Vowels
There are seven monophthongs in Romanian:
| Front | Central | Back | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Close | i | ɨ | u |
| Mid | e̞ | ə | o̞ |
| Open | ä |
Although e̞, o̞ are written above with diacritics to show their mid height and ä with a diacritic to show its central backness, in virtually all phonetic transcriptions of Romanian these characteristics are implied and the symbols are written without diacritics. The same convention is applied in this article.
The table below gives a series of word examples for each vowel.
| Vowel | Description | Examples |
|---|---|---|
| /a/ | Open central unrounded | apă /ˈa.pə/ water balaur /baˈla.ur/ dragon cânta /kɨnˈta/ to sing |
| /e/ | Mid front unrounded | erou /eˈrow/ hero necaz /neˈkaz/ trouble umple /ˈum.ple/ to fill |
| /i/ | Close front unrounded | insulă /ˈin.su.lə/ island salcie /ˈsal.tʃi.e/ willow topi /toˈpi/ to melt |
| /o/ | Mid back rounded | oraș /oˈraʃ/ city copil /koˈpil/ child acolo /aˈko.lo/ there |
| /u/ | Close back rounded | uda /uˈda/ to wet aduc /aˈduk/ I bring simplu /ˈsim.plu/ simple |
| /ə/ | Mid central unrounded | ăsta /ˈəs.ta/ this păros /pəˈros/ hairy albă /ˈal.bə/ white (fem. sg.) |
| /ɨ/ | Close central unrounded | înspre /ˈɨn.spre/ toward cârnat /kɨrˈnat/ sausage coborî /ko.boˈrɨ/ to descend |
While most of these vowels are relatively straightforward and similar or identical to those in many other languages, the close central unrounded vowel /ɨ/ is uncommon as a phoneme and especially uncommon amongst Indo-European languages.
Read more about this topic: Romanian Phonology
Famous quotes containing the word vowels:
“As no one can tell what was the Roman pronunciation, each nation makes the Latin conform, for the most part, to the rules of its own language; so that with us of the vowels only A has a peculiar sound.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Playing “bop” is like playing Scrabble with all the vowels missing.”
—Duke Ellington (1899–1974)
“These equal syllables alone require,
Though oft the ear the open vowels tire;”
—Alexander Pope (1688–1744)