Notes
- Used only in loanwords.
- [k] and [q] are contrastive in the Ulaanbaatar dialect, but are allophones of the single phoneme /k/ in other dialects.
- [ɣ] and [ʁ] are allophones of /k/; the latter appearing in back-vowel contexts.
- Always follows another consonant, and usually modifies the sound with iotation (unless used before е, in which case it is unpronounced).
- Occasionally used before е to indicate that its pronunciation should not be blended with the consonant before it (as its sound is iotated).
- Devoiced to [ɬ] at the end of a syllable or before a voiceless consonant.
- Uncommon, and only found in loanwords of Tibetan origin, but occurs in some high-frequency words such as лхагва 'Wednesday'.
- Uncommon and more often found in loanwords.
- Devoiced to [r̥] at the end of a syllable or before a voiceless consonant.
- [β] occurs at the beginning of words, as well as in the middle of words before vowel sounds; [w] occurs at the end of a word after a vowel or in the middle of a word before a consonant.
- [x] is the front-vowel allophone of /x/, and [χ] is the back-vowel allophone of /x/.
- Used before я and ё to indicate that its pronunciation should not be blended with the consonant before it (as its sound is iotated).
- /a/ and /ɔ/ are fronted to [ɛ] and [ɞ] before a palatalized consonant.
- Also palatalizes any consonant immediately before it.
- Resembles a diphthong, but is phonetically and phonemically a long monophthong; ии is not used.
- The only long vowel represented by a single letter. Although pronounced with the same vowel sound as ий, it does not palatalize the preceding consonant. Other than loanwords, it is only found in inflectional suffixes.
- Mainly used as the rounded back vowel harmonic form of аа in suffixes.
- Generally, /ju/ in words containing э, ө, ү, е; /jʊ/ in words containing а, о, у, я, ё. (See Mongolian vowel harmony.)
- The diphthongs /aɪ, eɪ, ɔɪ, ʊɪ, uɪ/ are phonetically [ɛe̯, ee̯, ɞe̯, ɵe̯, ʉe̯] in Khalkha Mongolian.[1]
References
- Svantesson et al. (2005): 22