Tibetan pinyin

The SASM/GNC/SRC romanization of Tibetan, commonly known as Tibetan pinyin, is the official transcription system for the Tibetan language in the People's Republic of China for personal name and place names. It is based on the Lhasa dialect of Standard Tibetan and reflects the pronunciation very accurately, except that it doesn't mark tone. It is used within China as an alternative to the Wylie transliteration for writing Tibetan in the Latin script; for use within academic circles, Wylie transliteration is more commonly used.

Initials

The tone of a syllable depends mostly on its initial consonant. In this table, each initial is given in the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) with the vowel a and a tone mark to present tone register (high/low).

ཀ་

ཁ་ག་

ང་

ཅ་

ཆ་ཇ་

ཉ་

ཏ་

ཐ་ང་

ན་

པ་

ཕ་བ་

མ་

ཙ་

ཚ་ཛ་

ཝ་

ཞ་ཤ་

ཟ་ས་

ཡ་

ར་

ལ་

ཧ་

ཀྱ་

ཁྱ་གྱ་

ཀྲ་

ཁྲ་གྲ་

ཧྲ་

ལྷ་

g

k

ng

j

q

ny

d

t

n

b

p

m

z

c

w

x

s

y

r

l

h

gy

ky

zh

ch

sh

lh

IPA	Wylie transliteration	Tibetan pinyin
pá	p, sp, dp, lp	b
pà	rb, sb, sbr	b
mpà	lb, ’b	b
pʰá	ph, ’ph	p
pʰà	b	p
má	rm, sm, dm, smr	m
mà	m, mr	m
wà	w, db, b[1]	w
tá	t, rt, lt, st, tw, gt, bt, brt, blt, bst, bld	d
ntá	lth	d
tà	rd, sd, gd, bd, brd, bsd	d
ntà	zl, bzl, ld, md, ’d	d
tʰá	th, mth, ’th	t
tʰà	d, dw	t
ná	rn, sn, gn, brn, bsn, mn	n
nà	n	n
lá	kl, gl, bl, rl, sl, brl, bsl	l
là	l, lw	l
l̥á	lh	lh
tsá	ts, rts, sts, rtsw, stsw, gts, bts, brts, bsts	z
tsà	rdz, gdz, brdz	z
ntsà	mdz, ’dz	z
tsʰá	tsh, tshw, mtsh, ’tsh	c
tsʰà	dz	c
sá	s, sr, sw, gs, bs, bsr	s
sà	z, zw, gz, bz	s
ʈá	kr, rkr, lkr, skr, tr, pr, lpr, spr, dkr, dpr, bkr, bskr, bsr	zh
ʈà	rgr, lgr, sgr, dgr, dbr, bsgr, rbr, lbr, sbr	zh
ɳʈà	mgr, ’gr, ’dr, ’br	zh
ʈʰá	khr, thr, phr, mkhr, ’khr, ’phr	ch
ʈʰà	gr, dr, br, grw	ch
ʂá	hr	sh
rà	r, rw	r
cá	ky, rky, lky, sky, dky, bky, brky, bsky	gy
cà	rgy, lgy, sgy, dgy, bgy, brgy, bsgy	gy
ɲcà	mgy, ’gy	gy
cʰá	khy, mkhy, ’khy	ky
cʰà	gy	ky
tɕá	c, cw, gc, bc, lc, py, lpy, spy, dpy	j
tɕà	rby, lby, sby, rj, gj, brj, dby	j
ɲtɕà	lj, mj, ’j, ’by	j
tɕʰá	ch, mch, ’ch, phy, ’phy	q
tɕʰà	j, by	q
ɕá	sh, shw, gsh, bsh	x
ɕà	zh, zhw, gzh, bzh	x
ɲá	rny, sny, gny, brny, bsny, mny, nyw, rmy, smy	ny
ɲà	ny, my	ny
já	g.y	y
jà	y	y
ká	k, rk, lk, sk, kw, dk, bk, brk, bsk	g
kà	rg, lg, sg, dg, bg, brg, bsg	g
ŋkà	lg, mg, ’g	g
kʰá	kh, khw, mkh, ’kh	k
kʰà	g, gw	k
ŋá	rng, lng, sng, dng, brng, bsng, mng	ng
ŋà	ng	ng
ʔá	—, db	—
ʔà	’	—
há	h, hw	h

