Appendix:Tagalog spellings

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Filipino orthography

This appendix details the orthographical considerations for Tagalog (or its standardized form, Filipino) according to the 2013 Ortograpiyang Pambansa (National Orthography) of the Komisyon sa Wikang Filipino (KWF). This page only covers spelling rules designed for Tagalog; other major Philippine languages may have their own spelling rules that differ from KWF's recommendations. This page also details the spelling conventions used to determine the main spelling for Tagalog entries in Wiktionary.

The modern Tagalog language evolved from Old Tagalog, which used the baybayin script and used by the ancient Tagalogs. As the Spanish arrived, Tagalog adopted the Latin alphabet, and through time, various reforms have been done.

History

Pre-Hispanic period

Before the Spanish arrived, the Tagalogs used the baybayin script, an abugida (alphasyllabary). From the 1600s to the 1700s, the use of baybayin declined as the Spanish introduced the Latin alphabet.

Introduction of Latin script

Tagalog, as well as most Philippine languages, was first written using a Spanish-based alphabet called the abecedario, with 28 to 32 letters. ⟨k⟩ and ⟨w⟩ were not used until the introduction of the abakada.

Historical Tagalog spellings are as follows:

Spanish loanwords were kept in their original spellings, except words that were corrupted as they were borrowed (e.g. candila from candela),
Initial ⟨i⟩ was first written with ⟨y⟩ until Spanish took on its present orthography and modern form, e.g. ylagan
⟨h⟩, is pronounced /h/, a common sound in Philippine languages, unlike in Spanish (Spanish counterpart /x/ is transcribed as ⟨j⟩, ⟨h⟩ is silent).
/k/ was represented by ⟨c⟩ (before ⟨a⟩, ⟨o⟩, and ⟨u⟩, e.g. cayó, cong, cúlang), ⟨qu⟩ (before ⟨e⟩ and ⟨i⟩, e.g. aquin, quilala). /ɡ/ before ⟨e⟩ and ⟨i⟩ was spelled with ⟨gu⟩ (e.g. guitnâ).
/w/ was represented by ⟨u⟩ (e.g. gauâ, ualâ), and the diphthong /au/ was represented by ⟨ao⟩ (e.g. icao). Words like huwag and kapwa were spelled houag and capouâ.
/ŋ/ was represented by either ⟨ng̃⟩, ⟨ñg⟩, or ⟨n͠g⟩ (e.g. pangalan were spelled pang̃alan, pañgalan, or pan͠galan. The modern spellings of the particles mga and ng originate from Spanish-era contractions of mang̃á and nang̃.
Contractions are spelled with double commas, e.g. iba't were spelled iba,t,
Diacritics were sometimes added in vowels, like in Spanish, but with the addition of the circumfix and grave to represent final glottal stops.

19th-century reforms

Attempts to “indigenize” the Tagalog alphabet through the the adoption of ⟨k⟩ and ⟨w⟩ were originally opposed, but gained support during the prelude to the Philippine Revolution. Also at that time, José Rizal, during his exile (destierro) in Dapitan, proposed a new orthography for Tagalog, which better reflects its baybayin roots, which would become the basis of the abakada. Spellings using ⟨k⟩ gained acceptance as it was used for Tagalog words in the Spanish-Tagalog translating dictionaries by Pedro Serrano-Laktaw and was widely used by the Katipunan, nevertheless, Tagalog spelling is not completely standardized until the mid-20th century and spelling varied by the writers' preference.

Reforms

José Rizal's proposal became the basis of the abakada alphabet adopted along with the elevation of Tagalog as the national language in 1935, and the abakada was formally made the national alphabet in 1941. At this stage, most established Spanish loanwords from the 19th century onward begin to take on their present spelling.

