USAGE: Cantonal spelling

Well, here I go with another a dem craaaazy tonal spellings, this one for
Cantonese.  First, here's how I'm numbering the tones:

Tone 1, IPA 55, yin ping tone, reflex of Mandarin tone 1, 7a in ruh syllables
Tone 2, IPA 21, yaang ping tone, reflex of Mandarin tone 2
Tone 3, IPA 35, yin shaangh tone, reflex of Mandarin tone 3
Tone 4, IPA 13, yaang shaangh tone, reflex of Mandarin tone 3
Tone 5, IPA 33, yin quh tone, reflex of Mandarin tone 4, 7b in ruh syllables
Tone 6, IPA 11, yaang quh tone, reflex of Mandarin tone 4, 8 in ruh syllables

The mapping to Mandarin tones is *etymological*, not phonetic.
What I don't (yet) know what to do with is the "changed tones".  There
are two of these, and they have semantic meaning, unlike regular tones.

yin1 'smoke' > yin0 'tobacco'
tong2 'sugar' >tong* 'candy'

Supposedly, 0 sounds like 1, and * like 3.

Damn, www.fi.muni.cz is down.  More later.

--
John Cowan           http://www.ccil.org/~cowan              cowan@ccil.org
Please leave your values        |       Check your assumptions.  In fact,
   at the front desk.           |          check your assumptions at the door.
     --sign in Paris hotel      |            --Miles Vorkosigan

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