Consisting of 37 characters and five tone marks, it transcribes all possible sounds in Mandarin.īopomofo was first introduced in China by the Republican government in the 1910s and was used alongside the Wade–Giles system for romanization purposes, which used a modified Latin alphabet.
More commonly used in Taiwanese Mandarin, it may also be used to transcribe other varieties of Chinese, particularly other varieties of Mandarin Chinese dialects, as well as Taiwanese Hokkien. 18 CE (derived from Brahmi numerals)īopomofo ( Chinese: 注音符號 pinyin: zhùyīn fúhào Wade–Giles: chu⁴yin¹ fu²hao⁴), or Mandarin Phonetic Symbols, also named Zhuyin ( Chinese: 注音 pinyin: zhùyīn), is a Chinese transliteration system for Mandarin Chinese and other related languages and dialects. BCEĪdlam (slight influence from Arabic) 1989 CE Caucasian Albanian (origin uncertain) c.Cherokee (syllabary letter forms only) c.
