following §§. The special vowel signs are pronounced respectivily as e, i, o, u are in and most other European languages, viz. or e in ten; like i in machine, tin;

༤, , ” German, Italian like ay in say,

like o in so, on;

like u in rule, pull. It ought to be specially remarked that all vowels, including e and o (unlike the Sanscrit vowels from whom they have taken their signs) are short, since no long vowels at all occur in the Tibetan language, except particular circumstances, mentioned below (s. § 9. 5, 6). 2. When vowels are initial, is used as their base, as is ↑ in Urdu, e. g. Wama,,mother'. 3. is originally different from ', as the latter denotes the opening of the previously closed throat for pronouncing a vowel with that slight explosive sound which the Arabs mean by ↑ (ä ̧3), as the a in the words: the lily, an endogen, which would

,(همرنة)

be in Tibetan characters ལི་ལི་ཨན་; འ་ on the contrary is

the mere vowel without that audible opening of the throat (as Arabic ¦ without »), as in Lilian, 2 In Eastern Tibet this difference is strictly observed; and if the vowel is o oru the intentional exercion for avoiding the sound of

makes it resemble to wo and wu:,the milk, almost like wo-ma,,the owl' = wug-pa. In western Tibet this has been obliterated, and is there spoken just like tཨ་

4. Syllables. The Tibetan language is monosyllabic, that is to say all its words consist of one syllable only, which indeed may be variously composed, though the

componend parts cannot, in every case, be recognised in their individuality. The mark for the end of such a syllable is a dot, called tseg, put at the right side of the upper part of the closing letter, such as T the syllable ka. This tseg must invariably be put down at the end of each written syllable, except before a sad (§ 10), in which case only

na retains its tseg. If therefore such a dot is found after two or more consonants, this will indicate that all of them, some way or other, form one syllable with only one vowel in it: ka-ra, kar (cf. §§ 5. 8).

=

5. Final consonants. 1. Only the following ten: ག་ ང་ ད་ ན་ བ་ མ་ འ་ ར་ ལ་ ས་ (and the four with affixed ས, v. 5) occur at the end of a syllable. 2. It must be observed, that as finals are never pronounced like the English 9, d, b in leg, bad, cab, but are transformed differently in the different provinces. In Ladak they sound like k, t, p e. g. = sock, 5′ = got, top. 3. In all Central Tibet, moreover, final 5 and 5, sometimes even ", modify the sound of a preceeding vowel: a to ä (similar to the English a in hare, man), o into o (French eu in jeu), u into ụ (French u in mur). In most of the other provinces and are uttered so indistinctly as to be scarcely audད་ become so, go. In Tsang even final

ག་

ible, so that,

is scarcely perceptible, and final , particularly after o,

སོལ་བ་

is almost dissolved into a vowel sound = a: so-wa,

kon-choa.*) 4. Final

is sounded as s only changes into

in Northern Ladak; elsewhere it or dissappears entirely, prolonging, or even modifying at the same time the preceding vowel. Thus the following words:

ནས་ ,barley', ཤེས་ ,know་, རིས་,fgure', ཆོས་ ,religion་, ལུས་

,body', are pronounced in Northern Ladak: năs, šěs, ris, čos, lus; in Lahoul: nai, shei, rī, čō, lū; in Lhasa, and consequently by everyone who wishes to speak elegantly: nạ, sẽ, mì, độ lệ. 5. In some words final A occurs as a second closing letter (affix), after ', as in

