Qau language
Kra language spoken in China
Qau, Central Gelao, or Sinicized Gelao (Chinese: 汉仡佬; pinyin: Hàn Gēlǎo) is a Gelao language spoken in Guizhou, China.
01Dialects
The dialects of Qau that are still spoken are:
- Dagouchang 大狗场 or Pingba Qau (in Pingba County)
- Wanzi 湾子 or Anshun Qau (in Anshun City)
02Phonology
Consonants
| Labial | Alveolar | (Alveolo-) palatal |
Velar | Uvular | Glottal | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| plain | lat. | plain | lat. | ||||||
| Nasal | m | n | ɲ̟ | ŋ | |||||
| Stop | voiceless | p | pˡ | t | k | kˡ | q | (ʔ) | |
| aspirated | pʰ | tʰ | kʰ | qʰ | |||||
| prenasal | ᵐp | ᵐpˡ | ⁿt | ᵑk | ᵑkˡ | ||||
| Affricate | voiceless | ts | tɕ | ||||||
| aspirated | tsʰ | tɕʰ | |||||||
| prenasal | ⁿts | ᶮtɕ | |||||||
| Fricative | voiceless | f | s | ɕ | x | h | |||
| voiced | v | vˡ | z | ʑ | |||||
| Approximant | l | (w) | |||||||
- [ʔ] is heard in syllable-initial position before vowels.
- [w] is heard as an initial consonant of Chinese loanwords.
Vowels
| Front | Central | Back | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Close | iu, ie, iɒ, io | ue, ua, uɒ | |
| Mid | ei | əu, əɯ | |
| Open | ai, au | ||
| Triphthong | iau | uei, uai |
- /i/ is heard as a syllabic [ɹ̩] when after sounds /s, ts/
- [ɯ] is only heard in the diphthong /əɯ/.
- Vowels with a word-final /n/ can also be heard as nasalized [Ṽ].
Tones
The Wanzi dialect has 6 tones.
| Tone | Value | Example | Meaning |
|---|---|---|---|
| ˥ | 55 | əɯ55 | Water |
| ˦ | 44 | vla44 | Eight |
| ˧ | 33 | plei33 | Year |
| ˨˦ | 24 | plɐ24 | Blood |
| ˩˧ | 13 | mpi13 | Goat |
| ˥˩ | 31 | ntau31 | Bird |
03Pronouns
The following are pronouns from Pingba Gelao.
| Gloss | Pingba Gelao |
|---|---|
| I | (su33) i42 |
| you | (su33) mu21 |
| he, she, it | (su33) u42 |
| we | (su33) ta33 |
| you all | (su33) sa33 |
| they | pə42 nu42 |
| my household | qa33/a33 qei42 |
| your household | qa33/a33 mu21 |
| his/her household | qa33/a55 qu42 |
04Numerals
Pingba Gelao numerals are given below.
- si33
- su33
- ta33
- pu33
- mpu33
- naŋ33
- ɕi13
- zua55
- sə13
- pan13
Sources and credits
This article is adapted from the Wikipedia article “Qau language”, written by its contributors and licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Fathomly has changed the layout, removed citation markers, navigation and maintenance notices, and adjusted punctuation. This adapted version is shared under the same license. For references, see the original article.
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