Points to Ponder — Page ii
Note on Transliteration In transliterating Arabic words we have followed the following system adopted by the Royal Asiatic Society. ا at the beginning of a word, pronounced as a when it has Fatḥ on it, i when it has Kasrah on it, u when it has Ḍamma on it, preceded by a very slight aspiration, like h in the English word ‘honor. ’ ث th, pronounced like th in the English word ‘thing. ’ ح ḥ, a guttural aspirate, stronger than h. خ kh, pronounced like the Scotch ch in ‘loch. ’ ذ dh, pronounced like the English th in ‘that. ’ ص ṣ, strongly articulated s. ض ḍ, similar to the English th in ‘this’. ط ṭ, strongly articulated palatal t. ظ ẓ, strongly articulated z. ع ‘, a strong guttural, the pronunciation of which must be learnt by the ear. غ gh, a sound approached very nearly in the r ‘grasseye’ in French, and in the German r. It requires the muscles of the throat to be in the ‘gargling’ position whilst pronouncing it. ق q, a deep guttural k sound. ء ’, a sort of catch in the voice. The consonants not included in the above list have the same phonetic value as in the principal languages of Europe. Short vowels are represented by a for َـ (like u in ‘bud’); i for ِـ (like i in ‘bid’); u for ُـ (like oo in ‘wood’); the long vowels by ā for or ﺁ (like a in ‘father’); ī for or ی ِـ (like ee in ‘deep’); ai for َـ ی (like i in ‘site’); ū for ُـ و (like oo in ‘root’); au for َـ و (resembling ou in ‘sound’). In transliterating Urdu/Persian words, we have followed the above Royal Asiatic Society. Please note that in transliterated words the letter ‘e’ is to be pronounced as in ‘prey’ which rhymes with ‘day;’ however the pronunciation is flat without the element of English diphthong. If in Urdu and Persian words ‘e’ is lengthened a bit more it is transliterated as ‘ei’ ‘to be pronounced as ‘ei’ in ‘feign’ without the element of diphthong thus ےک is transliterated as ‘Kei. ’ For the nasal sound of ‘n’ we have used the symbol ñ. Thus Urdu word ںیم would be transliterated as ‘mein. ’ These transliterations are not included in the system of transliteration by Royal Asiatic Society.