Editing Thai script (section)

==History==
[[File:Bangkok National Museum - 2017-04-22 (008).jpg|thumb|right|150px|[[Ramkhamhaeng inscription|Ram Khamhaeng Inscription]], the oldest inscription using [[Sukhothai script]] 

([[Bangkok National Museum]])]]
[[File:Evolution of The Thai Alphabet.png|thumb|450x450px|The evolution of the Thai alphabet]]
The Thai script is derived from the [[Sukhothai script]], which itself is derived from the Old [[Khmer script]] ({{langx|th|อักษรขอม}}, ''akson khom''), which is a southern [[Brāhmī script|Brahmi]]c style of writing derived from the south Indian [[Pallava alphabet]] ({{langx|th|ปัลลวะ}}). According to tradition it was created in 1283 by King [[Ramkhamhaeng|Ram Khamhaeng]] the Great ({{langx|th|พ่อขุนรามคำแหงมหาราช}}).<ref name=hartmann>{{citation |last1=Hartmann |first1=John F. |title=The spread of South Indic scripts in Southeast Asia |date=1986 |page=8}}</ref> The earliest attestation of the Thai script is the [[Ram Khamhaeng Inscription]] dated to 1292; however, some scholars question its authenticity.<ref name="diller">{{cite journal |last1=Diller |first1=Anthony V.N. |title=Thai orthography and the history of marking tone |date=1996 |url=http://oriens-extremus.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/OE-39-2-04.pdf |pages=228–248 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201003043416/http://oriens-extremus.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/OE-39-2-04.pdf |archive-date=Oct 3, 2020 |url-status=dead |website=Oriens Extremus }}</ref> The script was derived from a cursive form of the Old Khmer script of the time.<ref name=hartmann/> It modified and simplified some of the Old Khmer letters and introduced some new ones to accommodate Thai phonology. It also introduced tone marks. However, according to the Wat Bang Sanuk Inscription (C.107) in [[Phrae province]], several scholars propose that the earliest Thai script could be dated back to 1219.<ref name=13th>{{cite journal|url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/20072298|title=Relics, Oaths and Politics in Thirteenth-Century Siam|date=2020|author=[[David K. Wyatt]]|journal=Journal of Southeast Asian Studies|volume=32|issue=1|pp=3–65|archivedate=13 April 2025|archiveurl=https://archive.org/details/relics-oaths-and-politics-in-thirteenth-century-siam}}</ref>{{rp|25–7}}

Thai is considered to be the first script in the world that invented [[Tone (linguistics)#Phonetic notation|tone markers]] to indicate distinctive tones, which are lacking in the Mon-Khmer ([[Austroasiatic languages]]), [[Dravidian languages]] and [[Indo-Aryan languages]] from which its script is derived or partly influenced. Although Chinese and other [[Sino-Tibetan languages]] have distinctive tones in their phonological system, no tone marker is found in their orthographies. Thus, tone markers are an innovation in the Thai language that later influenced other related Tai languages and some [[Tibeto-Burman languages]] on the [[Mainland Southeast Asia]].<ref name=diller/> Another addition was consonant clusters that were written horizontally and contiguously, rather than writing the second consonant below the first one.<ref name=diller/> Finally, the script wrote vowel marks on the main line; however, this innovation fell out of use not long after.<ref name=hartmann/>