1865.] Note on the Pronunciation of the Tibetan Language. 93 



in words like khyi } the dog, gyehva, to fall clown, Kye-lang, the name 

 of the village in Lahoul where the Moravian Mission is established, 

 the correct pronunciation has been preserved even in that province, 

 and chlii instead of klvyi is only used by still more Eastern Tibetans. 

 Upon the whole, it may be said that, if not perfectly, still to a certain 

 degree, the different changes which the pronunciation of the language 

 has undergone in the course of upwards of one thousand years, may 

 be traceable even at the present day in the different districts of Tibet 

 from Purig and Balti in the west to the capital town of Lhasa near 

 the Chinese frontier, where the deviation, or we may justly say, the 

 degeneration has reached its highest pitch, in introducing assimilations, 

 dissolving certain consonants nearly into vowels, dropping others entire- 

 ly, confounding two or three cognate sounds into one intermediate, and 

 mingling the short vowels with one another. Assimilations as in the 

 Latin compono instead of con-pono, are unheard of in the written 

 Tibetan language, as also in the spoken dialect of the western pro- 

 vinces ; the word gompa will in Purig mean nothing but a step ; 

 a different idea, that of custom, practice, which the Lahoulee will 

 include, being connected with the spelling : gomspa or sgompa. In 

 the pronunciation of Lhasa two more, gonpa to dress, to put on, and 

 gonpa, monastery, are. mixed up with the two former, by means of 

 assimilation of the n. Again : s in the end of a syllable is pronounced 

 in Purig and Ladak, but dropped in most other districts, not with- 

 out a prolonging or changing influence on the preceding vowel. Thus 

 the word chhos, religion, law, (dharma in Sanscr.) is pronounced 

 chhos in Ladak, chhoi in Lahoul, child in upper Kunawur, chho in Lhasa ; 

 d and g, in the end of a syllable, are melted into semivowels or nearly 

 liquid consonants in a similar way as in Danish (though not exactly 

 the same) : shad, the language, loses its s even in Southern Ladak, 

 but in Lhasa it is mutilated into M ; smad, the nether part, into 

 one'; Bod, proper name of Tibet, the Bhota of Sans., into Bo'; lchags } 

 iron, into cha 1 , scarcely different in pronunciation from ja, tea; 

 srmgmo, sister, is pronounced shringmo in west Tibet, singmo or 

 nearly simo in Lhasa ; sa and za, shi and zhi (the latter like ji when 

 pronounced as in French,) which are as accurately distinguished by 

 every Lahoulee or Ladakee, as s in seal and z in zeal, are confounded 

 in Lhasa. 



