On the name Pornthip

Khunying Pornthip Rojanasunand (พรทิพย์ โรจนสุนันท์), a well-known and highly respected forensic pathologist, is now a household name in Malaysia for her testification at the inquest of the death of the political aide Teoh Beng Hock.

According to the Reader’s Digest Trust Survey, Khunying Pornthip is the most trusted individual in Thailand for her dedication to bring justice to the society. It is saddening to see some individuals, with malicious intent, poking fun at her name by calling her “Dr. Porn”.

One has to blame bad transliteration for this. Learners of Thai language will know how messy the Thai transliterations are, a joke says that there are as many Thai transliterations as Thai learners. Although the Royal Institute of Thailand has its official transliteration system, many different transliterations still can be found. According to this official system, Pornthip Rojanasunand should be transliterated as Phonthíp Rôchanasunan.

Pornthip, or Phonthíp, a common female name in Thailand, is actually of Sanskrit origin, though it might not be recognizable as such at the first glance.

The first part of the name Phon (พร) comes from the Sanskrit word vára (वर), “blessing” or “boon”. Many Sanskrit loan words in Thai lose their word-final short vowels, e.g. lôk (โลก) “world”, comes from the Sanskrit word loka (लोक). The final alveolar /r/ and /l/ in Thai are pronounced as /n/, it is not uncommon to hear Thais pronounce “bill” as “bin”. The Sanskrit labiodental /v/ becomes the Thai bilabial /ph/ (aspirated /p/), and in Thai a short vowel /o/ is inserted in between two consonants, so the Sanskrit vára eventually becomes phon in Thai.

Thíp (ทิพย์), the second part of the name, is derived from the Sanskrit word divya (दिव्य), “divine”. The Sanskrit dental /d̪ / becomes the Thai alveolar /th/ (aspirated /t/), e.g. the Sanskrit deva (देव) “god” becomes thêp (เทพ) in Thai. The word-final short vowel is dropped, and in Thai the final consonant /j/ (ย) becomes silent, indicated by the sign (-์), so divya in Sanskrit becomes thíp in Thai.

The Sanskrit equivalent of Phonthíp therefore, is Varadivya, both means “divine blessing”. Let us hope that Dr. Pornthip, or Phonthíp if you prefer, continues to receive divine blessings so that she can continue her good works.