Chinese Tones
Every syllable of every word in languages like Mandarin Chinese and Thai have pitch patterns that are part of the correct pronunciation and that contrast with other words that have the same consonant and vowel sounds but different tones.
Mandarin / 普通話·普通话 Pu3tong1hua4
Tones are called 聲調·声调 sheng1diao4 in Mandarin, or "four tones" 四聲·四声 si4sheng1.
Numbers for Mandarin tone contours (e.g., "55" for high level) are from the work of linguist 趙元任·赵元任 Yuen Ren CHAO (1892–1982).
![[IMAGE: Mandarin tone chart]](../images/mandtonechartdkbr.gif)
| Tone Number | Diacritic | Tone Name | Tone Contour | Contour Numbers |
|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | ![]() macron | high level 陰平・阴平 yin1ping2 | starts at very high pitch, flat (long duration) | 55 | |
| 2 | ![]() acute | high rising 陽平・阳平 yang2ping2 | starts at medium pitch, rises to very high | 35 | |
| 3 | ![]() caron | falling rising 上聲・上声 shang3sheng1 | before a pause or the end of a sentence | full: starts at fairly low pitch, falls very low, and rises to fairly high (long duration) | 214 |
| before a 1st-, 2nd-, 4th-, or 5th-tone syllable | abbreviated: starts at fairly low pitch, falls very low, and stops | 21 | |||
| before a 3rd-tone syllable | shifts to 2nd tone (high rising): starts at medium pitch, rises to very high | 35 | |||
| 4 | ![]() grave | high falling 去聲・去声 qu4sheng1 | starts at very high pitch, falls quickly to very low | 51 | |
| 5 or 0 | ![]() none | neutral 輕聲・轻声 qing1sheng1 | varies depending on preceding syllable [used with many grammatical words and with endings of many compound words] | varies | |
Cantonese / 粵語 Jyut6jyu5 (Mandarin: Yue4yu3)
Tones are called 聲調 sing1diu6 in Cantonese.
Numbers for Cantonese tone contours (e.g., "55" for high level) are from the work of linguist 趙元任·赵元任 Yuen Ren CHAO (1892–1982).
![[IMAGE: Cantonese tone chart]](../images/canttonechartdkbr.gif)
| Tone Number | Environment | Tone Name | Tone Contour | Contour Numbers |
|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jyutping | Yale1 | ||||
| 1 | 1 | when ending in a vowel or nasal (-m, -n, -ng) | high level2 陰平 jam1ping4 [yin1ping2]3 | starts at very high pitch, flat | 552 |
| 7 | when ending in a stop consonant (-p, -t, -k) | entering high level 陰入 jam1jap6 [yin1ru4] | starts at very high pitch, flat, and ends abruptly with unreleased stop consonant | 5 | |
| 2 | 2 | only ends in a vowel or nasal (-m, -n, -ng) | high rising 陰上 jam1soeng5 [yin1shang4] | starts at medium pitch, rises to very high | 35 [25, 24]4 |
| 3 | 3 | when ending in a vowel or nasal (-m, -n, -ng) | mid level 陰去 jam1heoi3 [yin1qu4] | starts at medium pitch, flat | 33 [44] |
| 8 | when ending in a stop consonant (-p, -t, -k) | entering mid level 中入 zung1jap6 [zhong1ru4] | starts at medium pitch, flat, and ends abruptly with unreleased stop consonant | 3 [4] |
|
| 4 | 4 | only ends in a vowel or nasal (-m, -n, -ng) | low falling 陽平 joeng4ping4 [yang2ping2] | starts at fairly low pitch, falls very low | 21 [11] |
| 5 | 5 | only ends in a vowel or nasal (-m, -n, -ng) | low rising 陽上 joeng4soeng5 [yang2shang4] | starts at fairly low pitch, rises to medium pitch | 23 [13, 24] |
| 6 | 6 | when ending in a vowel or nasal (-m, -n, -ng) | low level 陽去 joeng4heoi3 [yang2qu4] | starts at fairly low pitch, flat | 22 [33] |
| 9 | when ending in a stop consonant (-p, -t, -k) | entering low level 陽入 joeng4jap6 [yang2ru4] | starts at fairly low pitch, flat, and ends abruptly with unreleased stop consonant | 2 [3] |
|
|
1Yale = the Yale romanization system for Cantonese. 2In some areas the 1st tone has two forms: high level (55) and high falling (53). In other areas high falling has merged into high level (55). 3Words in [square brackets] are the Mandarin pronunciations of the Cantonese tone names. 4Numbers in [square brackets] are other linguists' analyses, which may refer to different varieties of Cantonese. |
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The compilation on this Language and Humor page copyright © 2009 Kevin Sullivan, lahkevin at gmail dot com. Posted December 30, 2009.
![[IMAGE: text; TEXT: vowels with macron accent]](../images/sans12macrondkbr.gif)
![[IMAGE: text; TEXT: vowels with acute accent]](../images/sans12acutedkbr.gif)
![[IMAGE: text; TEXT: vowels with caron accent]](../images/sans12carondkbr.gif)
![[IMAGE: text; TEXT: vowels with grave accent]](../images/sans12gravedkbr.gif)
![[IMAGE: text; TEXT: vowels with no accent]](../images/sans12neutraldkbr.gif)