Chiangmai Or Chiang Mai?

[ChiangMaiFun]

My understanding (correct me if I get this wrong) that Chiang Mai IS Chiang Mai NOT Chiangmai? same Chaing Rai???

If so... why is this forum incorrectly spelt?

Just a thought...

[Tywais]

Chiang Mai is the correct spelling as per formal Thai transcription of the Royal Institute. If the construct is such that it can be broken into words that have meaning then it is separate words. Chiang Mai is in this category meaning "New Town". Chiangrai on the other hand has no meaning and is spelled as a single word.

Regarding the Thaivisa spelling of it, have no idea.

[MonsieurHulot]

Chiang Mai is the correct spelling as per formal Thai transcription of the Royal Institute. If the construct is such that it can be broken into words that have meaning then it is separate words. Chiang Mai is in this category meaning "New Town". Chiangrai on the other hand has no meaning and is spelled as a single word.

Regarding the Thaivisa spelling of it, have no idea.

Ty ways, Is Thaivisa spelled as a single word because it has no meaning?

[Limbo]

Chiangrai on the other hand has no meaning and is spelled as a single word.

/quote]

Sorry Tywais, the correct spelling is Chiang Rai.

Here in the northern part of Thailand (but also in the old Lanna areas in Burma and Laos) Wiang and Chiang mostly indicate that the towns have been walled.

Chiang indicates that even a king has resided there, in our case Mengrai, Por Khun.

And Rai means area, land, garden, compare the Rai Mae Fah Luang for instance.

Meng or Man is the old word for king.

So the original meaning might have come close to the 'kings-walled-land' or something similar.

More beautiful I can't make it.

Fifteen to twenty years ago mainly the spelling 'Chiangrai' was used, mostly by foreigners who didn't know the correct spelling and who didn't seem to bother either as long as the mail arrived.

When Thai started to use more and more English (as also Chiang Rai 'globalised') they learned at school and in practice the correct version.

In the mean time most foreigners also learned and started to use the correct version as that is the only version you see around you, at least when you live here.

Just type in both versions on Google and see the result, not only the numbers but also about who uses which version.

At your service!

Limbo

**************************************

[ThaiBasil]

I even know a Thai restaurant back home where its spelled: Chieng Mai (name of the restaurant) and the owners are Thai (or Chinese Thai or Laos, not really sure). I guess if Thai people don't really bother then why should we?

[Tywais]

Sorry Tywais, the correct spelling is Chiang Rai.

That's what I get for using only one Google reference instead of cross checking. But it makes sense since Chiang is a separate word, and also rai though probably not meaning a unit of measurement of land.

Interesting article from Major Roy Hudson > How to spell Chiang Mai

[muggins]

Sorry Tywais, the correct spelling is Chiang Rai.

That's what I get for using only one Google reference instead of cross checking. But it makes sense since Chiang is a separate word, and also rai though probably not meaning a unit of measurement of land.

Interesting article from Major Roy Hudson > How to spell Chiang Mai

Don't forget to take into account the Thai system of stringing words together and that there is no consistent phonetic system used in place names. Just to add to the confusion - there is also the Chiengmai Gymkhana club.

Chiang Mai, Chiangmai, Chiengmai , they're probably all correct in one way or the other.

[ChiangMaiFun]

Sorry Tywais, the correct spelling is Chiang Rai.

That's what I get for using only one Google reference instead of cross checking. But it makes sense since Chiang is a separate word, and also rai though probably not meaning a unit of measurement of land.

Interesting article from Major Roy Hudson > How to spell Chiang Mai

wow interesting... Chiang Mai it is then - you would think Thai Visa might get it right chaimai?

[Ajarn]

What a ridiculous question

[alant]

bugger, now i have had to change my profile but i refuse to use capital letters as i cant find them in the thai alphabet books i have ( learn to read 2-4 year old) or is it i am too idle

[Limbo]

Interesting article from Major Roy Hudson > How to spell Chiang Mai

Is it possible that Major Roy Hudson is living in Chiang Mai and still driving around by himself in a small red Toyota though he must be 94 now

(the car I guess should be about 15 years old).

That he and Tony B., who is now 84 and living in Payao both where in the British Army building Bailey bridges in Bangkok and Maesai in 1946?

In that case I met him four years ago 555!

Limbo

[Blinky Bill]

The correct spelling is เชียงใหม่.

Roy and Tony are both still around.

[sabaijai]

Sorry Tywais, the correct spelling is Chiang Rai.

That's what I get for using only one Google reference instead of cross checking. But it makes sense since Chiang is a separate word, and also rai though probably not meaning a unit of measurement of land.

