Enhypen Alphabet (‘empirical nominal hyperlingual notation’) is a language-neutral spelling system for Chinese characters, specifically for Chinese-derived proper names. It bears less prejudice from Mandarin, as compared to Yuen Ren Chao’s General Chinese and Professor Gu Qian’s Common Sound Systems of Chinese Dialects, where the bias is more or less dedicated.
It serves as a startpoint to ‘Sinicize’ respective for tacit perceptions of characters, which is barely possible for natural languages, stubborn for previous works, and Shidinn leads to the other extreme.
Initials
Inherited from Sampson’s spelling of Old Chinese (matched through phonemes, but seen from jurisdiction only slightly drifted), which is nearly identical to General Chinese except for the use of voiced letters.
For tones, options include
- c for departing and h for going tone, as Sampson (who prefers s to h).
- As in General Chinese, duplicate the vowel for departing tone (possibly hard to recognise) and ‘intensify’ the last letter for going tone.
- Use diacritics or numerals as my friend.
Finals
韵 a 麻韵车，韵 ai 皆夬的…
- a 麻
- ai 皆开夬
- au 肴
- am 衔咸
- an 删山
- aq 江
- â 歌戈开
- åq 唐阳
- åu 豪
- em 盐添
- e 祭
- ei 齐
- en 仙先
- eq 清青
- i 之脂A
- ie 支
- im 侵A
- in 臻
- io 宵
- iq 蒸
- ı 之脂B
- ın 真B
- ım 侵B
- o 模
- oa 歌合
- oi 皆合
- on 魂
- oq 东
- ou 侯
- ô 鱼
- ôi 灰
- ôn 元
- ôm 严凡
- ɵm 覃
- ɵn 寒
- ȣn 痕
- ȣq 登
- u 虞
- ui 微
- un 文
- uq 冬
Sample
| 癸巳歳晩書懐 | <left as an exercise> |
|---|---|
| 無能短見愍操觚 標榜文明紫亂朱 | Vunȣq toɵnkenh miin tsåugou, piopåaq vunmeq tzz loɵn ju. |
| 限字暴於始皇暴 制言愚駕厲王愚 | Gann dzh båw ô Shıigoåq båw, jeh qôn qu kah Lehwåq qu. |
| 不知書契垂千載 何止寒暄便匹夫 | Pou tji shôkhey zjui tsentzɵe, gâji gɵnhôn bien phitfu. |
| 根本不同休妄斷 蟹行記號但音符 | Kınpoon pouhdoq hiu vånqtuɵnh, gaygang kihgaw dɵnn ımfvu. |
Notes
Biblography:
The letter ɵ features Wu pronunciation as /ø/. Cantonese /ɔ/ (occasionally; along with ‘Classical Mandarin’ if existed) is barely acceptable according to my friend.
This is an April Fools’ Day post. I am not saying the methodology disclosed here is viable for, if I can say, phono-lexical transcription. I say that the ‘asthetics’ of orthography, boasted and even regarded as art by amateur linguists, is irrelevant and at best abuse of letters. They say l is not for Shidinn /n/; I say c is not for Italian /tʃ/!