Lao (, phasa Lao; ), sometimes referred to as Laotian, is a Southwestern Tai language and the official language of Laos. It is also spoken in the Isan region of northeastern Thailand, where it is usually called the Isan language. The political split of the Lao-speaking population along the Mekong River resulted from the Franco-Siamese crisis of 1893. Lao is written in the Lao script, an abugida that evolved from early Tai scripts.
Lao is a tonal and analytic language, characteristics shared with other Kra-Dai languages as well as nearby Sino-Tibetan and Austroasiatic languages. It features high mutual intelligibility with Thai and Isan, enabling direct communication between speakers despite differences in their respective writing systems. The Vientiane dialect serves as the de facto standard.
In addition to being the sole official language of Laos, Lao serves as a lingua franca among the country's ethnically and linguistically diverse population. It is also spoken by diaspora communities, primarily in the United States, France, and Australia.
Classification
Kra-Dai Hlai languages Kam-Sui languages Kra languages Be language Tai languages Northern Tai languages Central Tai languages Southwestern Tai languages Northwestern Tai languages Khamti language Tai Lue language Shan language others Chiang Saen languages Northern Thai language Sukhothai language Thai language Southern Thai language Lao-Phuthai languages Tai Yo language Phuthai language Lao language (PDR Lao, Isan language)
The Lao language falls within the Lao-Phuthai group of languages, including its closest relatives, Phuthai (BGN/PCGN Phouthai, RTGS Phu Thai) and Tai Yo. Together with Northwestern Tai, which includes Shan, Ahom and most Dai languages of China, the Chiang Saen languages (which include Standard Thai, Khorat Thai, and Tai Lanna) and Southern Tai form the Southwestern branch of Tai languages. Lao (including Isan) and Thai, although they occupy separate groups, are mutually intelligible and were pushed closer through contact and Khmer influence, but all Southwestern Tai languages are mutually intelligible to some degree. The Tai languages also include the languages of the Zhuang, which are split into the Northern and Central branches of the Tai languages. The Tai languages form a major division within the Kra-Dai language family, distantly related to other languages of southern China, such as the Hlai and Be languages of Hainan and the Kra and Kam-Sui languages in mainland China and in neighbouring regions of northern Vietnam.
History
Tai migration (8th–12th century)
The ancestors of the Lao people were speakers of Southwestern Tai dialects that migrated from what is now southeastern China, specifically what is now Guangxi and northern Vietnam where the diversity of various Tai languages suggests an Urheimat. The Southwestern Tai languages began to diverge from the Northern and Central branches of the Tai languages, covered mainly by various Zhuang languages, sometime around 112 CE, but likely completed by the 6th century. Due to the influx of Han Chinese soldiers and settlers, the end of the Chinese occupation of Vietnam, the fall of Jiaozhi and turbulence associated with the decline and fall of the Tang dynasty led some of the Tai peoples speaking Southwestern Tai to flee into Southeast Asia, with the small-scale migration mainly taking place between the 8th and 12th centuries. The Tais split and followed the major river courses, with the ancestral Lao originating in the Tai migrants that followed the Mekong River.
Divergence and convergence As the Southwestern Tai-speaking peoples diverged, following paths down waterways, their dialects began to diverge into the various languages today, such as the Lao-Phuthai languages that developed along the Mekong River and includes Lao and its Isan sub-variety and the Chiang Saen languages which includes the Central Thai dialect that is the basis of Standard Thai. Despite their close relationship, there were several phonological divergences that drifted the languages apart with time such as the following examples:Jonsson, Nanna L. (1991) Proto Southwestern Tai. Ph.D dissertation, available from UMI.
PSWT *ml > Lao /m/, > Thai /l/
PSWT *r (initial) > Lao /h/, > Thai /r/
PSWT *ɲ > Lao /ɲ/, > Thai /j/
Similar influences and proximity allowed for both languages to converge in many aspects as well. Thai and Lao, although separated, passively influenced each other through centuries of proximity. For instance, the Proto-Southwestern Tai *mlɛːŋ has produced the expected Lao /m/ outcome maeng ( mèng, ) and the expected Thai /l/ outcome laeng ( ), although this is used only in Royal Thai or restricted academic usage, with the common form malaeng ( ), actually an archaic variant. In slang and relaxed speech, Thai also has maeng ( ), likely due to influence of Lao.
Thai and Lao also share similar sources of loan words. Aside from many of the deeply embedded Sinitic loan words adopted at various points in the evolution of Southwestern Tai at the periphery of Chinese influence, the Tais in Southeast Asia encountered the Khmer. Khmer loan words dominate all areas and registers of both languages and many are shared between them. Khmer loan words include body parts, urban living, tools, administration and local plants. The Thai, and likely the Lao, were able to make Khmer-style coinages that were later exported back to Khmer. The heavy imprint of Khmer is shown in the genetics of Tai speakers, with samples from Thai and Isan people of Lao descent showing proof of both the Tai migration but also intermarriage and assimilation of local populations. Scholars such as Khanittanan propose that the deep genetic and linguistic impact of the autochthonous Khmer and their language indicates that the earliest days of Ayutthaya had a largely bilingual population. Although evidence and research in Lao is lacking, major Lao cities were known to have been built atop existing Khmer settlements, suggesting assimilation of the locals. Isan and Lao commonly use a Khmer loan not found in Thai, khanong ( khanông, ), 'doorframe', from Khmer khnâng (, ), which means 'building', 'foundation' or 'dorsal ridge'.Gunn, G. C. (2004). 'Laotinization' in Southeast Asia: A Historical Encyclopedia, from Angkor Wat to East Timor. Ooi, K. G. (ed.). Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, Inc.
