Learning the three s of Sanskrit

It’s not hard to learn the three sounds of s in Sanskrit. Actually, two of them are represented as sh and not simply s.

Phonetically, they all have different representation. We will try to learn all three of them from one word only that uses all of them. It is quite interesting and funny to try to pronounce the sound of this word. 🙂

Sanskrit Letters	English Letters	Category in Sanskrit	Category in English
स	s	दन्तय	Dental
श	Ś	तालव्य	Palatal
ष	Ṣ	मूर्धन्य	Cerebral

 

 

Now, we need to understand the sound. While pronouncing the first letter, which is स, our tongue touches the root of our teeth and that’s why it is dental.

The second letter, which is श is pronounced by touching our tongue at the center of palate.

The third letter, which is ष is pronounced by touching the tongue at the roots of the teeth but with the sound of sh.

I hope as you practice these sounds, you will be able to distinguish between these three sounds.

All these are present in almost all the Indian languages except a few like Punjabi where श and ष are represented by one letter ਸ਼।

Let me know if you need to ask a question regarding this.