Lao
Language · official in 1 country
The Franco-Siamese crisis of 1893 split the speakers of Lao along the Mekong, so the language of Laos is called Isan across the river in Thailand. Phasa Lao is a Southwestern Tai language, tonal and analytic, highly intelligible with Thai, and written in the Lao script, an abugida that grew out of early Tai scripts.
The language on record
- Own name
- ລາວ
- ISO 639-1
- LO
- ISO 639-3
- LAO
- Script
- Lao
- Family
- Southwestern Tai
- Official in
- 1 country
Where Lao is official
Laos, where Lao is the sole official language and a lingua franca among many ethnic groups. The Isan-speaking northeast of Thailand, on the other bank, has no Lao entry on record.
About Lao
How Tai speakers reached the Mekong
The ancestors of the Lao spoke Southwestern Tai dialects in what are now Guangxi and northern Vietnam. Southwestern Tai began to split from the Northern and Central Tai languages, mostly Zhuang, around 112 CE. Unrest around the fall of the Tang dynasty pushed small groups south between the 8th and 12th centuries, and the ancestral Lao followed the Mekong. Sound changes set Lao apart from Thai: Proto-Southwestern Tai initial r became h in Lao but stayed r in Thai.
Why Khmer words run through Lao
Khmer loanwords cover body parts, tools, administration, urban life and local plants, and many are shared with Thai. Lao and Isan use khanong, doorframe, from Khmer khnâng, which Thai lacks. Sanskrit arrived largely through Khmer, and Pali through Theravada Buddhism. The Tai Dam of northern Vietnam, shielded from these influences, speak a language Lao and Thai speakers cannot understand, though its core is close to Lao.
What Lan Xang added
The kingdom of Lan Xang, formed in 1354 from the Tai principalities of Laos and Isan, developed a court register, rasa sap, for speaking to and about the king and senior clergy; it fell out of use when the monarchy ended in 1975. In the 16th century scribes gave up Khmer script for a simplified cursive called Tai Noi, which survives with a few changes as the Lao script.
Which French words remain
French was the administrative language of the protectorate for sixty years, until independence in 1953, and it brought words such as sangtimet, centimetre, and kine for Guinea. Laos joined La Francophonie in 1972 and became a full member in 1992. In 2010 about 173,800 people, 3% of the population, were fluent in French. Thai, across the border, borrowed from English instead.
Common questions
Questions about Lao
Is Lao the same language as Thai?
No, though the two are highly intelligible and speakers can talk directly. They belong to different groups of Southwestern Tai, and centuries of contact and shared Khmer and Indic loanwords have drawn them together.
How many tones does Lao have?
Six lexical tones in general, though the Vientiane and Luang Prabang dialects have five.
Which dialect is standard Lao?
The dialect of Vientiane is the de facto standard.