Pronunciation And Orthography

The sound system has recently undergone some rather major changes. For one thing, if it's a stop you can pretty much forget about it, with only a few exceptions.

I avoided digraphs as much as I could, but given the limitations of the HTML character set sometimes I was stuck. At least there are fewer vowels these days.

CONSONANTS Bilab Lab-Den Dent. Alveo Al-Pal Vel Glot.
Obstr. Unv. Stop         t    
Fric.   f þ s sh   h
Voice Stop         d    
Fric.   v ð z zh    
Apprx Nasal m     n      
Glide         j w  
Liquid         r l  

VOWELS Front Central Back
High y   u
Mid ä i a
Low ö e o

Vowel harmony is an important feature in Tidash, though the rule is surprisingly simple: no front vowel may ever appear in a word which contains a back vowel, and vice versa. Central vowels may appear with either. Therefore, shähi would be acceptable, as would shahi, but shäha would not.

Last but not least, there are two tones in Tidash, high and low. They are important for noun pluarlization but not much else.

Last modified 22 October 1998