Tagalog orthography radically changed in the 1970s, amidst controversies surrounding purism on the Surian ng Wikang Pambansa (SWP, Institute of the National Language), which resulted in the modern alphabet in use today. A change in the abakada in 1977 added 11 letters, resulting to the 31-letter pinagyamang alpabeto (“enriched alphabet”) but some letters were removed in 1987 by KWF's predecessor, the Linangan ng mga Wika sa Pilipinas, resulting to the present 28-letter modern Filipino alphabet.

1977

The orthography was reformed with the 1977 orthography, with the enforcement of Department Memorandum No. 194, s. 1976 by the Department of Education, Culture and Sports (DECS) and publication of Mga Tuntunin sa Ortograpiyang Filipino: Mga Patnubay na Sinusunod sa Pagwawasto ng mga Aklat Babasahin by the Surian ng Wikang Pambansa (SWP, the Institute of the National Language).

Some of the spellings affected are:

spellings containing the vowel pairs /ia/, /ie/, /io/, /iu/ /ua/, /ue/, /ui/, /uo/, where the new spelling have the ⟨i⟩ or ⟨u⟩ retained with ⟨y⟩ or ⟨w⟩ inserted after, or replaced with ⟨w⟩ and ⟨y⟩.
most single-word compounds involving the univerbation of two words containing the clitic ligatures -ng and -g, where they become -n-.

2007

The orthography was reformed with the 2007 orthography, with the publication of the 2007 revision to the Ortograpiya ng Wikang Pambansa by the Komisyon sa Wikang Filipino (KWF, the Commission on the Filipino Language). The spelling reform generally affected variant spellings of words featuring the vowel pairs ⟨ia⟩, ⟨ie⟩, ⟨io⟩, ⟨ua⟩, ⟨ue⟩, and ⟨ui⟩ following a consonant (in the first syllable) or a consonant pair (in other positions) where the first vowel is not kept when a ⟨w⟩ or ⟨y⟩ is inserted as in the 1977 rule introduced by the Mga Batayang Tuntuning Sinusunod sa Pagsusuring Aklat by the Surian sa Wikang Pambansa (SWP, or Institute of the National Language).

2013

Another reform in 2013 which took effect in 2014, with the publication of the 2013 Ortograpiyang Pambansa and the and the 2014 Manwal sa Masinop na Pagsulat, affirmed the full use of the 8 letters added to the Filipino alphabet, and reinforced etymological spelling of loanwords.

Alternative forms interchanging ⟨e⟩ and ⟨i⟩, and ⟨o⟩ and ⟨u⟩ (some remained standard). This rule is added to avoid confusion and counter the effect of /e~i/ and /o~u/ allophony in spelling (especially in loanwords).
Alternative forms starting with ⟨is⟩ of Spanish loanwords starting with ⟨es⟩. Under the 2014 reform, spellings starting with ⟨is⟩ has been reserved to English borrowings where the original word starts with an ⟨s⟩ followed by another consonant.

Glottal stops (tunog na paimpit)

Glottal stops (impit na tunog) are generally indicated using:

a hyphen (gitling, e.g. pag-ibig), where the glottal stop is found between a consonant and vowel
a circumfix (pakupya, e.g. likô), where the glottal stop comes after a stressed last syllable
A grave (paiwa, e.g. batà), where the second to last syllable is stressed and the glottal stop is on the end.

Glottal stops before vowels, which are natural in Philippine languages, are not indicated in spelling. The glottal stop disappears when followed by another word and the vowel is lengthened by some speakers, but is generally retained.

Syllabification

Tagalog words can have these syllable structures: V, CV, CVC, CCV, VCC, CVCC, CCVC, CCVCC, CCVCCC.

Rules on syllabification are as follows:

When there are two or more vowels in the initial, central and final positions, each are hyphenated separately.
When there are two consecutive consonants within a word, the first are included on the preceding syllable while the second in the following one.
When there are three consecutive consonants in the word, the first two follows the vowel of the preceding syllable and the third goes to the following syllable
When the first of three consecutive consonants is an M or N and the following are either BL, BR, DR, PL, and TR, the first consonant follows the vowel of the preceding vowel, and the remaining two goes to the following syllable.
When there are four consecutive consonants within a word, the first two follows the vowel of the previous syllable, and the other two are part of the following syllables.

