This document provides an introduction to the consonants of the Tibetan language. It includes: - A chart showing the Tibetan characters alongside the Wylie transliteration and pronunciation of each consonant. - Explanations of pronunciation rules for different columns of consonants, including tones (high and low) and aspiration. - Notes on nasal and other consonant sounds. - An indication that future lessons will cover how the pronunciation has evolved since the fixed orthography was established in the 11th century.

1. Welcome in my course for
Tibetan language!

2. The consonants
ཀ ka /ka/
ཅ ca /tɕa/
ཏ ta /ta/
པ pa /pa/
ཙ tsa /tsa/
ཞ zha /ɕa/
ར ra /ra/
ཁ kha /kʰa/
ཆ cha /tɕʰa/
ཐ tha /tʰa/
ཕ pha /pʰa/
ཚ tsha /tsʰa/
ཟ za /sa/
ལ la /la/
ཧ ha /ha/
ག ga /kʰa/
ཇ ja /tɕʰa/
ད da /tʰa/
བ ba /pʰa/
ཛ dza /tsʰa/
འ 'a /a/
ཤ sha /ɕa/
ཨ a /a/
ང nga /ŋa/
ཉ nya /ɲa/
ན na /na/
མ ma /ma/
ཝ wa /wa/
ཡ ya /ja/
ས sa /sa/
Beside the Tibetan character is the Wylie transliteration, and then the
prononciation between slashes.
If you don’t know the phonetic, the character /ɕ/ is quite close to the French and
German "ch". If you’re a native English speaker, then you should say it like the
"ch" in "challenge" but without the /t/ sound at the beginning.

3. 1st and 2nd columns
ཀ ka /ka/
ཅ ca /tɕa/
ཏ ta /ta/
པ pa /pa/
ཙ tsa /tsa/
Those sounds are pronounced
with a high tone, just like when
you are singing. :)
ཁ kha /kʰa/
ཆ cha /tɕʰa/
ཐ tha /tʰa/
ཕ pha /pʰa/
ཚ tsha /tsʰa/
Those sounds are pronounced with a
high tone, but with a /h/ between the
consonant and the vowel, this is the
aspiration.
In case of a high tone, I will help you by writing the high tone with a macron:
ā, ō… This is the only indication I can give you about pronunciation
without disturbing the transliteration. Of course, the macron is not
compulsory In your answers.

4. 3rd and 4th columns
ག ga /kʰa/
ཇ ja /tɕʰa/
ད da /tʰa/
བ ba /pʰa/
ཛ dza /tsʰa/
Those sounds are pronounced
with a low tone, like when you
are speaking. The aspiration is
not as strong as in the 2nd
column.
Please note that the sounds are
not voiced, or only half-voiced.
ང nga /ŋa/
ཉ nya /ɲa/
ན na /na/
མ ma /ma/
Those sounds are the nasal
sounds. They are also
pronounced with a low tone.

5. The other characters
ཝ wa /wa/ ཞ zha /ɕa/
ཟ za /sa/ འ 'a /a/
ཡ ya /ja/ ར ra /ra/
ལ la /la/
Those sounds are
pronounced with a low
tone.
There is no aspiration
with "zha", it is written
only to make the
difference with "za".
ཤ sha /ɕa/
ས sa /sa/
ཧ ha /ha/
ཨ a /a/
Those sounds are
pronounced with a high tone.
Like with "zha", there is no
aspiration with "sha", it is
written only to make the
difference with "sa".

6. The vowels
The vowel /a/
is the default
vowel. You
need to write
a diacritic to
express the
other vowels.
They are
pronounced
just like in
Spanish.

7. But that would be too easy…
The Tibetan language is written since the 7th
century, the orthography has been fixed during
the 11th century and its writing has not changed
since then! It means that just like English and
French languages, the pronunciation has
evolved and I’m going to teach you the rules in
the next slideshow.
Don’t be afraid, there is not that much :p