Some notes on pronouncing Mongolian names

Recently, someone pointed out to me that including a pronunciation guide to my transcrition of Mongolian names would be helpful. I intend to do that in future posts but thought I would begin with a short guide that I can also provide a link to in the future.

Mongolian has two sets of vowels: vowels that are considered to be made in the front of the mouth and vowels made in the back of the mouth. The front vowels are e as in the Spanish espanol, i as in Amy, o as on tooth, u as in spoon. The back vowels are a as in father, o as in dog (only made further back - think "aunt" as someone from Boston would say it), and u as in ... well there's no equivalent in any English word that I can think of. There are several other letters that are considered vowels that are combinations of the aforementioned vowels and a combination of y. So there is a ya sound. One Mongolian name that has this sound is Bayambaa.

There are also several consonants in Mongolian that we don't have in English. One is the kh. Another is the back g. There is a 'v' like sound that is made with the two lips rather than with the upper teeth and two lower lips. They also have a single letter for our ch as in church sound, and another single letter for sh as in ship.

You'll notice a two letter combination at the end of many names such as Bilgee, Bayambaa, Ganaa, Saraa. These are actually a small suffix that Mongolians often stick on the end of names. The two letters actually denote that the emphasis is on the last syllable. So it's not Bilʹgee. Remember the e sounds like espanol (more like day) so think Bil·gayʹ.

That's all for now. I'll try to add some pronunciations in parentheses after new names from now on.