Tones of Taiwanese

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Tones of Taiwanese. In MTL, the tone is indicated by f, r, or x or modified spelling of the vowel.

Pitch vs. time of the seven tones of Taiwanese. Peh-oe-ji (POJ) is shown for the vowel a
File:Seven Tones.mp3
1. af, 2. ar, 3. ax, 4. aq, 5. aa, 7. a, 8. ah
svaf, tea, khox, khoaq, laang, ea, phvi, tit (衫 短 褲 闊 人 矮 鼻 直)

Table

Tone
number
Name Description Pitch MTL Example
1 dark level (ym-pviaa 陰平) high 55 af say
2 rising (siorng 上) shouting 51 ar hor
3 dark departing (ym-khix 陰去) low falling 31 ax pax
4 dark entering (ym-jip 陰入) low short aq piq 鱉, aq
5 light level (ioong-pviaa 陽平) curving tone 24 aa hiim 熊, guu
7 light departing (ioong-khix 陽去) basic tone 33 a chviu
8 light entering (ioong-jip 陽入) high short ah lok 鹿
  • "level, rising, departing, entering" or "pviaa, siorng, khix, jip" refer to the original four tones of Middle Chinese
  • Not shown: Tone 6 (pitch 22/33) is not widely used. Lukang accent still has the 6th tone, which has merged with the 2nd and 7th tones in other dialects of Taiwanese. Tone 9 (pitch 35) is used in Japanese loanwords and contractions. See TRS for diacritics.

See also