Loanwords

A radical change in Tagalog orthography is the addition of the letters C, F, J, Ñ, Q, V, and Z, which allows retaining the spellings of words in other indigenous languages where they are used. New loanwords from foreign languages are also covered by the new alphabet, so they are allowed to be kept in their original spellings.

Borrowings from other Philippine languages: Loans from other Philippine languages with sounds not found in Tagalog do not have to be respelled to abakada. This is the case when they are spelled with the seven new letters of the Filipino alphabet. For example, the name of the Ifugao tribe and language do not have to be respelled to Ipugaw to conform to abakada spelling, but can be spelled as Ifugaw.
New loanwords: New loanwords from Spanish, English and other foreign languages do not have to be respelled to abakada. New loans from Spanish (e.g. futbol, fosil, visa, vertebra) do not have to respelled into the abakada, if they are not listed in these two major dictionaries, the Diccionario tagalo-hispano (1914) by Pedro Serrano-Laktaw, and the Diksiyunaryo-tesauro Pilipino-Ingles (1972) by Jose Villa Panganiban. English loanwords are not required to be respelled as well (e.g. fern, folder, jam, jar, envoy, develop)
Previous Spanish loanwords: Previous Spanish loanwords are kept in their existing spelling using the abakada.
Proper nouns: Proper nouns from foreign languages are kept in original spelling.
Experimental respelling of English and other borrowings: Respellings of borrowings from English and other foreign languages are permitted, provided they are easy to read, and take in consideration their cultural, religious, and political roots, and is not confused with another native word.
Preference on Spanish borrowings: Due to the problems that arise when respelling English loanwords, borrowing from Spanish is preferred, especially where the English term to be borrowed is similar, as the Spanish orthography has better sound and letter correspondences with Tagalog than English. For example, instead of borrowing English standardization and respelling it to the lengthy *istandardiseysiyon, estandardisasyon, borrowing from Spanish estandardización is used.
Special case for y: y (from Spanish, meaning “and”) is not respelled into i when used as part of a personal name with the maternal surname last (e.g. Emilio Aguinaldo y Famy), or used with Spanish-derived numerals (e.g. treynta y uno).
Cases of Spanish borrowings with ⟨h⟩ pronounced. The letter ⟨h⟩ (hache) is not pronounced in Spanish, but in some loanwords, the ⟨h⟩ is kept to prevent confusion with a similar word. For example, Spanish historia, with the sense “history” is borrowed into Tagalog as historya to prevent confusion with istorya , also from the same etymon, but with the sense of “story”. The also is also done with humano (from Spanish), which is borrowed without change to prevent confusion with native umano, so are the related terms humanismo.
The letter ⟨j⟩: ⟨j⟩ is generally used to represent /d͡ʒ/, and is not used on Spanish loanwords (except proper nouns) spelled with that letter (and pronounced /h/), which are phonetically respelled into ⟨h⟩ (e.g. juez become huwes). The letter ⟨j⟩ is used on new borrowings from English and other foreign languages where spelled with ⟨j⟩ like jet, jazz, jester, jujitsu, but not those with /d͡ʒ/ which written with a different letter like in general, generator an region, if they will be borrowed, may be respelled phonetically with ⟨dy⟩ as *dyeneral, *dyenereytor, and *ridyon. English loanwords with ⟨j⟩ respelled to ⟨dy⟩ (e.g. dyaket, dyanitor, dyip) do not have to be restored to their original spellings.

Vowel clusters/diphthongs

Diphthongs (diptonggo) or vowel clusters (kambal patinig) composed of a weak vowel like /i/ and /u/ at the initial position are treated in two ways.

