The Origins of Chinese & Vietnamese

Proto-Chinese Phonology

Table of Contents

Syllable Structure #

The Proto-Chinese syllable had the following structure.

(C1)C2(C3)(C4)V(C5)(C6)(C7)

Pre-initial Consonant (C1) #

The pre-initial consonant was an optional consonant that could be either s, n, or m. (s was pretty common. n and m were not very common, at least as far as I can reconstruct.)

Initial Consonant (C2) #

The initial consonant had to be one of the following 34 consonants.

Stop Nasal Fricative Approximant
Glottal ʔ h
Velar k kʰ g gʱ ŋ ŋ̊
Palatal c cʰ ɟ ɟʱ ɲ ɲ̊
Alveolar t tʰ d dʱ n n̥ s sʰ z r l r̥ l̥
Labial p pʰ b bʱ m m̥ w

First Medial Consonant (C3) #

The first medial consonant was an optional r or l.

Second Medial Consonant (C4) #

The second medial consonant was an optional w.

Vowel (V) #

The vowel had to be one of the following eight vowels (four short, four long).

Front Back
High i, iː u, uː
Low e, eː o, oː

Final Consonant (C5) #

The final consonant was an optional consonant that could be one of the following 11 consonants.

Stop Nasal Approximant
Glottal ʔ
Velar g ŋ
Palatal ɟ ɲ
Alveolar d n r l
Labial b m w

First Post-Final Consonant (C6) #

If the final consonant was a nasal, liquid, or approximant, there could be a post-final ʔ.

Second Post-Final Consonant (C7) #

The second post-final consonant was an optional s.

Observations #

I would like the reader to note that Proto-Chinese did not have an unusually large number of vowels or consonants. Unlike other authors, I do not reconstruct dozens of vowels or scores of consonants at any stage of Chinese.

Note that Proto-Chinese was not a tonal language.

One unusual thing about Proto-Chinese is that it was a monosyllabic language. That is, words were almost always consisted of a single syllable, to the point where the word is often equated with the syllable in Chinese scholarship.