a very accurate vehicle for the representation of sounds, yet we cannot be certain what was the exact pronunciation of the Aryan letters; and in one or two instances, both in consonants and vowels, there is reason to believe that the ancient pronunciation differed considerably from that of to-day.
The short a अ, which in Sanskrit is held to be inherent in every consonant not otherwise vocalized, is pronounced by the western languages and Hindi—in fact, by all except Bengali and Oṛiya—as a short dull sound like the final a in Asia, or that in woman. Bengali, however, is peculiar in respect of this sound, which is only exceptionally used. That is to say, the character অ and its equivalent, the unwritten inherent vowel, is pronounced a only in certain words, such as the word गण "crowd," when used to form the plural of nouns, sounded gan, not gon; at least, so says Shamacharan Sirkar, in his excellent Grammar, and no doubt he is correct to the rule, but in practice one hears gon constantly. In some cases the অ is pronounced as a short o, just as in English not, thus तावत् tâbot, not tâvat; तिरस्कार tirosh (not tiras) kâr. Purists, however, affect to pronounce it as in Sanskrit, and would read अनल anal, not onol.
The same rule holds good in Oṛiya, but not to the same extent as in Bengali. In the former language there is much less fondness for open broad sounds than in the latter. In short syllables, especially when unaccented, the अ is sounded a; thus, कदाच ka (not ko) dâch. Also in syllables where the a is long by position, as मण्डल mandal, चकला chaklâ. Before र or ड, however, it is sounded o, but this o is not such a deep full sound as the Bengali; thus, बड is boṛo, but often it sounds baṛa, the a here being an attempt to represent a sound halfway between the short a in woman and the deep short o of the Bengali.
The sound of a is omitted from consonants in many instances where we should expect, on the analogy of the Sanskrit, to