Interesting article from Major Roy Hudson > How to spell Chiang Mai

The 'rai' in Chiang Rai is ราย, short for Mengrai (aka Phaya Mangrai), who founded Chiang Rai - เชียงราย - before he founded Chiang Mai. Nothing to do with ไร่ the measure of land. So it means 'Walled City of (Meng)Rai.' Some scholars also argue that it might be a corruption of an older name for the town, เวียงชัยนารายณ์ or Wiang Chayanarai, meaning Walled City of the Victorious Narayana but if that were so the newer name would likely still have /ณ์/ on the end.

I asked admins to change the name of the forum to Chiang Mai long ago but I guess someone forgot

[ChiangMaiFun]

Sorry Tywais, the correct spelling is Chiang Rai.

That's what I get for using only one Google reference instead of cross checking. But it makes sense since Chiang is a separate word, and also rai though probably not meaning a unit of measurement of land.

Interesting article from Major Roy Hudson > How to spell Chiang Mai

The 'rai' in Chiang Rai is ราย, short for Mengrai (aka Phaya Mangrai), who founded Chiang Rai - เชียงราย - before he founded Chiang Mai. Nothing to do with ไร่ the measure of land. So it means 'Walled City of (Meng)Rai.' Some scholars also argue that it might be a corruption of an older name for the town, เวียงชัยนารายณ์ or Wiang Chayanarai, meaning Walled City of the Victorious Narayana but if that were so the newer name would likely still have /ณ์/ on the end.

I asked admins to change the name of the forum to Chiang Mai long ago but I guess someone forgot

Good morning - any chance of nudging them again?

[zzaa09]

I even know a Thai restaurant back home where its spelled: Chieng Mai (name of the restaurant) and the owners are Thai (or Chinese Thai or Laos, not really sure). I guess if Thai people don't really bother then why should we?

Semantics....phonetics.....doesn't really matter how the 'official' or casual romanized spelling might be.

[Limbo]

The correct spelling is เชียงใหม่.

Roy and Tony are both still around.

Thanks Blinky Bill!

Good to hear.

I still have pictures that Tony made in Maesai (Mae Sai?) in 1946 and Roy showed me pictures of Bailey bridge over the Chao Phya in Bangkok.

Let me honour these young lads (I guess 180 years old together) with a drawing of a Bailey bridge.

The Bailey bridge of Mae Sai was later used over de Mae Kok River at Chiang Rai town and after that, untill less than two years ago over a tributary of "The Kok' for the road between Ban Panjamorn and Chiang Rung. British quality!

Now I don't know anymore where it is.

(If John in Mae Sai, another retired British Army man, would join them, they would together be more than 260 years old,555)

Thanks Sabaijai!

Fun to read that you found out that 'rai' indeed refers to Mengrai.

The same is the case with Rai Mae Fah Luang, where more and more people (the time factor certainly plays a role)

are referring to as the 'rai'.

Among people dressed in farmers clothes (mohoms, sp?) with a little bit longer hair than usual, a shoulder bag made of cloth (jaam sp?) but certainly not

working on the field, it has been fashion a while to talk about and even write Chieng Hai.

Have a nice day everybody!

Limbo

[Chunkton]

I have also frequently heard Lanna people refer to Chiang Rai as Chieng Hai.

[Blinky Bill]

I have also frequently heard Lanna people refer to Chiang Rai as Chieng Hai.

With the northern Thai dialect the R sound is pronounced with an H sound.

Example (excuse my crappy phonetics) : Mai Ruu = Bo Hoo, Bai nai = Bai sai

[orang37]

Sawasdee Khrup, TV Friends,

Thanks, Khun Limbo, and Khun Sabaijai, for some great posts with nutritious historical content on this thread !

Those of you wish to know more about Lanna history might enjoy the excellent book "History of Lanna," by Sarassawadee Ongsakul, translated into English by Chitraporn Tanratanakul (paperback 2nd. edition, Silkworm Press, Chiang Mai, 2005). Not only does she cover the period before Phaya Mengrai, but she also covers the period of Burmese occupation (200 years) that left Chiang Mai at the end of the 18th. century (Christian calendar) depopulated, ruined for twenty years.

~o:37;

[catmac]

My thanks to all who gave us some very interesting anecdotes and facts, just what a forum should be.

Thanks, too, to orang37 for the title of that book, it's on my reading list as of today.

[sassienie]

I`ve seen it spelt as: Chiang Mai, Chiangmai, Chiengmai and Chieng Mai.

My Thai brother in law once told me it means, a lot of elephants.

Dun know for sure and don`t really give a toss. I just live here and plod on as usual.

[sabaijai]

In Lanna, or Northern Thai, Chiang Rai would be pronounce Jiang Hai by most native residents in the capital district, Siang Hai from roughly Chiang Saen all the way east to Nan.

