Khmer script
Mark Khmer name Function
។ ខណ្ឌ khăn Used as a period ( the sign resembles an eighth rest in music writing ) . However , consecutive sentences on the same theme are often separated only by spaces
៘ ល៉ៈ lăk Equivalent to etc
ៗ លេខទោ lékhtoŭ ( figure two ) Duplication sign ( similar in form to the Khmer numeral for 2 ) . It indicates that the preceding word or phrase is to be repeated ( duplicated ) , a common feature in Khmer syntax
៕ បរិយោសាន bâriyaôsan A period used to end an entire text or a chapter
៚ គោមូត្រ koŭmot ( cow urine ) A period used at the end of poetic or religious texts
៙ ភ្នែកមាន់ phnêkmoăn ( cock 's eye ) A symbol ( said to represent the elephant trunk of Ganesha ) used at the start of poetic or religious texts
៖ ចំណុចពីរគូស châmnŏch pi kus two dots ( and a ) line Used similarly to a colon . ( The middle line distinguishes this sign from a diacritic . )
Spacing and punctuation
Spaces are not used between all words in written Khmer . Spaces are used within sentences in roughly the same places as commas might be in English , although they may also serve to set off certain items such as numbers and proper names . Western-style punctuation marks are quite commonly used in modern Khmer writing , including French-style guillemets for quotation marks . However , traditional Khmer punctuation marks are also used ; some of these are described in the following table .
The Khmer script (; ) is an abugida (alphasyllabary) script used to write the Khmer language (the official language of Cambodia). It is also used to write Pali in the Buddhist liturgy of Cambodia and Thailand. The Khmer script was adapted from the Pallava script, which ultimately descended from the Brahmi script, which was used in southern India and South East Asia during the 5th and 6th centuries AD. The oldest dated inscription in Khmer was found at Angkor Borei District in Takéo Province south of Phnom Penh and dates from 611. The modern Khmer script differs somewhat from precedent forms seen on the inscriptions of the ruins of Angkor. The Thai and Lao scripts are descendants of an older form of the Khmer script. Khmer is written from left to right. Words within the same sentence or phrase are generally run together with no spaces between them. Consonant clusters within a word are stacked, with the second (and occasionally third) consonant being written in reduced form under the main consonant. Originally there were 35 consonant characters, but modern Khmer uses only 33. Each character represents a consonant sound together with an inherent vowel, either â or ô; in many cases, in the absence of another vowel mark, the inherent vowel is to be pronounced after the consonant. There are some independent vowel characters, but vowel sounds are more commonly represented as dependent vowels, additional marks accompanying a consonant character, and indicating what vowel sound is to be pronounced after that consonant (or consonant cluster).