Editing Tibetan script (section)

=== Basic alphabet ===
In the Tibetan script, the [[syllable]]s are written from left to right. Syllables are separated by a ''tsek'' (་); since many Tibetan words are monosyllabic, this mark often functions almost as a space. Spaces are not used to divide words.<ref name="x832">{{cite book | last1=Chan | first1=A. | last2=Noble | first2=A. | title=Sounds in Translation: Intersections of Music, Technology and Society | publisher=ANU E Press | series=DOAB Directory of Open Access Books | year=2009 | isbn=978-1-921536-55-7 | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=r5JFo7oajsMC&pg=PA146 | access-date=2024-05-12 | page=146}}</ref>

The Tibetan alphabet has thirty letters, sometimes known as "radicals", for consonants.<ref name="daniels">Daniels, Peter T. and William Bright. ''The World's Writing Systems''. New York: Oxford University Press, 1996,</ref> As in other [[Indic scripts]], each consonant letter assumes an [[inherent vowel]]; in the Tibetan script it is /a/. The letter {{bo-textonly|ཨ}} is also the base for dependent vowel marks.

Although some Tibetan dialects are [[Tone (linguistics)|tonal]], the language had no tone at the time of the script's invention, and there are no dedicated symbols for tone. However, since tones developed from [[Segment (linguistics)|segmental]] features, they can usually be correctly predicted by the archaic spelling of Tibetan words.

