TolsienO
Introduction
Phonology
Consonants
| Bilabial | Labio-dental | Dental | Alveolar | Post-alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Uvular | Glottal | |||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | m | n | ɲ | ŋ | |||||||||||||||
| Plosive | p b | t̚ tʰ t d | k g | ||||||||||||||||
| Fricative | ɸ β | f v | θ ð | s z | ʃ ʒ ɧ̙ʷ | χ ʁ | h | ||||||||||||
| Approximant | j | w | |||||||||||||||||
| Flap | (ɾ) | ||||||||||||||||||
| Lateral approx. | l | ||||||||||||||||||
| Prenasalized occlusive | (ᵑg) |
Vowels
| Front | Central | Back | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Close | i y | u | |||||
| Close-mid | e (ø) | o | |||||
| Open-mid | (ɛ) (œ) ɛ̃ | ɔ ɔ̃ | |||||
| Open | ä | ɑ̃ |
Notes :
It is very likely that some phonemes or graphemes that do not appear explicitly in the associated documentation were nonetheless meant to be included. These would be :
The phoneme /ɛ/, which is not mentioned explicitly but is probably the reason the grapheme <Ê ê> appears in the alphabet.
The phoneme /ø/ or /œ/ is also not mentioned explicitly, and there is no grapheme either, but the presence of a ";" shows that it was probably meant to be included. However, this is only very indirect evidence.
In a similar way, there is reason to believe that the phoneme /ɲ/ is included, and corresponds to the explicitly mentioned grapheme <Ñ ñ> ; meanwhile, the phoneme /ᵑg/ is only evidenced by a ";".
The flap /ɾ/ is indirectly mentioned by its inclusion in the syllable /bɾa/ corresponding to the grapheme <Ƃ ƃ>.
Some IPA symbols used in the original description are most likely to be erroneous :
The phoneme /χ/ is probably what was meant by /ħ/ ;
The notation /ɧ̙ʷ/ is the most recent agreed upon description of a phoneme that probably corresponds to what was described as /h̪/ in the original documentation.
Orthography
Alphabet
Y y /jo/ or /ɔj/
Æ æ /aj/ ; Æ̊ æ̊ /ja/
A a /a/
B b /b/
Q q /ʃ/
D d /d/
E e /e/ ; Ê ê /ɛ/ (E, e ; Ê, ê ;)
G g /g/ ; Ñ ñ /ɲ/ (G, g ; ; Ñ, ñ)
H h /h/
I i /i/
Ƶ ƶ /ð/ ; Ƶ̆ ƶ̆ /ʒ/
K k /k/
L l /l/
M m /m/
N n /n/
O o /o/ or /ɔ/ ; Œ œ /o/
P p /p/ ; Ƥ ƥ /ɸ/
R r /ʁ/
C c /s/ ; S s /θ/
T t /t/ ; Ŧ ŧ /t̚/ or /tʰ/ or /t/
U u /y/
V v /v/ ; F f /f/
Ƿ ƿ /wi/
Z z /z/
Ɯ ɯ /ɑ̃/ ; Ɯ̂ ɯ̂ /ɛ̃/ ; Ɯ̌ ɯ̌ /ɔ̃/
W w /u/
X x (or Ħ ħ) /χ/
Ƃ ƃ /bɾa/
Ŋ ŋ /ŋ/
Ɋ ɋ /ɧ̙ʷ/
Ƀ ƀ /β/
Spelling rules
The so-called "link" is a diacritic that is used with either and another vowel, in order to denote the approximant /j/, or <w> (or more rarely, <o>) and another vowel to denote the approximant /w/. Here are a few examples :
i͠e /je/
o͠a /wa/
ê͠w /ɛw/
By convention :
i͠i /ji/
i͠ĭ /ij/
w͠w /wu/
w͠w̆ /uw/
w͠o ou o͠o /wo/
o͠w̆ ou o͠ŏ /ɔw/