Page:A Concise Grammar of the Malagasy Language.djvu/11

 aòrina, 'built.' In these cases the a is a prefix, the rest of the word being a root.

The following combinations of vowels are less often found: ia, oa, oi (or oy), oe, aoe, and oai.

Final a is changed into y when a word ending in -na, -ka, or -tra, is followed either by the article ny or by certain proper nouns which do not admit of the article: this change softens and shortens the sound of the final syllable, and also serves to mark the genitive and ablative cases.

The third example shows that verbs in -za, -ka, or -tra, also follow this rule.

Final a is left unchanged, in order that the sense may not be doubtful, when a word ending in -na, -ka, or -tra, is not followed by another word in the genitive or in the ablative case.

Fàntatra nỳ òlona, known (are) the people, i.e. the people are known.

Consonants.—The consonants are pronounced as in English, with the following exceptions:—