Romanisation of the Wenzhou dialect of Wu Chinese, part of the greater Ōu grouping of Wu dialects centred on the city, refers to the use of the Latin alphabet to represent the sounds of the dialect group.
The first instance of Wenzhounese romanisation begins with the language documentation efforts of Christian missionaries who translated the Bible into many varieties of Chinese in both Chinese characters and in phonetic romanisation systems based largely on the Wade-Giles system. The first romanised form of Wenzhounese can be seen in an 1892 Gospel of Matthew translation.[1]
In 2004, father-and-son team Shen Kecheng and Shen Jia published the work Wenzhouhua, which outlines a systematic method for romanising each initial and rhyme of the dialect. Its primary orthographic innovation is its means of expressing the three-way distinction of Wu stops in an orthography that distinguishes only between voiced and unvoiced stops.
The Wade-Giles-based systems deal with this as k, k', and g to represent pronounced as //k//, pronounced as //kʰ//, and pronounced as //ɡ//. Since voiced obstruents no longer exist in Standard Chinese, pinyin deals with pronounced as //k// and pronounced as //kʰ// as g and k respectively. The Shens use the same basic method and transcribe voiced stops by duplicating the voiced series of letters so pronounced as //ɡ// is gg in the system. Likewise, pronounced as //ɦ// is transcribed as hh.
They adopt other pinyin conventions, such as x for what is normally transcribed in Chinese usage of the IPA as pronounced as //ɕ// and c for pronounced as //tsʰ//. Vowels are transcribed with a number of digraphs, but few are innovations. The influence of Chinese IMEs is seen in their system as well since v denotes pronounced as //y// and ov denotes pronounced as //œy//. Another way that it diverges from pinyin is in Wenzhounese's unrounded alveolar apical vowel pronounced as //ɨ//, which is written as ii, since, unlike Mandarin, apical vowels are not in complementary distribution with pronounced as //i// in Wenzhounese.
Tones, however, are marked not by diacritics or tone spelling but by simply placing superscript values of Chao's tone lettering system.[2]
| Romanisation | Wugniu | IPA | Example characters |
|---|---|---|---|
| a | a | pronounced as /[a]/ | Chinese: 矮反鞋媽 |
| ae | ae | pronounced as /[ɛ]/ | Chinese: 杏鹦行㧸 |
| ai | ai | pronounced as /[ai]/ | Chinese: 北個國十 |
| au | au | pronounced as /[au]/ | Chinese: 甌愁狗有 |
| e | eo | pronounced as /[ɜ]/ | Chinese: 鏖保草否 |
| ee | e | pronounced as /[e]/ | Chinese: 愛才德黑 |
| ei | ei | pronounced as /[ei]/ | Chinese: 比池肥式 |
| eu | ou | pronounced as /[ɤu]/ | Chinese: 臭豆流多 |
| i | i | pronounced as /[i]/ | Chinese: 野鼻變長 |
| ia | ia | pronounced as /[ia]/ | Chinese: 丫药着腳 |
| iai | iai | pronounced as /[iai]/ | Chinese: 乙益甩急 |
| ie | iae | pronounced as /[iɛ]/ | Chinese: 腰打橫兩 |
| ii | y | pronounced as /[ɨ]/ | Chinese: 書吃思溪 |
| o | o | pronounced as /[o]/ | Chinese: 恶茶車學 |
| oe | oe | pronounced as /[ø]/ | Chinese: 暗半端亂 |
| ov | eu | pronounced as /[øy]/ | Chinese: 步父婦魚 |
| u | u | pronounced as /[u]/ | Chinese: 乌部果委 |
| uie | uiae | pronounced as /[uiɛ]/ | Chinese: 奣 |
| uo | uao | pronounced as /[uɔ]/ | Chinese: 拗飽當爪 |
| uo | iuao | pronounced as /[yɔ]/ | Chinese: 壅共双从 |
| v | iu | pronounced as /[y]/ | Chinese: 溫安干月 |
| n | n | pronounced as /[n]/ | Chinese: 唔 |
| ng | ng | pronounced as /[ŋ̩]/ | Chinese: 餓二我吳 |
| ang | an | pronounced as /[aŋ]/ | Chinese: 本分今京 |
| eng | en | pronounced as /[eŋ]/ | Chinese: 病稱民星 |
| ong | on | pronounced as /[oŋ]/ | Chinese: 東豐空夢 |
| Romanisation | IPA | Example characters |
|---|---|---|
| b | pronounced as /[p]/ | Chinese: 把百半本 |
| bb | pronounced as /[b]/ | Chinese: 白抱備別 |
| c | pronounced as /[tsʰ]/ | Chinese: 采草測產 |
| d | pronounced as /[t]/ | Chinese: 打帶刀島 |
| dd | pronounced as /[d]/ | Chinese: 大地動頭 |
| f | pronounced as /[f]/ | Chinese: 反福火分 |
| g | pronounced as /[k]/ | Chinese: 該高歌工 |
| gg | pronounced as /[ɡ]/ | Chinese: 厚渠峽跔 |
| h | pronounced as /[h]/ | Chinese: 風海好黑 |
| hh | pronounced as /[ɦ]/ | Chinese: 房孩紅華 |
| i | pronounced as /[j]/ | Chinese: 安溫央也 |
| j | pronounced as /[tɕ]/ | Chinese: 見叫斤酒 |
| jj | pronounced as /[dʑ]/ | Chinese: 件舊僅狂 |
| k | pronounced as /[kʰ]/ | Chinese: 開考科肯 |
| l | pronounced as /[l]/ | Chinese: 來郎老雷 |
| m | pronounced as /[m]/ | Chinese: 馬買滿毛 |
| n | pronounced as /[n]/ | Chinese: 拿內奶男 |
| ny | pronounced as /[ɲ]/ | Chinese: 你鳥捏女 |
| ng | pronounced as /[ŋ]/ | Chinese: 礙傲牛瓦 |
| p | pronounced as /[pʰ]/ | Chinese: 怕拍跑片 |
| q | pronounced as /[tɕʰ]/ | Chinese: 出窗千春 |
| s | pronounced as /[s]/ | Chinese: 散掃色殺 |
| ss | pronounced as /[z]/ | Chinese: 愁詞存靜 |
| t | pronounced as /[tʰ]/ | Chinese: 他塔湯體 |
| u | pronounced as /[u]/ | Chinese: 歪彎屋挖 |
| w | pronounced as /[v]/ | Chinese: 犯肥份飯 |
| x | pronounced as /[ɕ]/ | Chinese: 少手雙先 |
| y | pronounced as /[j]/ | Chinese: 床就前全 |
| z | pronounced as /[ts]/ | Chinese: 雞早進真 |
| zz | pronounced as /[dz]/ | Chinese: 才茶沉池 |