Central Tibetan

Central Tibetan language, also known as Dbus Tibetan, Ü Tibetan or Ü-Tsang Tibetan, is the most widely spoken Tibetic language and the basis of Standard Tibetan.

Central Tibetan
Ü-Tsang
དབུས་སྐད་, Dbus skad / Ükä དབུས་གཙང་སྐད་, Dbus-gtsang skad / Ü-tsang kä
The name of the language written in the Tibetan script
Pronunciation	[wýkɛʔ, wýʔtsáŋ kɛʔ]
Native to	Tibet, India, Nepal, China
Region	Ngari, Ü-Tsang, Amdo, Kham, Himachal Pradesh
Native speakers	(1.2 million cited 1990–2014)[1]
Language family	Sino-Tibetan Tibeto-Burman Tibeto-Kanauri (?) Bodish Tibetic Central Tibetan
Standard forms	Lasetian Standard Tibetan
Writing system	Tibetan script
Language codes
ISO 639-3	Variously: bod – Lhasa Tibetan dre – Dolpo hut – Humla, Limi lhm – Lhomi (Shing Saapa) muk – Mugom (Mugu) kte – Nubri ola – Walungge (Gola) loy – Lowa/Loke (Mustang) tcn – Tichurong
Glottolog	tibe1272  Tibetan sout3216  South-Western Tibetic (partial match) basu1243  Basum
ELP	Walungge
	Dolpo[2]
	Lhomi[3]
Shingsaba is classified as Vulnerable by the UNESCO Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger

Dbus is the Wylie spelling of the name in Tibetan script, དབུས་, whereas Ü is the pronunciation of the same in Lhasa dialect, [wy˧˥˧ʔ] (or [y˧˥˧ʔ]). All of these names are frequently applied specifically to the prestige dialect of Lhasa.

Varieties

Dbus and Gtsang

There are many mutually intelligible Central Tibetan languages besides that of Lhasa, with particular diversity along the border and in Nepal:

Limi (Limirong), Mugum, Dolpo (Dolkha), Mustang (Lowa, Lokä), Humla, Nubri, Lhomi, Dhrogpai Gola, Walungchung Gola (Walungge/Halungge), Tseku

Basum (most divergent, possibly a separate language)

Ethnologue reports that Walungge is highly intelligible with Thudam.

Glottolog reports these South-Western Tibetic languages as forming a separate subgroup of languages within Central Tibetan languages, but that Thudam is not a distinct variety. On the opposite, Glottolog does not classify Basum within Central Tibetan but leaves it unclassified within Tibetic languages.

Tournadre (2013) classifies Tseku with Khams.^[4]

Central Tibetan has 70% lexical similarity with Amdo Tibetan and 80% lexical similarity with Khams Tibetan.^[5]

Qu & Jing (2017), a comparative survey of Central Tibetan lects, documents the Lhasa, Shigatse, Gar, Sherpa, Basum, Gertse, and Nagqu varieties.^[6]

Ngari Tibetan

Ngari Tibetan, more specifically Stöd Ngari (as opposed to the language of pre-1842 Lower Ngari that is now an independent language), is the endonym for a topolect spoken around Ngari Prefecture, T.A.R. Traditionally, it's considered a divergent variety of Dbusgtsang but not Dbusgtsang proper, however, some Western Khams Tibetan varieties such as Gêrzê Tibetan and Nagqu Tibetan are now considered part of the Ngari Tibetan areal group as well.^[7] In Indian-administrated Tibet since the 1846 British invasion of Spiti, a related topolect is now known under exonym "Lahuli and Spiti".