[realthaideal]

Sassienie -

I`ve seen it spelt as: Chiang Mai, Chiangmai, Chiengmai and Chieng Mai.

My Thai brother in law once told me it means, a lot of elephants.

Howdy Sassy Knees.

Your Bro In-Law was pulling your leg or just trying to appease the Farang.

Or it could be two stories combined to get a new result for you as we are in 'Lan Na,' the land of a 'million rice fields'. And this can only make me think you may have once asked about a street in Vientianne (better Wieng Jaan) called 'Lan Xang' which means land/ street of a 'million elephants'.

As for this city's romanized spelling, I'd prefer it to be a bit more faithful and follow as Chieng Mai or even Chieng Hmai - fat chance of that. I do feel that breaking it into 2 words makes it easier for the avg Farang to say, and to get the accent a little more accurate than if it were all jammed together. But this is all pedantics and small stuff - ie word-nerd jerk-off stuff, but I love it.

[MonsieurHulot]

Sassienie -

I`ve seen it spelt as: Chiang Mai, Chiangmai, Chiengmai and Chieng Mai.

My Thai brother in law once told me it means, a lot of elephants.

Howdy Sassy Knees.

Your Bro In-Law was pulling your leg or just trying to appease the Farang.

or, third possibility, he is an ignoramus. There has to be a few in every family.

[Limbo]

My Thai brother in law once told me it means, a lot of elephants.

Maybe you pronounced it wrong sassenie, 555!

Your brother in law has a lot of company. Most people don't know about their history or anything related to it.

I think the following might have played a role in the history teaching the older generation of Thais (and still the most)

have received:

At the end of the nineteenth century, the decades of the consolidation of the Siamese nation,

the brother of the Great King, the in many aspects brilliant Prince Damrong, ordered the history to be placed on record.

Since then normal historical research became difficult as it could be interpreted as criticism of the

work of the brother of the Great King Rama V.

It became subject to be copied in the minds, not to reflect on. Learn it for the exams and after that you can forget it.

In Europe there was a similar trend towards the end of the nineteenth century, because also there nationalism became functional in creating 'countries'.

National hero's were produced, monuments erected, parades held, national holidays announced and national hymns had to be sung

at any thinkable occasion, and the concept of the 'own' nation was printed in the minds of those living within the geographical area

that constituted the country. In countries with royal institutions their national value rose and they were given a prominent place.

The interpretation of history had to fit in this context as well.

Now we can look back and understand that the history writing during this period was influenced by the ideas of that time, related to

certain needs. And that is simply part of the history itself.

History was however brought back to live again and the historians got the freedom to give new interpretations to historical events of the past,

thus could, eagerly controlled by their colleagues, rewrite certain parts. The scientific approach you might call it.

Plus of course that 'national history' was put in a much wider cultural context of which social and economical aspects became a much bigger place.

But the question of Europeans knowing more about their history than Thai do I would not dare to answer.

So I seriously ask myself why i made this posting.

I hope you didn't read it...

Limbo

[sabaijai]

Sassienie -

I`ve seen it spelt as: Chiang Mai, Chiangmai, Chiengmai and Chieng Mai.

My Thai brother in law once told me it means, a lot of elephants.

Howdy Sassy Knees.

Your Bro In-Law was pulling your leg or just trying to appease the Farang.

Or it could be two stories combined to get a new result for you as we are in 'Lan Na,' the land of a 'million rice fields'. And this can only make me think you may have once asked about a street in Vientianne (better Wieng Jaan) called 'Lan Xang' which means land/ street of a 'million elephants'.

As for this city's romanized spelling, I'd prefer it to be a bit more faithful and follow as Chieng Mai or even Chieng Hmai - fat chance of that. I do feel that breaking it into 2 words makes it easier for the avg Farang to say, and to get the accent a little more accurate than if it were all jammed together. But this is all pedantics and small stuff - ie word-nerd jerk-off stuff, but I love it.

That would be 'Wiang Jan,' with a short /a/ in jan (sandalwood).

Curious how 'chieng' is more faithful than 'chiang'?

[realthaideal]

Oh man, getting shaken down by Sabai Jai ! Nice to hear from you, sir. I'm at work here in AK, and it ain't all it's cracked up to be. Like Ian Forebs, I'm on here from time to time just to day dream about where I'd rather be -Chieng Hmai.

Yeah SJ, maybe the moon 'jan' should be with one a. Or maybe it should be 'jantr' even better !

And wouldn't you call Chieng more faithful 'cause of the salah 'iyeh' thing ? But then that only leads me to submit a new option 'Chiyeng Hmai.' That's the best one yet.