Vowels and final consonants

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

The seventeen vowels of the Lhasa dialect are represented in Tibetan pinyin as follows:

IPA	Tibetan pinyin	IPA	Tibetan pinyin
i	i	ĩ	in
e	ê	ẽ	en
ɛ	ai/ä	ɛ̃	ain/än
a	a	ã	an
u	u	ũ	un
o	o	õ	on
ɔ	o
y	ü		ün
ø	oi/ö	ø̃	oin/ön

Syllable-final -r is usually not spoken, but lengthens the preceding vowel. Syllable-final -n of the written forms usually nasalises the preceding vowel. This is how syllable-final consonants are transcribed:

IPA	Tibetan pinyin
p	b
ʔ	g/—
r	r
m	m
ŋ	ng

Intersyllable influence

Sometimes there's intersyllable influence, e.g.:

Tibetan script	Tibetan pinyin	Wylie (EWTS)	Lhasa IPA	Expl
མ་ཕམ་གཡུ་མཚོ།	Mapam Yumco	w=ma-pham g.yu-mtsho/	[]	前加字提前 (How to tranlate Tibetan concept "前加字" in English?)
ཁྲ་འབྲུག་དགོན་པ།	Changzhug Gönba	w=khra-’brug dgon-pa/	[ʈ͡ʂʰaŋʈ͡ʂ˭uk k˭ø̃p˭a]

Examples

Tibetan Script	Wylie	Tibetan pinyin	Tournadre	other transcriptions
གཞིས་ཀ་རྩེ	Gzhis-ka-rtse	Xigazê	Zhikatse	Shigatse, Shikatse
བཀྲ་ཤིས་ལྷུན་པོ་	Bkra-shis-lhun-po	Zhaxilhünbo	Trashilhünpo	Tashilhunpo, Tashilhümpo, etc.
འབྲས་སྤུང་	’Bras-spung	Zhaibung	Dräpung	Drebung
ཆོས་ཀྱི་རྒྱལ་མཚན་	Chos-kyi Rgyal-mtshan	Qoigyi Gyaicain	Chökyi Gyältshän	Choekyi Gyaltsen
ཐུབ་བསྟན་རྒྱ་མཚོ་	Thub-bstan Rgya-mtsho	Tubdain Gyaco	Thuptän Gyatsho	Thubten Gyatso, Thubtan Gyatso, Thupten Gyatso

See also

• Standard Tibetan
• Tibetan alphabet
• Wylie transliteration
• THL Simplified Phonetic Transcription
• Hanyu pinyin

Notes

1. ^ as in Namjagbarwa

References

• Zhōngguó Shǎoshù mínzúyǔ dìmíng hànyǔ pīnyīn Zìmǔ yīnyì zhuǎnxiěfǎ 中国少数民族语地名汉语拼音字母音译转写法
• Guójiā cèhuìjú dìmíng yánjiūsuǒ 国家测绘局地名研究所 (Institute for Place Names of the State Survey Bureau; ed.). Zhōngguó dìmínglù 中国地名录 / Gazetteer of China. (Beijing, Zhōngguó dìtú chūbǎnshè 中国地图出版社 1997); ISBN 7-5031-1718-4. Contains official spellings for place names.
• Zàngwén Pīnyīn Jiàocái – Lāsàyīn 藏文拼音教材•拉萨音 / bod yig gi sgra sbyor slob deb, lha sa'i skad (Course in the Pöyig Kigajor of Lhasa dialect; Běijīng 北京, Mínzú chūbǎnshè 民族出版社 1983), ISBN 7-105-02577-8. Pöyig Kigajor (ZWPY) is a modified version of the official transcription "Tibetan pinyin" (ZYPY), with tone letters.
• Wylie, Turrell: A Standard System of Tibetan Transcription In: Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 1959, p. 261-267.
• David Germano, Nicolas Tournadre: THL Simplified Phonetic Transcription of Standard Tibetan (Tibetan & Himalayan Library, December 12, 2003).
• The Transliteration and Transcription of Tibetan (Tibetan & Himalayan Library)
• Romanization of Tibetan Geographical Names – UNGEGN