Burmese

How Old Burmese became Modern Burmese

Old Burmese runs from the 11th to the 16th century, Middle Burmese to the 18th, and Modern Burmese from the middle of the 18th. The sounds changed a good deal over that time. The grammar and word order barely moved. Old Burmese took many Pali words through Pyu, which explains spellings such as pūjo, "to worship", where Pali has pūjā. From the mid-15th century bilingual Pali and Burmese texts called nissaya reshaped the literary language by treating Burmese postpositions as the equivalents of Pali inflections.

Why the letters turned round

The earliest Burmese script used square block letters. From the 17th century rising literacy brought a flood of writing on palm leaves and folded paper, the parabaik, and the cursive round letters took over. The alphabet has 33 letters and 12 vowels and needs no spaces between words. Tone and vowel marks sit on all four sides of a letter. Spelling still keeps sounds that speech has merged, such as the separate nasal finals.

What made Burmese the state language

In the mid-1700s Mon was still the main language of Lower Burma; after the Konbaung victory over the Restored Hanthawaddy Kingdom in 1757, the region shifted to Burmese. Under British rule English came first in education. A Burmese major at the University of Rangoon and student protests in 1920 against English in matriculation exams fed the demand for teaching in Burmese. The 1948 Constitution made it the official language. A commission set up in August 1963, precursor of the Myanmar Language Commission, took charge of spelling and diction.

Burmese remains diglossic: a literary form for print and formal speeches, and a spoken one for conversation and television.