All that's left after that is scrambling the vowels to the actual Thai order, and that would look really screwy in English.

Sure let's do it: eChiyng aihM. That's better. I would love to change all the street and municipal signs (like there are lots of good street signs around town) to read like that !

[orang37]

Sawasdee Khrup, Khun Sabaijai, and Khun RealThaiDeal,

I would always defer to your astute analyses of the Thai language (because I am illiterate in written Thai), but, may I suggest a slightly different "point of view" : the differences in transliterated spelling (obviously I can't appreciate the differences in the glyphs and diacritical markings in written Thai you are discussing) just reflect translators having heard different variations in regional speech ?

A second hypothesis would be that when a language commonly uses a phoneme that is not used in the native language of the foreign listener, the ambiguity of how that "alien" phoneme "registers" in foreign listeners gets reflected in a variety of transliterations. Of course, if a language is being "cohesively regulated" across a relatively "homogeneous" population by some kind of top-down official body, if you have, as in France, every schoolchild getting the same lesson at the same time of day per age cohort, that's another story.

My understanding (please correct me if I am wrong) is that scholars are still disagreeing about how to transliterate certain Thai language forms. And was it only twenty years or so there was agreement in English on how to transliterate Chinese ?

I know when I first came here, my "ears heard" Bangkok Thais say "Chiang Lai" for what I now pronounce "Chiang Rai." Was I hearing a regional difference, or have my ears "changed" : I don't know.

I offer these hypotheses in the spirit of Occam's Razor (technically : "Ockham") which suggests that given a number of competing hypotheses, the simpler is usually a good choice, or at least deserves verification through testing first.

An interesting side-note : I understand that it was only in 1980 with publication of research by the late Dr. Hans Penth on a 15th. century stele (the Chang Sa now in the Chiang Mai museum), that there was a general scholarly consensus that "Lan Na" did mean, in fact, "one million rice fields," rather than "many rice fields." See the book by Sarassawadee Ongsakul I mentioned before for details. (pp. 11 and following) And here I have to "qualify" the words "scholarly consensus" by saying that I don't know whether Professor Ongsakul is referring to "outside western scholarship" or being inclusive of both Thai scholarship and western scholarship.

And thank you, both, for "elevating" the discussion here.

best, ~o:37;

Edited July 30, 2009 by orang37

[Tywais]

I know when I first came here, my "ears heard" Bangkok Thais say "Chiang Lai."

Bangkok Thai also known as central/middle Thai, will usually be fairly clear with the "r" sound. However, Bangkok is a regional melting pot and probably come across dialects from all areas of Thailand.

"Standard Thai, also known as Central Thai or Siamese, is the official language of Thailand, spoken by about 25 million people (1990) including speakers of Bangkok Thai (although the latter is sometimes considered as a separate dialect)"

Dialects

[sabaijai]

Oh man, getting shaken down by Sabai Jai ! Nice to hear from you, sir. I'm at work here in AK, and it ain't all it's cracked up to be. Like Ian Forebs, I'm on here from time to time just to day dream about where I'd rather be -Chieng Hmai.

Yeah SJ, maybe the moon 'jan' should be with one a. Or maybe it should be 'jantr' even better !

And wouldn't you call Chieng more faithful 'cause of the salah 'iyeh' thing ? But then that only leads me to submit a new option 'Chiyeng Hmai.' That's the best one yet.

All that's left after that is scrambling the vowels to the actual Thai order, and that would look really screwy in English.

Sure let's do it: eChiyng aihM. That's better. I would love to change all the street and municipal signs (like there are lots of good street signs around town) to read like that !

Well, all that fresh summer salmon can't be so bad ...

More shaking and baking on the way, master chef If you were to spell out the Pali-Sanskrit for /jan/ in Wiang Jan it wouldn't have an /r/. It's from chandana, meaning 'sandalwood,' not chandra (candra), 'moon.' So in Thai จันทน์ (not จันทร์). Of course in modern Lao they lop off the last two characters entirely (ວຽງຈັນ).

The /ia/ vowel is a diphthong of /i/ and /a/ with the /y/ added for vowel sandhi. (Or a triphthong of /i/, /y/ and /a/ if you prefer). That's why the standard translit is Chiang. The final phoneme in /ia/ is a schwa. That's Yiddish for 'uh'

Orang37, indeed everyone can create their own idiosyncratic transliteration system, which is why the simplest thing to do, at least for Thai place names, is follow the standard RTGS

Apologies to anyone who thinks they logged onto the Thai Language subforum instead of the Chiang Mai subforum

By the way, word from above is that when the new forum software is introduced (can't say when, but it won't be long), the title of the forum will be amended to Chiang Mai Forum.