January 04, 2016

རྫོང་ཁའི་འབད་འདི་བྱེད་ཡིན་དགོས་ཚུལ།

I have always wondered about the rDzong-kha word for “to do,” which is spelled either as ’bad, sbed, or sbe. But my impression is that both of these are mistakes caused by ignorance. Actually it is the verb byed (“to do”) as in Tibetan (or Chos-skad for political correctness) and the difference in rDzong-kha being only in pronunciation. In rDzong-kha, the subscript (here y-subscript) is silent. Such a phenomenon is not unknown especially in Central Tibetan dialect such as in the pronunciation of sprangspral, and spre’u.

5 comments:

  1. 'bad does make sense though

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  2. It does but my feeling is that it was a result of trying to make sense of byed (pronounced bed).

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  3. It does but my feeling is that it was a result of trying to make sense of byed (pronounced bed).

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  5. Interesting...

    In A mdo kha skad they say "yed" in lieu of "byed." They claim that the "ba" was simply elided over time.

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