In tonal languages, tone names are the names given to the tones these languages use.
Chinese
In contemporary standard Chinese (Mandarin), the tones are numbered from 1 to 4. They are descended from but not identical to the historical four tones of Middle Chinese, namely level (Chinese: 平; pinyin: píng), rising (上; shǎng), departing (去; qù), and entering (入; rù), each split into yin (陰; yīn) and yang (陽; yáng) registers, and the categories of high and low syllables.
Vietnamese
Standard Vietnamese has six tones, known as ngang, sắc, huyền, hỏi, ngã, and nặng tones.
Thai
Thai has five phonemic tones: mid, low, falling, high and rising, sometimes referred to in older reference works as rectus, gravis, circumflexus, altus and demissus, respectively.2 The table shows an example of both the phonemic tones and their phonetic realization, in the IPA.
| Tone | Thai | Example | Phonemic | Phonetic | Example meaning in English |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| mid | สามัญ | นา | /nāː/ | [näː˧] | paddy field |
| low | เอก | หน่า | /nàː/ | [näː˩] or [näː˨˩] | (a nickname) |
| falling | โท | หน้า | /nâː/ | [näː˦˩] | face, front |
| high | ตรี | น้า | /náː/ | [näː˦˥] or [näː˥] | maternal aunt or uncle younger than one's mother |
| rising | จัตวา | หนา | /nǎː/ | [näː˨˩˦] or [näː˨˦] | thick |
References
References
- Nguyễn, Văn Lợi; Edmondson, Jerold A. (1998), "Tones and voice quality in modern northern Vietnamese: Instrumental case studies", Mon-Khmer Studies, 28: 1–18
- Frankfurter, Oscar. Elements of Siamese grammar with appendices. American Presbyterian mission press, 1900 [1] (Full text available on Google Books)