ནགས་ ,forest', གངས་ ,glacier-ice་, ཐབས་ ,means་, རམས་ ,indigo'; these are pronounced in N. Ladak: nacks, gans, taps, rams, elsewhere nack (in Ü: nā), gan (ET ghang), tap, ram. 6. before and is especially in ET very often pro5

nounced m, e.g.ཉན་པ་ iäme-pa,ཉོན་པ་ cón-pa,སྙེམ་པ་ iem-pa

6. Dipthongs. 1. They occur in Tibetan writing only where one of the vowels i, o, u have to be added to a word ending with an other vowel (s. §§ 15. 1; 33. 1; 45. 2). These

additional vowels are then always written 2, 3, 3,

འོ་, འུ་

never etc. (cf. § 3.3); and the combinations ai, oi, ui

(as in བཀའི་, མགོའི་, བུའི་) are pronounced very much like á, ú, @, so that the syllables ནའི་, ཤེའི་, རིའི་, ཆོའི་

*) This is the form in which the word, chosen by the missionaries to express the Christian „God" (cf. dict.), has found its way into several popular works.

ལུའི་ can only in some vulgar dialects be distinguished from those mentioned in § 5. 4. 2. The others ao, eo, io, oo, uo,

(rt, eu, iu (བཀའོ་, སྐྱེའོ་, བགྱིའོ་, འགྲོའོ་, འདུའོ་, གའུ་, བྱེའུ་;, ཁྱིའུ་) are pronounced in rapid conjunction, but

either vowel is distinctly audible. In prosody they are generally regarded as one syllable, but if the verse should require it they may be counted as two.

7. Compound consonants. 1. They are expressed in writing by putting one below the other, in which case several change their original figure.

Subjoined consonants. 2. The letter y subjoined to another is represented by the figure, and occurs in connection with the three gutturals and labials, and with 2༞, thus ཀྱ་ ཁྱ་ གྱ་ པྱ་ ཕྱ་ བྱ་ མྱ་. The former tree have preserved, in most cases, their original pronunciation kya, kya, gya (the latter in ET: ghya s. § 2. 6). In the Mongol pronunciation of Tibetan words, however, they have been corrupted into è, č, respectively, a well known instance of which is the common pronunciation Kanjur i. o. kangyur,

or eleg. ku-gyur (བཀའ་འགྱུར་). པྱ་, ཕྱ་, བྱ are almost

everywhere spoken without any difference from 3, 5, E (except in the Western dialect before e and i, where the y is dropped and,, alone are pronounced). spoken ny 3. 3. r occurs at the foot of the gutturals,

=

is

བ་

dentals, labials, of 5, , N, and 5, in the shape of In some parts of the country, as in Purig, these combina

tions are pronounced literally, like kra, khra etc., but by far the most general custom is to sound them like the Indian cerebrals, viz. T, 5, indiscriminately

=

༄; ཁྲ, ཐྲ, ཕྲ= ཎ ཨཾ; གྲ, དྲ. བྲ = ཋ @ (in CT: /%); only in the 8th; case of the literal pronunciation br is not uncommon.

In and both letters are distinctly heard; 5 sounds like

shr in shrub, and so does

nearly in all cases: thus,

in these the

generally. In Ü this r is dropped

pa, sa etc. 4. Six letters

are often found with an ལ beneath: ཀླ་ གླ་ བླ་ ཟླ་ རླ་ སླ་; alone is pronounced, except in, which sounds da. 5. The figure, sometimes found at the foodof a letter is used in Sanscrit words to express the subjoined a, , as in (cf. § 9. 6) for TT; and is now pronounced स्वाहा;

འའ

by Tibetans ō: sōha; in words originally Tibetan it now exists merely as an orthographical mark, to distinguish homonymes in writing, as ♂fsa,hot and tsa,salt“; but,

as it is spoken, in some words at least, in Balti (e. g. F rtswa,grass', it must be supposed that, in the primitive form of the language, it was generally heard. — Note. Of such compounds, indeed, as lot' it is difficult to understand, how they can have been pronounced literally, if the v was not, perhaps, pronounced before the y.

A

Superadded consonants. 6. r above another consonant is written, and 11 contonants have this sign: རྐ་ རྒ་ རྔ་ རྟ་ རྡ་ རྣ་ རྦ་ རྨ་ རྩ་ ཛ་, above ཉ་ it preserves