{| class="wikitable" style="text-align:center; width:75%;"
|- align=center style="font-size:small;"
!
!style="background:beige;" colspan=2 | Unaspirated<br />''high''
!style="background:#d6f5d6;" colspan=2 | [[Aspirated consonant|Aspirated]]<br />''medium''
!style="background:#ffcce6;" colspan=2 | [[Voiced]]<br/ >''low''
!style="background:#99bbff;" colspan=2 | [[Nasal consonant|Nasal]]<br />''low''
|- align=center style="font-size:small;"
!
! Letter
! [[International Phonetic Alphabet|IPA]]
! Letter
! IPA
! Letter
! IPA
! Letter
! IPA
|- align=center
| '''''[[Guttural]]''''' ||style="background:beige; font-size:24px;"| {{bo-textonly|ཀ}} || {{IPA|/ka/}} ||style="background:#d6f5d6; font-size:24px;"| {{bo-textonly|ཁ}} || {{IPA|/kʰa/}} ||style="background:#ffcce6; font-size:24px;"| {{bo-textonly|ག}}{{efn-lr|name=voiced|These voiced values are historical. They have been devoiced in modern Standard Tibetan.}} || {{IPA|/ɡa/}}  ||style="background:#99bbff; font-size:24px;"| {{bo-textonly|ང}} || {{IPA|/ŋa/}}
|- align=center
| '''''[[Palatal]]''''' ||style="background:beige; font-size:24px;"| {{bo-textonly|ཅ}} || {{IPA|/tʃa/}} ||style="background:#d6f5d6; font-size:24px;"| {{bo-textonly|ཆ}} || {{IPA|/tʃʰa/}} ||style="background:#ffcce6; font-size:24px;"| {{bo-textonly|ཇ}}{{efn-lr|name=voiced}} || {{IPA|/dʒa/}} ||style="background:#99bbff; font-size:24px;"| {{bo-textonly|ཉ}} ||  {{IPA|/ɲa/}}
|- align=center
| '''''[[Dental consonant|Dental]]''''' ||style="background:beige; font-size:24px;"| {{bo-textonly|ཏ}} || {{IPA|/ta/}} ||style="background:#d6f5d6; font-size:24px;"| {{bo-textonly|ཐ}} || {{IPA|/tʰa/}} ||style="background:#ffcce6; font-size:24px;"| {{bo-textonly|ད}}{{efn-lr|name=voiced}} || {{IPA|/da/}} ||style="background:#99bbff; font-size:24px;"| {{bo-textonly|ན}} || {{IPA|/na/}}
|- align="center"
|'''''[[Labial consonant|Labial]]'''''|| style="background:beige; font-size:24px;" | {{bo-textonly|པ}} || {{IPA|/pa/}}|| style="background:#d6f5d6; font-size:24px;" | {{bo-textonly|ཕ}} || {{IPA|/pʰa/}}|| style="background:#ffcce6; font-size:24px;" | {{bo-textonly|བ}}{{efn-lr|name=voiced}}|| {{IPA|/ba/}}|| style="background:#99bbff; font-size:24px;" | {{bo-textonly|མ}} || {{IPA|/ma/}}
|- align="center"
|'''''[[Dental consonant|Dental]]'''''
| style="background:beige; font-size:24px;" |{{bo-textonly|ཙ}}||{{IPA|/tsa/}}|| style="background:#d6f5d6; font-size:24px;" |{{bo-textonly|ཚ}}||{{IPA|/tsʰa/}}|| style="background:#ffcce6; font-size:24px;" |{{bo-textonly|ཛ}}{{efn-lr|name=voiced}} ||{{IPA|/dza/}}|| style="background:#EEEFE4; font-size:24px;" |{{bo-textonly|ཝ}}||{{IPA|/wa/}}
|- align=center
|style="background:#d9b3ff;" | '''''low''''' ||style="background:#d9b3ff; font-size:24px;"| {{bo-textonly|ཞ}}{{efn-lr|name=voiced}} || {{IPA|/ʒa/}} ||style="background:#d9b3ff; font-size:24px;"| {{bo-textonly|ཟ}}{{efn-lr|name=voiced}} || {{IPA|/za/}}  ||style="background:#d9b3ff; font-size:24px;"| {{bo-textonly|འ}} || {{IPA|/ɦa/}}<ref>{{cite journal
 |last         = Hill
 |first        = Nathan W.
 |year         = 2005b
 |title        = Once more on the letter འ
 |journal      = Linguistics of the Tibeto-Burman Area
 |volume       = 28
 |issue        = 2
 |pages        = 111–141
 |doi = 10.32655/LTBA.28.2.04
 |url          = http://eprints.soas.ac.uk/5632/1/once_more_on_the_letter.pdf
 |access-date  = 2022-06-01
 |archive-date = 2022-06-16
 |archive-url  = https://web.archive.org/web/20220616054618/https://eprints.soas.ac.uk/5632/1/once_more_on_the_letter.pdf
 |url-status   = live
}}; {{cite journal
 |last         = Hill
 |first        = Nathan W.
 |year         = 2009
 |title        = Tibetan <ḥ-> as a plain initial and its place in Old Tibetan phonology
 |journal      = Linguistics of the Tibeto-Burman Area
 |volume       = 32
 |issue        = 1
 |pages        = 115–140
 |doi = 10.32655/LTBA.32.1.03
 |url          = http://eprints.soas.ac.uk/7625/1/04-Hill-Dialect-reflexes-of-Tib-v.pdf
 |access-date  = 2022-06-01
 |archive-date = 2022-06-01
 |archive-url  = https://web.archive.org/web/20220601181159/https://eprints.soas.ac.uk/7625/1/04-Hill-Dialect-reflexes-of-Tib-v.pdf
 |url-status   = live
}}</ref> {{angle bracket|ʼa}} ||style="background:#d9b3ff; font-size:24px;"| {{bo-textonly|ཡ}} ||  {{IPA|/ja/}}
|- align=center  
|style="background:#b3ffff;" | '''''medium''''' ||style="background:#b3ffff; font-size:24px;"| {{bo-textonly|ར}} || {{IPA|/ra/}} ||style="background:#b3ffff; font-size:24px;"| {{bo-textonly|ལ}} || {{IPA|/la/}} ||style="background:#b3ffff; font-size:24px;"| {{bo-textonly|ཤ}} || {{IPA|/ʃa/}} ||style="background:#b3ffff; font-size:24px;"| {{bo-textonly|ས}} || {{IPA|/sa/}}
|- align=center
|style="background:#ffffcc;" | '''''high''''' ||style="background:#ffffcc; font-size:24px;"| {{bo-textonly|ཧ}} || {{IPA|/ha/}} ||style="background:#ffffcc; font-size:24px;"| {{bo-textonly|ཨ}} || {{IPA|/a/}} {{angle bracket|ꞏa}}
|}
{{notelist-lr}}