The first vowel disappears and is replaced by a ⟨y⟩ or ⟨w⟩ when the vowel pair is entirely in the second or another syllable of a word, e.g. tulyá, tilapyà, sawá.
The first vowel is retained and a ⟨y⟩ or ⟨w⟩ is inserted if:

the vowel pair follows a consonant in the first syllable of a word, e.g. tíya (/ˈtia/), siyá (/siˈa/). An apostrophe replaces the first vowel if one wishes to omit the it when writing its spoken form, e.g. s'ya for siya.
the vowel pair follows a consonant cluster inside the word, e.g. impiyerno (/ʔimpiˈeɾno/) instead of impyerno, industriya (/ʔinˈdustɾia/) instead of *industrya). This is done for ease of hyphenation, to help learners of the language.
the vowel pair follows a /h/ sound (a weak consonant), e.g. kolehiyo (/koˈlehio/) instead of *kolehyo and rehiyon (/ɾehiˈon/) instead of *rehyon.
the vowel pair is at the end of the word and the first vowel in the pair is stressed in the original form of the word, e.g. ekonomiya (/ʔekonoˈmia/).

For vowel clusters with hard vowels like /a/, /e/ and /o/, there is no need to insert ⟨y⟩ or ⟨w⟩ between the vowels, e.g. aorta, paraon, baul. Variants are permitted, by the way, e.g. ideya is a variant of idea. That said, /au/, as a diphthong, is often transcribed as ⟨aw⟩, that words like haula (from Spanish jaula) are also written hawla, like in Rizal's original alphabet and orthography for Tagalog.

Consonant clusters and digraphs

The pairs ⟨sk⟩ and ⟨st⟩: Words ending with the consonant clusters ⟨sk⟩ and ⟨st⟩ are permitted, unlike under the older abakada orthography where the second consonant is dropped, e.g. kontes (from English contest) can also be spelled kontest, and disk can be borrowed without respelling.
The consonant pair ⟨kt⟩: Tagalog words cannot end with the consonant cluster ⟨kt⟩, e.g. áspek (not *aspekt), korék (not *korekt), ádik (not *adikt)
Digraphs ⟨ch⟩ and ⟨sh⟩: The digraph ⟨ch⟩ (IPA: /t͡ʃ/), found in loanwords and some slang is generally transcribed into ⟨ts⟩. There is still hesitancy to accept the digraph ⟨sh⟩, which can be kept or respelled according to Tagalog phonology, but the digraph is used in the orthography for Ibaloi, a Cordilleran language spoken in Benguet.

E vs. I, and O vs. U

In native words, distinction of ⟨i⟩ and ⟨e⟩ or of ⟨u⟩ and ⟨o⟩ is irrelevant, and can change freely, but there are general rules regarding spelling words with those sounds.

E and I
- Interchanging ⟨e⟩ and ⟨i⟩ and vice versa are to be avoided in spelling.
- ⟨e⟩ followed by an ⟨s⟩ indicates a Spanish loanword, and ⟨i⟩ following ⟨s⟩ for English loanwords starting with ⟨s⟩ and a consonant cluster, e.g. eskandalo is from Spanish escándalo, while iskandal from English scandal.
O vs U
- Interchanging ⟨o⟩ and ⟨u⟩, and vice versa are to be avoided as well.
- ⟨o⟩ followed by ⟨n⟩ that becomes ⟨m⟩ before Spanish ⟨f⟩ and ⟨v⟩ can change to ⟨u⟩, e.g. kumperensiya (from conferencia), but not kumpleto (from completo) which should have been spelled as kompleto.
⟨e⟩ and ⟨o⟩ at the final syllable should not be changed to ⟨i⟩ and ⟨u⟩ respectively when the root word is followed by the enclitic -ng, or the root is reduplicated, except when intending to quote or imitate speech (e.g. taon-taon can be spelled taun-taon) or the new word has a significantly different meaning from its root (e.g. haluhalo (“halo-halo”) vs halo-halo (“hodgepodge”)
⟨o⟩ becomes ⟨u⟩ and ⟨e⟩ becomes ⟨i⟩ when followed by a suffix, e.g. babae + ka- -an becomes kababaihan, biro + -in becomes biruin.
- Exceptions: if the root is a loanword with a final /e/, the letter should be retained when suffixed, e.g. sine + -han should be sinehan, not *sinihan.
The vowel pair ⟨oo⟩ should be kept even when followed by a suffix, e.g. noo, and the suffixed form is noohin. The same rule applies where the word ends with the vowel pair ⟨uo⟩.

