Ningbonese Tones

How many tones does Ningbonese (Ningbo dialect) have?

This question is more complicated than it appears, and to explain why, one must go back to the history of tones in Chinese language:

In the beginning (Middle Chinese), there were four tones: level (平), rising (上), departing (去) and checked (入). Then, by Late Middle Chinese, however, each tone split into two, yin (阴) and yang (阳), according to whether the initial consonant is voiced or not.

Because the specific tone contour only depended on which of the four tones a word belongs to, along with the initial consonant, it could still be said that there are four tones, but 8 possible "tone contours". Wu Chinese, including Ningbo Dialect, preserves both the voiced and voiceless distinction as well as the yin and yang distinction -- so it could be said that there are four tones, but more possible tone contours.

So how many "tone contours" are there? First, of all, looking at single characters, according to online sources, the tones are as follows:

Tone name	Tone Contour	Example	English
阴平 yin level	53 High rising	刀 tau	knife
阳平 yang level	24 Mid rising	逃 dau	escape
阴上 yin rising	35 Mid rising	岛 tau	island
阳上 yang rising	213 Low rising	导 dau	lead
阴去 yin departing	44 Mid-high level	到 tau	arrive
阳去 yang departing	213 Low rising	道 dau	path
阴入 yin checked	55 High level	得 tah	get
阳入 yang checked	12 Low rising	达 dah	reach

Yang rising and yang departing have the same contour above; so, according to this table, for individual syllables, there may be seven tone contours. However, to my untrained ears, I can't tell the difference between several of them, so I can only distinguish 6 tone contours:

Tone contour	Examples
Falling	刀
Rising	逃岛导道
High	到
High with stop	得
Rising with stop	达

Wu Chinese also has Tone Sandhi, so the actual tone contour of a word depends on the words surrounding it -- and that's a topic for another post!

Ningbonese Vowels

Wu Chinese exhibits several features which Mandarin doesn’t have -- rounded front vowels (like German schön) and nasal vowels (like French bon). Let's take a look!

Firstly, there are the basic simple vowel sounds found in most languages:

	IPA	Example	English
a	a	买 ma	buy
e	e	海 he	sea
ae	ɛ	蛋 dae	egg
i	i	天 thi	heaven
o	o	沙 so	sand
u	u	古 ku	ancient

It's worth noting that the "o" is fairly close to "u". There are also some straightforward diphthongs:

ei	ɐi	对 tei	correct
ua	ua	快 khua	fast
ia	ia	爹 tia	dad
io	io	小 shio	small

There is also the very short vowel which is also found in the Mandarin reading of words like 子, 次, or 四. And in Ningbo Dialect there is also rounded version of this vowel, found in some words like 水:

y	ɿ	四 sy	four
yu	ʮ	水 syu	water

Two vowels which may be easy to confuse are the vowels in 好 and 火; the vowel in 好 is just the open-mid back rounded vowel ɔ, whereas the vowel in 火 sounds more like the sound in house.

au	ɔ	好 hau	good
ou	əu	火 hou	fire

The vowels in Ningbo Dialect which involve rounding are:

iu	y	区 chiu	district
eu	œʏ	头 deu	head
ieu	iʏ	手 shieu	hand
oe	ø	短 toe	short

A subset of the vowels can be followed by a nasal consonant -- unlike Mandarin, there is no distinction between front (alveolar) and back (velar) nasal sounds. Note, that for some people oen may rhyme with on.

on	oŋ	东 ton	east
en	əŋ	村 tsen	village
oen	øŋ	春 tshoen	spring
in	iŋ	冰 pin	ice

For two of the vowels, instead of being followed by nasal consonants, the vowels themselves can become nasalized! Note that in the Wu Chinese Association's romanization system, these are also spelled with an "n"; there is no ambiguity because for each type of vowel it can either be nasalized or followed by a nasal consonant.

an	ã	生 san	birth
aon	ɔ̃	汤 thaon	soup

Finally: Wu Chinese preserves the "checked tone" of Old Chinese, where syllables can end with stop consonants. The only stop consonant that words can end with is the glottal stop (ʔ).

ah	aʔ	法 fah	law
oeh	øʔ	雪 soeh	snow
ih	iʔ	笔 pih	pen
oh	oʔ	木 moh	wood
iueh	yəʔ	月 yueh	moon
ioh	yoʔ	吃 chioh	eat

Primary source: the Wu Chinese Association website and this post on Baidu Tieba.

Ningbonese Consonants

In general, Wu Chinese dialects have a similar set of initial consonants as Mandarin, with one major difference: Wu Chinese preserves the voiced initial consonants of Old Chinese -- so there's a distinction between 白 (voiced) and 百 (unvoiced). Additionally, Wu Chinese does not have retroflex consonants (Mandarin zh/ch/sh/r).

It may be difficult for learners to distinguish the voiced and voiceless un-aspirated consonants; it's helpful to note that syllables with voiced initial consonants always have a light (阳) tone, while syllables with voiceless initial syllables always have dark (阴) tones.

There are three groups of three stop consonants: voiceless un-aspirated, aspirated, and voiced p, t, and k:

	IPA	Example	English
p	p	八 pah	eight
ph	pʰ	漂亮 phio lian	beautiful
b	b	朋友 ban yeu	friend
t	t	多少 tou shio	how much
th	tʰ	天亮 thi nyan	morning
d	d	头发 deu fah	hair
k	k	交关 chio kuae	very
kh	kʰ	困觉 khuen kau	sleep
g	g	番茄 fae ga	tomato

There are also two groups: "c/ch" is like Mandarin "j/q", and is usually followed by an "i" sound; "ts/tsh" is like Mandarin "z/c".

ts	ts	钟头 tson deu	hour
tsh	tsʰ	出 tshoeh	out
dz	dz	茶 dzo	tea
c	tɕ	今末 cih mah	today
ch	tɕʰ	去 chiu	go
j	dʑ	其 ji	him/her

There are four groups of fricative consonants, each with voiced and unvoiced versions. It can be particularly difficult to hear the voiced glottal fricative "gh" and the voiced palatal fricative "zh", since these sounds do not appear in English or Mandarin.

f	f	飞机 fi ci	airplane
v	v	不好 vah hau	not good
h	h	好 hau	good
gh	ɦ	后 gheu	back
s	s	水 syu	water
z	z	辰光 zoen kuaon	time
sh	ɕ	晓得 shio tah	know
zh	ʑ	前 zhi	front

Finally, there are the sonorant consonants -- unlike Mandarin, this includes a velar nasal (ng) and a palatal nasal (ny).

m	m	明朝 min cio	tomorrow
ny	ȵ	人 nyin	person
ng	ŋ	我 ngo	me
n	n	侬 nou	you
l	l	来 le	come

Reference: Wu-chinese.com.