Indic languages also pushed Thai and Lao closer together, particularly Sanskrit and Pali loan words that they share. Many Sanskrit words were adopted via the Khmer language, particularly concerning Indian concepts of astrology, astronomy, ritual, science, kingship, art, music, dance and mythology. New words were historically coined from Sanskrit roots just as European languages, including English, share Greek and Latin roots used for these purposes, such as 'telephone' from Greek roots tēle, 'distant' and phōnē which was introduced in Thai as thorasap (, ) and spread to Isan as thorasap ( thôrasap, ) from Sanskrit dura (, ), 'distant', and śabda (, ), 'sound'. Indic influences also came via Pali, the liturgical language of Theravada Buddhism.
The effects of Khmer and Indic vocabulary did not affect all the Tai languages of Southeast Asia equally. The Tai Dam of northern Vietnam were shielded from the influence of the Khmer language and the Indic cultural influences that came with them and remain traditionally a non-Buddhist people. Although the Tai Dam language is a Chiang Saen language, albeit with a lexicon and phonology closer to Lao, the lack of Khmer, Sanskrit and Pali loan words makes the language unintelligible to Thai and Lao speakers.Diller, A. V. N., Edmondson, J. A. & Luo, Y. (2004) Tai-Kadai languages. (pp. 49–56). New York, NYC: Routledge.
Lan Xang (1354–1707)
Taking advantage of rapid decline in the Khmer Empire, Phra Chao Fa Ngoum ( ) defeated the Khmer and united the Tai mueang of what is now Laos and Isan into the mandala kingdom of Lan Xang in 1354. Fa Ngoum was a grandson of the ruler of Muang Xoua (RTGS Mueang Sawa), modern-day Louang Phrabang. Lan Xang was powerful enough to thwart Siamese designs from their base at Sukhothai and later Ayutthaya.Stuart-Fox, M. (1998). The Lao Kingdom of Lan Xang: Rise and Decline. (pp. 40–60). Banglamung, Thailand: White Lotus Press.
Khmer, and Sanskrit via Khmer, continued to influence the Lao language. Since Fa Ngoum was raised in the Khmer court, married to a Khmer princess and had numerous Khmer officials in his court, a now-extinct speech register known as rasa sap ( ) was developed to address or discuss the king and high-ranking clergy. Khmer and Sanskrit also contributed many belles-lettres as well as numerous technical, academic and cultural vocabulary, thus differentiating the Lao language from the tribal Tai peoples, but pushing the language closer to Thai, which underwent a similar process. The end of the Lao monarchy in 1975 made the Lao raxasap obsolete, but as Thailand retains its monarchy, Thai rachasap is still active.
The 16th century would see the establishment of many of the hallmarks of the contemporary Lao language. Scribes abandoned the use of written Khmer or Lao written in the Khmer alphabet, adopting a simplified, cursive form of the script known as Tai Noi that with a few modifications survives as the Lao script.Phra Ariyuwat. (1996). Phya Khankhaak, the Toad King: A Translation of an Isan Fertility Myth in Verse. Wajuppa Tossa (translator). (pp. 27–34). Lewisburg, PA: Bucknell University Press. Lao literature was also given a major boost with the brief union of Lan Xang with Lan Na during the reign of Xay Xétthathirat ( ) (1546–1551). The libraries of Chiang Mai were copied, introducing the tua tham (BGN/PCGN toua tham, RTGS tua tham) or 'dharma letters' which was essentially the Mon-influenced script of Lan Na but was used in Lao specifically for religious literature. The influence of the related Tai Lan Na language was strengthened after the capitulation of Lan Na to the Burmese, leading many courtiers and people to flee to safety to Lan Xang.
Theravada Buddhism Lan Xang was religiously diverse, with most of the people practicing Tai folk religion albeit somewhat influenced by local Austroasiatic animism, as well as the Brahmanism and Mahayana Buddhism introduced via the Khmer and Theravada Buddhism which had been adopted and spread by the Mon people. Although Lao belief is that the era of Lan Xang began the period of Theravada Buddhism for the Lao people, it was not until the mid-16th century that the religion had become the dominant religion.Holt, J. C. (2009). Spirits of the Place: Buddhism and Lao Religious Culture. Honolulu, HI: University of Hawaii Press. p. 14.
With Theravada Buddhism came its liturgical language, Pali, an Indic language derived from the Prakrit. Many Pali terms existed alongside earlier Sanskrit borrowings or were Sanskritized, leading to doublets such as Sanskrit maitri ( ) and Pali metta ( ), both of which signify 'loving kindness' although the Sanskrit term is more generally used for 'friendship'. The spread of Theravada Buddhism spread literacy, as monks served as teachers, teaching reading and writing as well other basic skills to village boys, and the Tai Noi script was used for personal letters, record-keeping, and signage, as well as to record short stories and the klon ( ) poetry that were often incorporated into traditional folksongs. + Shared Pali loan words from Theravada Buddhism Pali Isan Thai Lao Gloss 'merit''virtue' 'suffering''misery' 'sin''transgression' 'to share rejoicing' 'health''happiness' 'knowledge''wisdom' 'bicycle' 'dharma''morals'
Lao Three Kingdoms period (1713–1893)