Lingoflyާ — aabaafili
«aabaafili» is a vowel mark of the Maldivian script, read as “aa”. Long “a”: އާ is “aa”, on a consonant ބާ is “baa”. The Maldivian alphabet has 24 letters in total, and this character can be played right here. This character does not count as a letter of the alphabet. Length changes meaning in Divehi: ބަ and ބާ are different syllables. On a carrier the character looks like this: އާ. It appears, for example, in the word “ސަލާމް” (salaam) — hello.
In short
| Character | ާ |
| Name | aabaafili |
| Sound | aa |
| What it is | a vowel mark |
| On the carrier | އާ |
In our course the character comes 7th of 35: the order here is not alphabetical but from familiar to unfamiliar, its neighbours in the course are ް and ި, appears in roughly every fifth word on this site.
How to type ާ
- On a phone: add the Dhivehi keyboard in the keyboard settings (Gboard on Android; Keyboards in the iPhone settings).
- In Word on Windows: type U+07A7 and press Alt+X right after it — the code turns into the character.
- On a Mac: switch to the Unicode Hex Input source, hold Option and type 07A7.
- Type this sign after its base letter, even where it is drawn before it: letter first, then the sign, and they join.
- Unicode code point: U+07A7. With it, the character can be found in the character map of any system.
How it sounds
Long “a”: އާ is “aa”, on a consonant ބާ is “baa”
The character in the “ten fili — vowel signs” group
Five short and five long, in pairs. Without a fili a consonant is not read: ބ is not “b” but an unfinished sign. Here they are shown on alifu (އ), a letter with no sound of its own, which is why އަ sounds simply “a”.
Words with this character
How to remember this character
A single letter is the hardest thing to remember: memory has nothing to hold on to — a character has no meaning. A three-step loop works: see the character, try to recall the sound, see the right answer.
And come back to it the next day, not in an hour: a check a day or two later beats a check the same day. Nobody holds the whole alphabet — 24 letters — at once.
- It is better to test yourself the next day than at the end of the same session. That is why a word comes back to you tomorrow.checked many timesAdesope, Trevisan & Sundararajan, 2017, Review of Educational Research 87(3) · g = 0.82 when tested a day or two later, against 0.56 on the same day.
- Studying a little every day gets more into your head than spending the same total time in one sitting.checked many timesDonovan & Radosevich, 1999, Journal of Applied Psychology 84(5) · 63 studies compared, difference d = 0.46 — a sizeable figure for a learning effect.
Frequently asked
How does the Maldivian character ާ read?
As “aa” — it is a vowel mark of the Maldivian script. Long “a”: އާ is “aa”, on a consonant ބާ is “baa”.
What is the sign ާ called?
Aabaafili. A character's name and its sound are different things in the Maldivian script: it is called “aabaafili” and reads as “aa”. Learn the second one: the name only helps when the alphabet is recited aloud.
What can ާ be confused with?
Length changes meaning in Divehi: ބަ and ބާ are different syllables. Similar characters are best studied side by side and deliberately compared: learned on different days, they stay separate and get mixed up at their first meeting inside a word.