# Maldivian phonology

The phonemic inventory of Maldivian (Dhivehi) consists of 29 consonants and 10 vowels. Like other modern Indo-Aryan languages the Maldivian phonemic inventory shows an opposition of long and short vowels, of dental and retroflex consonants as well as single and geminate consonants.

## Vowels

Vowels :
| | Front | Front | Central | Central | Back | Back |
| | short | long | short | long | short | long |
| Close | i | iː | | | u | uː |
| Mid | e | eː | | | o | oː |
| Open | (æː) | (æː) | a | aː | | |
* ↑ [æː] is developed as a sound from the diphthong /ai/.
* The short open back vowel is phonetically central [ä].
* Diphthongs /ai/, /au/, and /oi/ become [æː], [aː], and [oe] in Malé. However, this does not apply to unassimilated loanwords.

## Consonants

Consonants :
| | | Labial | Dental/ Alveolar | Retroflex | Palatal | Velar | Glottal |
| Nasal | Nasal | m | n | ɳ | (ɲ) | | |
| Plosive/ Affricate | voiceless | p | t̪ | ʈ | t͡ʃ | k | |
| Plosive/ Affricate | voiced | b | d̪ | ɖ | d͡ʒ | ɡ | |
| Plosive/ Affricate | prenasal | ᵐb | ⁿd̪ | ᶯɖ | | ᵑɡ | |
| Fricative | voiceless | f | s̪ | ʂ | ʃ | | h |
| Fricative | voiced | | z | | | | |
| Approximant | Approximant | ʋ | l̪ | ɭ | j | | |
| Tap | Tap | | | ɽ | | | |
* ↑ The status of /ɲ/ as a phoneme is unclear. Except for two words, /ɲamɲam/ cynometra cauliflora (a kind of fruit) and /ɲaʋijani/ 'Gnaviyani' (alphabet letter), the /ɲ/ only occurs as the result of the fusion of /n/ and /i/: /du:ni/ 'bird', /du:ɲɲeʔ/ 'a bird'.
* ↑ /ʋ/ can occasionally be heard as a fricative [v], it has a [w] allophone occurring between vowel sounds /a/ and /u/.
Dental and retroflex stops are contrastive in Maldivian. For example: maḍun means ‘quietly’ madun means ‘seldom’. The segments /t/ and /d/ are articulated just behind the front teeth. The Maldivian segments /ʈ/, /ɖ/, /ʂ/, and /ɭ/ are not truly retroflex, but apical, produced at the very rear part of the alveolar ridge.
Maldivian has the prenasalized stops /ᵐb/, /ⁿd/, /ᶯɖ/, and /ᵑɡ/. These segments occur only intervocalically: /haⁿdu/ ('moon') /haᶯɖuː/ ('uncooked rice') and /aᵑɡa/ ('mouth'). Maldivian and Sinhalese are the only Indo-Aryan languages that have prenasalized stops.
The influence of other languages has played a great role in Maldivian phonology. For example, the phoneme /z/ comes entirely from foreign influence: /ɡaːziː/ ('judge') is from Persian, /maːziː/ ('past') is from Urdu.
The phoneme /p/ also occurs only in borrowed words in Modern Standard Maldivian: /ripoːtu/ ('report'). At one point, Maldivian did not have the phoneme /f/, and /p/ occurred in the language without contrastive aspiration. Some time in the 17th century, word initial and intervocalic /p/ changed to /f/. Historical documents from the 11th century, for example, show 'five' rendered as /pas̪/ whereas today it is pronounced /fas̪/.
In standard Maldivian when the phoneme /s/ occurs in the final position of a word it changes to [h] intervocalically when inflected. For example, /bas̪/ ('word' or 'language') becomes /baheʔ/ ('a word' or 'a language') and /mas/ ('fish') becomes /maheʔ/ ('a fish'). /s/ and /h/ still contrastive, though: initially /hiᵑɡaː/ ('operating') and /siŋɡaː/ ('lion') and intervocalically /aharu/ ('year') and /asaru/ ('effect').
/ʂ/ is peculiar to Dhivehi among Indo-Aryan languages. In some dialects, it is pronounced as a [ɽ̊] or [ɽ̊͜r̊]. The /ʂ/ is related historically and allophonically to /ʈ/ (but not to Sanskrit /ʂ/ or /ɕ/). Sometime after the 12th century, the intervocalic /ʈ/ became [ʂ] /raʈu/ 'island' (12th c.), [raʂu] 'island'. The /ʈ/ is retained in geminate clusters like /feʂuni:/ 'started', /faʈʈaifi/ 'has caused to start'. The contrast between /ʂ/ and /ʈ/ was made through loan words like /koʂani:/ 'cutting', /koʈari/ 'room'.

## Borrowed phonemes

Modern Standard Maldivian has borrowed many phonemes from Arabic. These phonemes are used exclusively in loan words from Arabic, for example, the phoneme /x/ in words such as /xaːdim/ ('male servant'). However, most Maldivians do not pronounce the sounds exactly. The following table shows the phonemes that have been borrowed from Arabic (and /ʒ/ from Persian and English) with their transliteration into Tāna, and their original and native pronunciation.
| Tāna | Arabic | SAMT | IPA Original / Dhivehi |
| ޙ | ح | ḥ | [ħ] / [h] |
| ޚ | خ | x | [x] / [h] |
| ޜ | ژ | ʒ | [ʒ] / [ʒ] |
| ޢ | ع | ‘ | [ʕ] / [ʔ] |
| ޣ | غ | ġ | [ɣ] / [g] or [ʔ] |
| ޥ | و | w | [w] / [ʋ] |
| ޛ | ذ | ź | [ð] / [z̺] |
| ޠ | ط | ţ | [tˤ] / [t̪] |
| ޡ | ظ | ẓ | [ðˤ] / [l] or [z̺] |
| ޘ | ث | ṡ | [θ] / [s̺] |
| ޤ | ق | q | [q] / [g] |
| ޞ | ص | ş | [sˤ] / [s̺] |
| ޟ | ض | ḑ | [dˤ] / [l] |
| ޝ | ش | ś | [ʃ] / [ʃ] or [s̺] |

## Phonotactics

Native Maldivian words do not allow initial consonant clusters; the syllable structure is (C)V(C) (i.e. one vowel with the option of a consonant in the onset and/or coda). This affects the introduction of loanwords, such as /ʔis.kuːl/ from English school.