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ᜀ - A [for those ᜁ - E/I who does not have ᜂ - O/U internet]
The three vowel characters were only used at the beginning of words and syllables, or syllables without any consonant. There were only three vowels because the ancient Tagalogs, and many other linguistic groups, did not distinguish between the pronunciations of i and e, or u and o until Spanish words entered their languages. Even today these sounds are interchangeable in words such as lalaki/lalake(man), babae (woman) and kababaihan (womanhood or womankind), uód/oód (worm), punò (tree trunk) and punung-kahoy (tree), and oyaye/oyayi/uyayi (lullaby).
The vowel characters actually represented vowels that were preceded by a glottal stop. This pronunciation was more common in the pre-Hispanic era but has changed over the centuries due to the influences of western languages. This shift can be seen when early texts, such as the Doctrina Christiana, are compared to modern Filipino. For example, we syllabicate the words ngayón (today) and gagawín (will do) as follows: nga-yon and ga-ga-wín respectively. But the baybayin text of theDoctrina reveals a different syllabic division. Ngayón was written, ngay-on, and gagawin was writtenga-gaw-in.
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