Topical question

[Mark Mandel]

Billionbridges.com asked:
> Taliban or Taleban?

Allen Maberry answered:

>>>>>
Taliban.
Persian for "Students" (talib = student, -an [plural])
romanized: [dot below letter]T[macron]alib[macron]an.
<<<<<

What does the t-underdot represent? I had gotten the idea somewhere that
the initial stop was a "strong" (velarized) Arabic t.


                  Mark A. Mandel : Senior Linguist
 Dragon Systems, a Lernout & Hauspie company : speech recognition
 320 Nevada St., Newton, MA 02460, USA : http://www.dragonsys.com