things like this.
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Re: นบพระภูมิบาล บุญดิเรก

Post by hhinner »

Don't take this as gospel. The letter on the end of Bun(ya) is yor ying, which at the start of a word is pronounced like the letter y. At the end of a word it is pronounced like the letter n. In the middle of a word it could be pronounced as either n or y or both, depending on the word. It would be permissible to say "Bun direk", but I guess if bunyadirek is considered as a compound word the yor ying takes on its schizophrenic aspect. Whether bun direk is considered a compound word or not, I don't know. Possibly bunyadirek is used as it sounds better in the song. I read somewhere that much of Pleng Sansoen Phra Barami is written in rachasap, or royal language, derived from Sanskrit and Pali, so that might also come into play.

There are better Thai speakers than me on the forum so you might get a more accurate opinion shortly.
Gregjam
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Re: นบพระภูมิบาล บุญดิเรก

Post by Gregjam »

Thanks hhinner, from the lack of responses but plenty of views your answer looks to be a good explanation. Thai is such a complicated language to read but I find that if you want to pronounce the words correctly a knowledge of the writing makes is much easier.
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Re: นบพระภูมิบาล บุญดิเรก

Post by migrant »

Gregjam wrote:Thai is such a complicated language to read but I find that if you want to pronounce the words correctly a knowledge of the writing makes is much easier.
Yes, taking lessons now. Tax law was so much easier!!
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hhinner
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Re: นบพระภูมิบาล บุญดิเรก

Post by hhinner »

^^ It certainly makes using a dictionary easier.
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Re: นบพระภูมิบาล บุญดิเรก

Post by MajorBloodnok »

hhinner wrote:
There are better Thai speakers than me on the forum so you might get a more accurate opinion shortly.
:o

? I doubt it.
Where are they? :?

Anyway they are not of the patient, helpful hhinner type, none of them* having come forward
to assist me in transcribing the names of Thai musicians. :cry:

* exept Big Boy & dtaa-maiaa!
A GRATEFUL GUEST OF THE KINGDOM OF THAILAND & HER PEOPLE
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Re: นบพระภูมิบาล บุญดิเรก

Post by Felipesed1 »

Perhaps the subject matter is of no interest!
Talentless youths with no musical ability miming to a backing track.
There is plenty of good Thai bands playing in the Huahin area. Go and see real musicians playing live.


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vto
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Re: นบพระภูมิบาล บุญดิเรก

Post by vto »

I am just a beginner in Thai language, but I have come across this kind of phenomenon, called "consonant reduplication" or "double functioning consonant", where consonant is written once, but is actually pronounced twice, first as the final consonant of a syllable, and then again as the initial consonant of the next syllable.

This appears for example in words like "radio" วิทยุ (wit-tha-yu), where the ท is both the final consonant of the วิท -syllable, and the initial consonant of the ทะ -syllable (where the ะ is unwritten, as it often is), and "fruit" ผลไม้ (phohn-la-maai) where the ล is the final consonant of ผล and the initial consonant of ละ (where the ะ is again unwritten). According to one dictionary, both "boon" and "boon-ya" are given as alternate pronounciations of the word บุญ. There's probably some underlying reason from Sanskrit or Pali why so.

From my studies I feel this is just one of the things you just have to remember for certain words.
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Re: นบพระภูมิบาล บุญดิเรก

Post by Gregjam »

This consonant reduplication occurs in a few places in the Royal Anthem and it is a good example possibly for others struggling to come to terms with reading Thai:
บุญดิเรก
พระยศยิ่งยง
ดุจถวายชัย ชโย
And also adding a sound at the end of a word that does not appear there:
หวังวรหฤทัย
เอกบรมจักริน
พระยศยิ่งยง (both reduplication and an 'ah')
I have go used to adding a sound to link two characters (perhaps a better description than letter) but adding a sound at the end of a word is hard. This may be partly because as a native English speaker I am used to a hard end to a word (d, t, s etc).
I obviously have a long way to go and need to spend more time learning this. Can anyone recommend a good book that I can take with me when I work to improve my understanding. There are so many out there but I need something that allows for my simple brain without all these fancy phonetic spellings and punctuations. Years ago I initially learnt my Thai from a book called 'The fundamentals of the Thai Language' which was very easy and useful to use. Never seen it since and my copy is nowhere to be found.
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