Central Tibetan

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Central Tibetan
Ü-Tsang
དབུས་སྐད་, Dbus skad / Ükä
དབུས་གཙང་སྐད་, Dbus-gtsang skad / Ü-tsang kä
Tibetanirv.png
The name of the language written in the Tibetan script
Pronunciation[wýkɛʔ, wýʔtsáŋ kɛʔ]
Native toIndia, Nepal, China (Tibet Autonomous Region)
Native speakers
(1.2 million cited 1990 census)[1]
Language family
Sino-Tibetan
  • Tibeto-Burman
    • Tibeto-Kanauri ?
Standard forms
  • Standard Tibetan
Writing system
Tibetan script
Language codes
ISO 639-3Variously:
bod – Lhasa Tibetan
dre – Dolpo
hut – Humla, Limi
lhm – Lhomi (Shing Saapa)
muk – Mugom (Mugu)
kte – Nubri
ola – Walungge (Gola)
loy – Lowa/Loke (Mustang)
tcn – Tichurong
Glottologtibe1272  Tibetan
sout3216  South-Western Tibetic (partial match)
basu1243  Basum
ELPWalungge
 Dolpo[2]
 Lhomi[3]

Central Tibetan, also known as Dbus, Ü or Ü-Tsang, is the most widely spoken Tibetic language and the basis of Standard Tibetan.

Dbus and Ü are forms of the same name. Dbus is a transliteration of the name in Tibetan script, དབུས་, whereas Ü is the pronunciation of the same in Lhasa dialect, [wy˧˥˧ʔ] (or [y˧˥˧ʔ]). That is, in Tibetan, the name is spelled Dbus and pronounced Ü. All of these names are frequently applied specifically to the prestige dialect of Lhasa.

There are many mutually intelligible Central Tibetan dialects besides that of Lhasa, with particular diversity along the border and in Nepal:[4]

Limi (Limirong), Mugum, Dolpo (Dolkha), Mustang (Lowa, Lokä), Humla, Nubri, Lhomi, Dhrogpai Gola, Walungchung Gola (Walungge/Halungge), Tseku, Basum

Ethnologue reports that Walungge is highly intelligible with Thudam, Glottolog that Thudam is not a distinct variety. Tournadre (2013) classifies Tseku with Khams.

Consonants[]

IPA Wade–Giles Tibetan Pinyin
[k] ཀ་ k g
[kʰ] ག་ kh, g k
[ŋ] ང་ ng ng
[tɕ] ཅ་ c j
[tɕʰ] ཇ་ ch, j q
[ɲ] ཉ་ ny ny
[t] ཏ་ t d
[tʰ] ད་ th, d t
[n] ན་ n n
[p] པ་ p b
[pʰ] བ་ ph, b p
[m] མ་ m m
[ts] ཙ་ ts z
[tsʰ] ཛ་ tsh, dz c
[w] ཝ་ w w
IPA Wade–Giles Tibetan Pinyin
[ɕ] ཞ་ ཤ་ zh, sh x
[s] z, s s
[j] ཡ་ y y
[ɹ] ར་ r r
[l] ལ་ l l
[h] ཧ་ h h
[c] ཀྱ་ gy gy
[cʰ] གྱ་ ky ky
[tʂ] ཀྲ་ kr zh
[tʂʰ] གྲ་ khr, gr ch
[ʂ] ཧྲ་ hr sh
[ɬ] ལྷ་ lh lh
  • འ isn't commonly transliterated to Roman, in the Wade–Giles system ' is used.

Vowels[]

ཨ（◌）







a au ag aŋ ab am ar ai/ä ai/ä ain/än








i iu ig iŋ ib im ir i in





[VOW 1]
u ug uŋ ub um ur ü ü ün







ê êg êŋ êb êm êr ê ên






o og oŋ ob om or oi/ö oi/ö oin/ön
  1. ^ 特殊

Pronunciation[]

IPA Wade–Giles Tibetan Pinyin IPA Wade–Giles Tibetan Pinyin
[a] a a
[ɛ] al, a'i ai/ä [ɛ̃] an ain/än
[i] i, il, i'i i [ĩ] in in
[u] u u
[y] ul, u'i ü [ỹ] un ün
[e] e, el, e'i ê [ẽ] en ên
[o] o o
[ø] ol, o'i oi/ö [ø̃] on oin/ön

一"ai, ain, oi, oin" is also written to "ä, än, ö, ön".

Conjunct vowels[]

IPA Wade–Giles Tibetan Pinyin
[au] a'u au
[iu] i'u, e'u iu

Last consonant[]

IPA Wade–Giles Tibetan Pinyin
[ʔ] d, s none
[n] n
[k/ʔ] g, gs g
[ŋ] ng, ngs ng
[p] b, bs b
[m] m, ms m
[r] r r

See also[]

  • Lhasa Tibetan
  • Amdo Tibetan
  • Ladakhi language
  • Balti language
  • Ü-Tsang

References[]

  1. ^ Lhasa Tibetan at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
    Dolpo at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
    Humla, Limi at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
    Lhomi (Shing Saapa) at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
    Mugom (Mugu) at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
    Nubri at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
  2. ^ Endangered Languages Project data for Dolpo.
  3. ^ Endangered Languages Project data for Lhomi.
  4. ^ N. Tournadre (2005) "L'aire linguistique tibétaine et ses divers dialectes." Lalies, 2005, n°25, p. 7–56 [1]


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