sented by the symbols -ough in the words rough, cough, bough, slough, and hiccough. The Cambodian writing system, on the other hand, represents the sounds of Cambodian with remarkably little ambiguity, especially at the level of common vocabulary.[1] There are exceptions, of course, especially at the level of learned vocabulary borrowed from Sanskrit and Pali sources. These exceptions will be dealt with as exhaustively as possible, but it would be impossible, even for as regular a writing system as Cambodian, to list them all.
Although Cambodian spelling has historically been plagued by a lack of standardization, much progress has been made toward standardization in recent years, largely through the efforts of the scholars of the Buddhist Institute, whose excellent two-volume official dictionary — /waccənaanukrɑm kmae/ ‘Cambodian Dictionary’ (Item 4 in the Bibliography) — has been used as the authority for the spellings in this book. Common alternative spellings are given for some words.
- ↑ Assuming one is dealing with a homogeneous dialect; differences of pronunciation from one dialect to another are another matter.
