THE EVOLUTION OF MALAY SPELLING. 117 



(e) When both syllables of the root have the a sound, and the 

 addition of a suffix requires an extra alif in the last syllable, 

 then if there is an alif in the first syllable of the root it should 



be omitted, unless it follows one of the letters j or ^ 



(fjV\ hen the root ends with one of the letters \ an alif must 



be written before the suffix an, the a lif required by rule (5 d) is 

 then omitted. (//) The further addition of suffixes or particles 

 to derived words causes no change in the spelling-. 



(0) {a) When sa is prefixed to a root commencing with a 

 vowel sound corresponding to wait or ya, the alif drops out, and 

 hamza takes its place ; with the prefix he the alif is retained and 

 hamza is written over it. {/>) When the root commences with 

 the a sound, the alif is retained and the hamza written over it. 

 Hamza is also employed in the same way with the suffix an 

 following an alif. (c) It is used with the suffix i following an 

 alif but not when it follows wan. (d) At the end of a word, 



hamza sometimes takes the place of final i- . (e) It also ap- 

 pears in a few Arabic words. 



In order to show the application of the principles of Malay 

 spelling reform suggested in this paper, the first chapter of 

 Ifikayat Abdullah, spelt according to the above rules, is here 

 appended, with a few notes on words which are spelt in an un- 

 usual way. A glossary of the words used in this paper as ex- 

 amples is also appended. The root words are arranged in the 

 order of the Malay alphabet, and, wherever necessary, the 

 spelling of one or more derivatives is given after the root. In 

 order to make this list more complete, several words have been 

 inserted in the glossary which will not be found among the 

 examples ; these include a number of words in the spelling of 

 which the Malays are very inconsistent, so that it seemed desir- 

 able to suggest a fixed standard of spelling in such cases. 



It will be seen that this method of spelling is essentially 

 the same as is at present in use among educated Malays through- 

 out the Malay Peninsula, which is admitted, even by the Dutch 

 scholars, to be the home of the purest form of the Malay 

 language. 



