Gwoyeu Romatzyh

Gwoyeu Romatzyh ({{zh-stp|s=国语罗马字|t=國語羅馬字|p=Guóyǔ Luómǎzì}}), abbreviated GR, is a romanization (formerly used officially in the Republic of China) with complex spelling rules which allow for tonal distinctions (unlike most other Romanizations, which require additional diacritics or numerals).

Segmental features

The differences and unique similarities unrelated to tone rendering that GR has with Wade-Giles (Wade) and Hanyu Pinyin (Pinyin):

Related Topics:
Wade-Giles - Hanyu Pinyin

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• The three symbols, j, ch, and sh, represent six sounds. When followed by "i", they are Pinyin j, q, and x. Otherwise, they correspond to zh, ch, and sh.
• Y represents both the empty rimes (Wade -u and -ih; Pinyin -i) and i (Wade and Pinyin i). The empty rime y may stand alone or be followed by a consonant. The vowel y is always followed by a vowel (including i), and is never alone.
• While GR iu is Pinyin/Wade ü, GR iou is Pinyin/Wade iu.
• Like Pinyin/Wade iu is spelled out as iou in GR, the Pinyin/Wade un and ui is spelled out as uen and uei.
• Au is Pinyin/Wade ao.
• Wade ts (formerly tz) is split into ts for ts' (Pinyin c) and tz for ts (Pinyin z)
• Like most Romanizations, it has a diacritic mark for the rarely used sound "eh!", which is è or ê, which behaves like e ("uh!"). But when in combination, è loses its accent.
• -ong is as in Pinyin, and unlike Wade's -ung.
• Like Pinyin, an apostrophe is used to disambiguate syllable sequence.
• It also has three letters for dialectal sounds: v (万 in extended Zhuyin), ng (兀), and gn (广).