Consonants

IPA Tibetan writing Wade–Giles Tibetan Pinyin [k] ཀ་ k g [kʰ] ཁ་ ག་ kh, g k [ŋ] ང་ ng ng [tɕ] ཅ་ c j [tɕʰ] ཆ་ ཇ་ ch, j q [ɲ] ཉ་ ny ny [t] ཏ་ t d [tʰ] ཐ་ ད་ th, d t [n] ན་ n n [p] པ་ p b [pʰ] ཕ་ བ་ ph, b p [m] མ་ m m [ts] ཙ་ ts z [tsʰ] ཚ་ ཛ་ tsh, dz c [w] ཝ་ w w

IPA Tibetan writing Wade–Giles Tibetan Pinyin [ɕ] ཞ་ ཤ་ zh, sh x [s] ཟ་ ས་ z, s s [j] ཡ་ y y [ɹ] ར་ r r [l] ལ་ l l [h] ཧ་ h h [c] ཀྱ་ gy gy [cʰ] ཁྱ་ གྱ་ ky ky [tʂ] ཀྲ་ kr zh [tʂʰ] ཁྲ་ གྲ་ khr, gr ch [ʂ] ཧྲ་ hr sh [ɬ] ལྷ་ lh lh

• འ isn't commonly transliterated to Roman, in the Wade–Giles system ' is used.

Vowels

ཨ（◌）

ཨ།	ཨའུ།	ཨག། ཨགས།	ཨང༌། ཨངས།	ཨབ། ཨབས།	ཨམ། ཨམས།	ཨར།	ཨལ། ཨའི།	ཨད། ཨས།	ཨན།
a	au	ag	aŋ	ab	am	ar	ai/ä	ai/ä	ain/än
ཨི། ཨིལ། ཨའི།	ཨིའུ། ཨེའུ།	ཨིག། ཨིགས།	ཨིང༌། ཨིངས།	ཨིབ། ཨིབས།	ཨིམ། ཨིམས།	ཨིར།		ཨིད། ཨིས།	ཨིན།
i	iu	ig	iŋ	ib	im	ir		i	in
ཨུ།		ཨུག། ཨུགས།	ཨུང༌། ཨུངས།	ཨུབ། ཨུབས།	ཨུམ། ཨུམས།	ཨུར།	ཨུལ། ཨུའི།[VOW 1]	ཨུད། ཨུས།	ཨུན།
u		ug	uŋ	ub	um	ur	ü	ü	ün
ཨེ། ཨེལ། ཨེའི།		ཨེག། ཨེགས།	ཨེང༌། ཨེངས།	ཨེབ། ཨེབས།	ཨེམ། ཨེམས།	ཨེར།		ཨེད། ཨེས།	ཨེན།
ê		êg	êŋ	êb	êm	êr		ê	ên
ཨོ།		ཨོག། ཨོགས།	ཨོང༌། ཨོངས།	ཨོབ། ཨོབས།	ཨོམ། ཨོམས།	ཨོར།	ཨོལ། ཨོའི།	ཨོད། ཨོས།	ཨོན།
o		og	oŋ	ob	om	or	oi/ö	oi/ö	oin/ön

1. 特殊

Pronunciation

IPA	Wade–Giles	Tibetan Pinyin	IPA	Wade–Giles	Tibetan Pinyin
[a]	a	a
[ɛ]	al, a'i	ai/ä	[ɛ̃]	an	ain/än
[i]	i, il, i'i	i	[ĩ]	in	in
[u]	u	u
[y]	ul, u'i	ü	[ỹ]	un	ün
[e]	e, el, e'i	ê	[ẽ]	en	ên
[o]	o	o
[ø]	ol, o'i	oi/ö	[ø̃]	on	oin/ön

一"ai, ain, oi, oin" is also written to "ä, än, ö, ön".

Conjunct vowels

IPA	Wade–Giles	Tibetan Pinyin
[au]	a'u	au
[iu]	i'u, e'u	iu

Last consonant

IPA	Wade–Giles	Tibetan Pinyin
[ʔ]	d, s	none
[n]		n
[k/ʔ]	g, gs	g
[ŋ]	ng, ngs	ng
[p]	b, bs	b
[m]	m, ms	m
[r]	r	r

See also

• Lhasa Tibetan
• Amdo Tibetan
• Ladakhi language
• Balti language
• Ü-Tsang