Editing Khmer script (section)

===Consonants with no dependent vowel===
There are three environments where a consonant may appear without a dependent vowel. The rules governing the inherent vowel differ for all three environments. Consonants may be written with no dependent vowel as an initial consonant of a [[Khmer language#Stress|weak syllable]], an initial consonant of a strong syllable or as the final letter of a written word.

In careful speech, initial consonants without a dependent vowel in weak initial syllables are pronounced with their inherent vowel shortened as if modified by the ''bânták'' diacritic (see previous section). For example the first-series letter "{{lang|km|ច}}" in "{{lang|km|ចន្លុះ}}" ("torch") is pronounced with the short vowel {{IPA|/ɑ/}}. The second-series letter "{{lang|km|ព}}" in "{{lang|km|ពន្លឺ}}" ("light") is pronounced with the short diphthong {{IPA|/ŏə/}}. In casual speech, these are most often reduced to {{IPA|/ə/}} for both series.

Initial consonants in strong syllables without written vowels are pronounced with their inherent vowels. The word {{lang|km|ចង}} ("to tie") is pronounced {{IPA|[cɑːŋ]}}, {{lang|km|ជត}} ("weak", "to sink") is pronounced {{IPA|[cɔːt]}}. In some words, however, the inherent vowel is pronounced in its reduced form, as if modified by a ''bântăk'' diacritic, even though the diacritic is not written (e.g. {{lang|km|សព}} {{IPA|[sɑp]}} "corpse"). Such reduction regularly takes place in words ending with a consonant with a silent subscript (such as {{lang|km|សព្វ}} {{IPA|[sɑp]}} "every"), although in most such words it is the ''bânták''-reduced form of the vowel ''a'' that is heard, as in {{lang|km|សព្ទ}} {{IPA|[sap]}} "noise". The word {{lang|km|អ្នក}} "you, person" has the highly irregular pronunciation {{IPA|[nĕəʔ]}}.

Consonants written as the final letter of a word usually represent a word-final sound and are pronounced without any following vowel and, in the case of stops, with [[no audible release]] as in the examples above. However, in some words adopted from [[Pali]] and [[Sanskrit]], what would appear to be a final consonant under normal rules can actually be the initial consonant of a following syllable and pronounced with a short vowel as if followed by {{lang|km|ាក់}}. For example, according to rules for native Khmer words, {{lang|km|សុភ}} ("good", "clean", "beautiful") would appear to be a single syllable, but, being derived from Pali ''subha'', it is pronounced {{IPA|[sopʰĕəʔ]}}.