Tedim language

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Wikipedia

Tedim
Tedim Chin
Zopau, Tedim pau, Zomi
Native toMyanmar, India
RegionChin State and Sagaing Division of Myanmar
Manipur State and Mizoram State of India
EthnicityZomi people, Chin people
Native speakers
(340,000 cited 1990)[1]
Latin
Pau Cin Hau script
Language codes
ISO 639-3ctd
Glottologtedi1235
ELPTiddim Chin

The Tedim language is a Tibeto-Burman language spoken mostly in the southern Indo-Burmese border. It is the native language of the Tedim tribe of the Zomi people, and a form of standardized dialect merging from the Sukte and Kamhau dialects. It is a subject-object verb language, and negation follows the verb. It is mutually intelligible with the Paite language.

History

Zomi was the primary language spoken by Pau Cin Hau, a religious leader who lived from 1859 to 1948. He also devised a logographic and later simplified alphabetic script for writing materials in Zomi.

Phonology

The phonology of Zomi can be described as (C)V(V)(C)T order, where C represents a consonant, V represents a vowel, T represents a tone, and parentheses enclose optional constituents of a syllable.[2]

Consonants

Labial Alveolar Alveolo-
palatal		 Velar Glottal
Plosive/
Affricate		 voiceless p t tɕ k ʔ
aspirated pʰ tʰ tɕʰ (kʰ)
voiced b d ɡ
Fricative voiceless f s x h
voiced v z
Nasal m n ŋ
Approximant l lˀ
  • Approximants [j, w] can be heard as allophones of vowels /i̯, u̯/ within diphthongs.
  • /x/ can also be heard as an aspirated velar stop [kʰ] in free variation.

Vowels

Front Central Back
Close i iː u uː
Mid ɛ ɛː ɔ ɔː
Open a aː
Diphthongs
Front Central Back
Close iu̯ i̯a ui̯ uːi̯ u̯a
Mid ei̯ ɛːi̯ eu̯ ɛːu̯ ou̯ oi̯ ɔːi̯
Open ai̯ aːi̯ au̯ aːu̯
  • Sounds /ɛ, ɔ/ may have short allophones of more close [e, o].[3]

Tone

Sample

Sample of Tedim language.[4]

Tedim/Zopau

A kipat cilin Pasian in vantung leh leitung a piangsak hi. Leitung in lim leh meel nei loin a awngthawlpi ahi hi. Tuipi tung tengah khua mial bikbek a, tua tui tungah Pasian' huih a nung hi. Pasian in, "Khuavak om ta hen", ci hi, tua ciangin khuavak om pah hi. Pasian in khuavak hoih hi ci-in mu hi, Pasian in khuamial panin khuavak khenkhia hi. Pasian in khuavak pen Sun ci a khuamial pen Zan ci hi. Nitak hong bei-in, zingsang hong tung a, ni khat ni ahi hi. Pasian in, "Tuite' laizang-ah van kuumpi om hen la, tua van kuumpi in tui leh tui kikhensak hen", ci hi. Pasian in van kuumpi bawl a, van kuumpi tunga om tuite leh van kuumpi nuai-a om tuite a khen hi. Tua mah bangin piang pah hi. Pasian in van kuumpi pen Vantung ci hi. Nitak hong bei-in, zingsang hong tung a, ni nihna ahi hi.

English In the beginning God created heaven and earth. The earth was formless and empty, and darkness covered the deep water. The spirit of God was hovering over the water. Then God said, "Let there be light!" So there was light. God saw the light was good. So God separated the light from the darkness. God named the light "day", and the darkness he named "night". There was evening, then morning, the first day. Then God said, "Let there be a horizon in the middle of the water in order to separate the water". So God made the horizon and separated the water above and below the horizon. And so it was. God named what was above the horizon "sky". There was evening, then morning, a second day.

Numbers

Tedim numbers are counted as follows.[5]

NumeralTedimEnglishHindi
0 beemzeroशून्य
1 khatoneएक
2 nihtwoदो
3 thumthreeतीन
4 lifourचार
5 ngafiveपाँच
6 guksixछह
7 sagisevenसात
8 giateightआठ
9 kuanineनौ
10 sawmtenदस
11 sawm leh khatelevenग्यारह
12 sawm leh nihtwelveबारह
13 sawm leh thumthirteenतेरह
14 sawm leh lifourteenचौदह
15 sawm leh ngafifteenपंद्रह
16 sawm leh guksixteenसोलह
17 sawm leh sagiseventeenसत्रह
18 sawm leh giateighteenअठारह
19 sawm leh kuanineteenउन्नीस
20 sawm nihtwentyबीस
30 sawm thumthirtyतीस
40 sawm lifortyचालीस
50 sawm ngafiftyपचास
60 sawm guksixtyसाठ
70 sawm sagiseventyसत्तर
80 sawm giateightyअस्सी
90 sawm kuaninetyनव्वे
100 za, za khathundredसौ
1,000 tuul khatone thousandहज़ार
10,000 tuul sawmone thousandदस हज़ार
1,000,000 awn khatone millionदस लाख
1,000,000,000 mak za khatone millionदस लाख

References

  1. ↑ Tedim at Ethnologue (18th ed., 2015) (subscription required)
  2. ↑ "Proposal to Encode the Pau Cin Hau Alphabet in ISO/IEC 10646" (PDF). unicode.org. Retrieved 15 September 2023.
  3. ↑ Otsuka, Kosei (2014). Tiddim Chin. Toshihide Nakayama and Noboru Yoshioka and Kosei Otsuka (eds.), Grammatical Sketches from the Field: Tokyo: Research Institute for Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa (ILCAA), Tokyo University of Foreign Studies. pp. 109–141.
  4. ↑ "Chin (Tedim) Language Sample". language-museum.com. LM. Retrieved 23 February 2026.
  5. ↑ "Numbers in Tedim". omniglot.com. Simon Ager. Retrieved 22 February 2026.