Cham Letter Sa

ꨧ writes the s sound at the beginning of a Cham syllable.

In Eastern Cham, this is one of two letters represented by Latin s in transcription, but the two letters are not interchangeable. A consonant written without a vowel sign carries a default vowel; added vowel signs can change it. For an s sound at the end of a syllable, Cham uses ꩋ.

Cham's oldest surviving Cham-language inscription, on the Đông Yên Châu stone, is dated to the late 4th/5th century. The script developed through Pallava, a South Indian script in the wider Brahmi family. Early inscriptions used Sanskrit and Old Cham for religious and political expression; later manuscripts held literary, documentary, and ritual texts. The Akhar Thrah manuscript tradition is documented from the seventeenth century and is especially associated with Eastern Cham. Western Cham communities in Cambodia also use Jawi, an Arabic-derived script.

How do I type ꨧ?

In iCham's Rumix mode, type -s for ꨧ by itself.

As of 2026, iCham's guide maps -s to the isolated letter and also accepts z or x instead of the hyphen. To enter a whole Cham word, type the Latin-based input and press Space or punctuation to make the keyboard output Akhar Thrah.

A vowel sign is stored after its base letter even when shaping displays it to the left. That shift is normal and does not change which letter comes first in the text.