Preface


By Dr. John H. Pulamte
Compiler, Pherzawl Diksawnari

"To the one who is an inspiration to love the art and beauty of literature, translation and its endless enquiry"

 

To some, Hmar is a thousand-year-old tribe and to some it is just a few hundred years. The two opinions will never meet. One thing however clear to both the two schools of thought is that the script used at the moment by them is introduced by two pioneer Christian missionaries in the late 1890s for Lushai (later Mizo) and its kindred tribes that includes Hmar.

PHERZAWL is given as the name of the ‘Dictionary’ in recognition of the contribution of the village in the educational history of not just the Hmars but of its cognate tribes. The first High School ever established in the entire hill districts of Manipur (way back in 1951) was in Pherzawl. It is a village school that so far produced 5 Cabinet Ministers in Mizoram and Manipur; 11 All India & Central Services officers and the same number of Professors and faculties and medical officers as well as Church leaders - that too, before it was fully taken over by the government. The village school unfortunately is on the decline now but it is hope and prayed that it will regain its past glory after the village become the headquarter of a newly and unexpectedly created new district by the government of Manipur in 2016.

No script or language is perfect and so is that of the Hmars. While the pioneer themselves used the letter ‘O’ as the short tune of ‘AW’, it was not done so afterwards. ‘G groups’ of the Zo family has wisely continued to use it and many Hmars has also started to inadvertently used the same when writing many of their popular villages which includes Muolhoi, Saikot, Senvon etc as well as many of their clan and sub-clan such as Songate, Tuolor, Chonghau, Khobung, Amo, Famhoite, etc.

Letter ‘Ṭ’ could have been left out as the English themselves also don’t have it. There are good number of words in English that have letter ‘th’ and ‘thr’ together. The same is with Hmar. An experiment is made in this Dictionary to try both the style that is, using letter ‘o’ in place of ‘aw’ when the tune is short, and ‘tr’ and ‘thr’ in place of ‘ṭ’ and ‘ṭh’. As such, there are few words that begin with ‘O’ which is not common in normal Hmar word. Also, as words that start with ‘ṭh’ are substituted by ‘thr’, it comes after ‘thl’ and, since letter ‘ṭ’ is being substituted by ‘tr’, it comes after ‘tl’. There is absolutely no intention for enforcement of the same but just a trial. The letter ‘Ṭ’ however still occupies its slotted place which led to additional few pages.

There is no Hmar word that starts with letter ‘G’ and J’ excepting use of ‘J’ by some members of the ‘Zote’ clan in writing their surname (clan name) as ‘Joute’. All other words that begins with ‘G’ and ‘J’ in this dictionary are imported words. There may come a time where letter ‘J’ will be used as soft tune of ‘Z’ like ‘jawng’ instead of ‘zawng’ (monkey); ‘jal’ in place of ‘zal’ (sleep).

Hmar script, A AW B CH is followed in the first place. As such, ‘A’ is followed by ‘AW’, ‘B’, ‘CH’ and so on. However, letter ‘AW’ is separated as ‘A’ and ‘W’ like normal English alphabet when it comes not in the beginning. As such, ‘Baal’ is followed by ‘Babu, Bachikhawm, Bahara’ and not by ‘Baw, Bawar nor ‘Bawi’; ‘Bat’ (due) is followed by ‘Bawng’ (cow). ‘Savom’ (bear) is followed by ‘saw’ (sprinkling of salt in curry); Otherwise, ‘sa’ (meat) have to be followed by ‘saw’ (sprinkling of salt in in curry) and, ‘sazuk’ (stag) have to be followed by ‘saw’. Similarly, letter ‘NG’ comes before ‘H’ but when the same comes in the middle of a ‘word’ they are separated and put after ‘M/N’ or ‘m/n’. As such, ‘bawng’ (cow) comes after ‘Bawmrang’ and not after ‘Bawde’. These are done so as not to confuse the non-Hmar user of this Dictionary. All ‘imported words’ are courageously put in its adapted form or spelling (Dictionary = Diksawnari) which may look odd and a bit inappropriate for the moment. This is not a recommendation but just a test of water. There is no attempt for enforcement of the same.

Most of the imported words that begin with letter ‘C and Q’ are put under ‘K’ as there is no ‘C’ and ‘Q’ in Hmar alphabet. Words that has ‘suk’ and ‘in’ as prefix is almost unlimited. It is carefully selected base on its commonness or relevance, importance or less use or the second syllable has no meaning by itself. The prefix ‘in’ in most cases can be substituted by ‘an’ (for eg. Inthawi = offering sacrifice; a’n thawi = he/she is making sacrifice). It is carefully selected base on its commonness or relevance and importance. ‘um’ is also a suffix (hnam um, tirdak um, beidong um, etc) but not that common (like prefix ‘in’ or ‘suk’); ‘pui’ is also suffix – thawpui, fakpui, inthloppui, etc.

Hmar dialect is peculiar in the fact that ‘double adverb’ is a determiner. It is not possible to put down all these double adverbs as the one left out also looks like very possible base on how it is expressed or define. A particular word can come under different ‘parts of speech’; only the most common one is given here due to space constraint.

Hmar words, especially those which are common among Hmars of Mizoram and Tuithraphai areas of Manipur are greatly influenced by Mizo/Lusei/Duhlien dialect due to its closeness in many aspects. It is for sure that there will be many words left out especially in name of tree, animals and plants. Suggestion solicited will be added in the next edition.

Name of tribes given are as per sources available. One may or may not agree and opinion is sure to differ. There may be some repetitive words; some incorrect statement of its parts of speech; spelling mistakes and oversight will be here and there. Hmar is a monosyllabic language with all word or syllable having a meaning of its own. Some single alphabet even has a corresponding meaning when translated into English. Name of many birds, animals and tree and plants are however written separately. Words to be separated may clubbed together and vice-versa. They are all subject to correction in the next edition. The Dictionary is open for public scrutiny and open criticism; we will accept and correct them next time. Some important and common phrases are added in the Dictionary for some obvious reasons.

I thank all who contributed to make this Dictionary see the light. Many thanks to SAL (Sinlung Academy of Letters) for gladly accepting to take charge of the future expansion and edition.

Abbreviation Used in the Dictionary