Transliteration

From TyvaWiki

Tyvan is written in a Cyrillic alphabet. There are two main practices for transliterating Tyvan to the Latin alphabet. One is based upon several different international standards for transliterating Cyrillic and the other is the standard Turkological practice for transliterating Turkic languages. The majority of Cyrillic-based transliteration is found in music albums and online correspondence while the Turkology practice is found mostly in scholarly works. It helps to be aware of both of them. If you are learning the language, it is advised to just learn Cyrillic.

Cyrillic	Tyvawiki	Turkology	Lopsaŋ-Chinmit	Description
А	a	a	a	ah, like in father
Б	b	b	в	unaspirated so it sounds somewhere between a p and a b.
В	v	v	в, v, f¹	v like in victory
Г	g	g	g, ƣ²	g like in good, but between vowels and at the end of words it becomes fricative, something like at the end of 'argh'
Д	d	d	d	unaspirated so it sounds like a t
Е	e	e	e, je	in Russian this letter is palatized, kind of like in 'yea', but in tyvan it is for the 'eh' sound occurring in the middle of words
Ё	jo	yo	jo	a bit like 'yaw'
Ж	zh	ž	ƶ	like the s in measure
З	z	z	z	like a z in zoo
И	i	i	i	like an i in hid
Й	j	y	j	like the y in yes, but written as j so as not to get confused with the unrounded back vowel y below
К	k	k	k	k like in kick
Л	l	l	l	l like in learn
М	m	m	m	an m like in me
Н	n	n	n	an n like in no
Ң	ŋ	ŋ	ņ	the sound that occurs at the end of words like ring. the use of ŋ is unambiguous and comes from the old Tyvan latin alphabet.
О	o	o	o	an o like in for
Ө	ö	ö	ө	a bit like the 'ur' in sure
П	p	p	p	a strong p sound, because it's aspirated
Р	r	r	r	the r is trill, but not rolled like in spanish
С	s	s	s	a regular s like in so
Т	t	t	t	a t like in true, but between vowels it sounds more like a d
У	u	u	u	a u like the sound in moon
Ү	ü	ü	y	sounds a little like the e in 'ew'
Ф	f	f	f	an f like in for
Х	kh	x	x	like the ch at the end of Scottish 'loch'. it's a kind of 'h' sound with a lot of friction.
Ц	ts	ts	ts	a ts like in 'its'
Ч	ch	č	c	the ch like in church
Ш	sh	š	ş	the sh like in shoot
Щ	shch	šč	şc	a soft sh sound, like bunching together 'fresh cheese'
Ъ	`	`	"	tyvan has some vowels that are pharyngealized and this character is used to mark vowels with this quality
Ы	y	ï	ь	sounds somewhere between the i in 'hid' and a u is 'uh'. do not round your lips like the u in 'moon'.
Ь	'	'	'	a character used in Russian that palatizes the preceding consonant. not used in Tyvan but likely encountered.
Э	e	e	e	the e like in 'bed'
Ю	ju	yu	ju	the beginning of 'you'
Я	ja	ya	ja	like in 'yap'

(1):в is used between vowels and after l (2):ƣ is a voiced fricative