Practicing the Letter e

Practice saying the words below, noting the difference between the vowel and the letter .

Always be aware of the similarities between and and note their differences. For example, parts of the letter look very similar to parts of the letter , and it is tempting to assume that they have the same vowel sound. However, the letter is a consonant with the vowel added, making the sound, "le," while is just a vowel by itself which represents the sound, "o."

Now that you've learned several "tricks" used in Devanagari, such as conjunct letters and the letter and its maatraa , the latter of which goes above consonants, you're going to start seeing some of these items combined. For example, the letter ste uses both concepts: first, the letter is combined with the letter , forming a conjunct which would normally make the sound, "sta." Secondly, the vowel maatraa is added to the conjunct, changing the vowel sound so that, "ste" is produced.

I resorted to bird calls to illustrate the combination of three items: the consonant normally make the sound, "ka," but adding the letter changes its sound to, "ke." Lastly, when the second form of candrabindu () is added, this nasalizes the letter which changes the sound to, "kE."