| Tiantai Dialect | |
| Nativename: | Undetermined: 天台話 / 天台话 |
| Pronunciation: | Tiantai Dialect: [tʰi.tʰai.u] |
| States: | China |
| Region: | Tiantai County, Taizhou, Zhejiang |
| Familycolor: | Sino-Tibetan |
| Fam2: | Chinese |
| Fam3: | Wu |
| Fam4: | Taizhou Wu |
| Fam5: | Taizhou |
| Isoexception: | dialect |
The Tiantai dialect, also known as Tiantaihua (; Tiantai dialect pronunciation: [tʰi.tʰai.u]) is a regiolect of Wu Chinese in the Taizhou Wu dialect group. It is spoken in Tiantai County, Taizhou, Zhejiang province, China.
Like other dialects in the Wu family, Tiantaihua has a three-way contrast between voiced, unaspirated voiceless, and aspirated initial consonants (e.g., pronounced as //t tʰ d//), preserving an earlier feature of Chinese which Mandarin has collapsed into a two-way distinction.
| T: | 天台話 |
| S: | 天台话 |
| P: | Tiāntāi Huà |
| J: | Tin1 Toi4 waa2 |
The Tiantai dialect is the main representative of the northern Taizhou dialect family.
The meaning of many common words and phrases in the Tiantai dialect differs from that of Standard Chinese. Below is a list of common differences:
| 味道 | Taste | Comfort, enjoyment | [1] | |
| 老實好 | Honestly good | Praise, very good | ||
| 煞夾 | Tightly squeezed | Very powerful | ||
| 老官 | Veteran official | Husband | ||
| 天亮 | Sunrise, dawn | Tomorrow | ||
| 拔好 | Properly pulled | Immediately | ||
| 活動 | Activity | Smart, intelligent | ||
| 壽 | Longevity | Silliness, lack of empathy | [2] | |
| 賴 | Sloppy | Bad behaviour | [3] | |
| 大慧 | Very intelligent | Able person | [4] | |
| 大吹 | Big blow | Stupid person | [5] |
Proverbs and phrases in the Tiantai dialect can be shorter in comparison with the corresponding phrase in Standard Chinese. For example, the phrase "露出馬腳" (literally "exposing the cloven hoof", metaphorically "exposed") is shortened to the phrase "出腳", literally meaning "taking the foot out".
Sentences can be shorter as well; see the example below.[6]
| Original | Chinese | 和 | 小王 | 比起來 | ， | 還是 | 小李 | 高 | 。 | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| English | Literal | As | John | compared to | , | it's still | Terry | taller | . | ||
| Rearranged | As | compared to John | (who is) | ||||||||
| Contracted | Literal | it's | Terry | taller | |||||||
| Chinese | 小王 | 是 | 小李 | 長 | 。 | ||||||
| Person | Regular Chinese pronoun | English equivalent | Tiantai dialect pronoun(s) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1st person singular | 我 | I | 我 |
| 2nd person singular | 你 | you (singular) | 爾[8] |
| 3rd person singular | 他 | he | 佢／渠[9] |
| 她 | she | ||
| 牠 | it (animals) | ||
| 它 | it (objects) | ||
| 1st person plural | 我們 | we | 我等／我拉／我拉個／項等 |
| 2nd person plural | 你們 | you (plural) | 爾拉／爾拉個 |
| 3rd person plural | 他們 | they | 佢拉／佢拉個／渠拉／渠拉個 |
| 她們 | |||
| 牠們 | |||
| 它們 |
| Voiceless unaspirated plosive | Voiceless aspirated plosive | Plosive voiced | Voiceless fricative | Voiced fricative | Glottalised? half voiced | Half voiced | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Consonant | Example | Consonant | Example | Consonant | Example | Consonant | Example | Consonant | Example | Consonant | Example | Consonant | Example | |
| Labial | p | 幫 | ph | 滂 | b | 平 | f 敷 | 敷 | v | 奉 | 'm | 媽 | m | 明 |
| Dental | ts | 知 | tsh | 初 | dz | 迟 | s 生 | 生 | z | 是 | 'l | 拉 | l | 來 |
| Coronal | t | 端 | th | 透 | d | 定 | 'n | 奶 | n | 南 | ||||
| Alveolo-palatal | c | 照 | ch | 穿 | j | 澄 | sh | 心 | zh | 從 | ||||
| Velar | k | 見 | kh | 溪 | g | 群 | 'ng | 嗯 | ng | 牙 | ||||
| Glottal | ' | 影 | h | 曉 | gh | 匣 | y | 移 | ||||||
| w | 胡 | |||||||||||||
| Open mouth | Closed mouth | Even teeth | Round mouth | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Vowel | Example | Vowel | Example | Vowel | Example | Vowel | Example | |
| y | 資 | |||||||
| i | 衣 | |||||||
| u | 烏 | iu | 雨 | |||||
| a | 矮 | ua | 歪 | ia | 野 | |||
| e | 哀 | ue | 威 | i.e. | 煙 | |||
| o | 掗 | uo | 花 | |||||
| ae | 晏 | uae | 彎 | |||||
| oe | 半 | uoe | 碗 | ioe | 遠 | |||
| au | 奧 | iau | 要 | |||||
| eu | 歐 | ieu | 悠 | |||||
| ou | 哥 | |||||||
| an | 杏 | uan | 橫 | ian | 央 | |||
| aon | 項 | uaon | 汪 | iaon | 雙 | |||
| en | 恩 | uen | 溫 | |||||
| in | 音 | iuin | 雲 | |||||
| on | 翁 | ion | 用 | |||||
| aeh | 鴨 | uaeh | 挖 | |||||
| ah | 百 | uah | 摑 | iah | 腳 | |||
| aoh | 惡 | uaoh | 鑊 | iaoh | 捉 | |||
| eh | 黑 | ieh | 葉 | |||||
| ih | 一 | iuih | 出 | |||||
| oeh | 脫 | uoeh | 骨 | ioeh | 月 | |||
| oh | 屋 | ioh | 郁 | |||||
| m | 無白 | n | 爾白 | ng | 五 | |||
There are 8 tones in the Tiantai dialect, which are obtained by splitting each of the four tones in Mandarin to yin (陰) and yang (陽).
| yin ping (陰平) | pronounced as /˧˧/ (33) | |
| yang ping (陽平) | pronounced as /˨˦/ (24) | |
| yin shang (陰上) | pronounced as /˧˨˥/ (325) | |
| yang shang (陽上) | pronounced as /˨˩˦/ (214) | |
| yin qu (陰去) | pronounced as /˥˥/ (55) | |
| yang qu (陽去) | pronounced as /˧˥/ (35) | |
| yin ru (陰入) | pronounced as /˥ʔ/ (5) | |
| yang ru (陽入) | pronounced as /˨˧ʔ/ (23) |