D/R allophony

In general, Tagalog ⟨d⟩ becomes ⟨r⟩ following vowels, e.g. dito becomes narito when the prefix na- is added, but not in nandito. This is done for ease of pronunciation.

Daw vs. raw, and din vs rin: Daw is usually raw when followed by a vowel or a gliding consonant (w and y), so is din, which becomes rin. This rule, however, does not apply when the preceding word has a syllable starting with r.
Exceptions: Some words starting with ⟨d⟩ are normally written without change when following an ⟨a⟩, e.g. dulas in madulas (though there is Marulas) and dilaw in madilaw (though there is Marilao). Sometimes, there are similar words that have different meanings when spelled with a ⟨d⟩ or an ⟨r⟩.

All those mentioned are just rough guidelines, but not formal spelling rules, so daw following a vowel is still accepted.

Accents

Accents (tuldik or asento) are generally used to aid in pronunciation of homonyms, and are not required in writing. Under the Balarila by Lope K. Santos, there are three accents used in Tagalog:

The acute (pahilís) indicates a stressed syllable, pronounced quickly.
The circumflex (pakupyâ) indicates stress followed by a glottal stop.
The grave (paiwà) indicates a final glottal stop.

Indicating stress by an acute accent is encouraged, especially when distinguishing between homonyms, both within Tagalog and with other Philippine languages, e.g. húli (“act of stopping the movement of someone or something”) vs hulí (“late”)

The prefix ma- may be spelled with an acute accent when it indicates an accidental action or event to distinguish it from a homophone with a different part of speech or a similarly-spelled word, e.g. mádulas (“to accidentally slip”) vs madulás (“slippery”), mápatay (“to be killed”) vs mamatay (“to die”), máhulí (“to be late”) vs mahuli (“to get caught”), and másáma (“to become part of”) and masamâ (“bad; evil”).

Hyphens

Hyphens (gitling) have multiple uses in Tagalog spelling.

Reduplications: Hyphens separate words in reduplications e.g. ano-ano, araw-araw
Onomatopoeias: Hyphens are used to indicate onomatopoeic writing of each syllable, e.g. tik-tak
Final consonant followed by initial vowel: Hyphens are inserted where a syllable ends with a consonant and is followed by another beginning with a vowel, e.g. pag-asa, agam-agam, mag-isa, pang-umento, brawn-awt
Word boundaries
- Hyphens separate the first syllable of a word formed from a proper noun, e.g pa-Mandaluyong, taga-Itogon, maka-Filipino
- Hyphens also separate the first syllable of a word formed from a loanword kept in its original spelling, e.g. pa-cute, ipa-cremate
Unusual pronunciations: Hyphens are also used to indicate stress on an unusual pronunciation of the first syllable, e.g. gáb-i.
New compound words: Hyphens are used to separate the two words in all new compound words, e.g. lipat-bahay, bigyang-buhay.
Time notation: Hyphens are used to separate ika- and alas- from numerals when writing times and dates. Only exception is ala-una, is always spelled, and should not be written as *ala-1
Words prefixed with de-: Hyphens are used in words with the Spanish-derived prefix de-, e.g. de-lata, de-kolor, de-kalidad
Words prefixed with di-: Hyphens are used in words prefixed with di (shortening of hindi) that has a meaning that are idiomatic or proverbial, is a common antonym of its root, or has jocular or derisive connotations.

Abbreviations

Abbreviation of names and associated elements (titles, salutations, positions, ranks) are written with periods.

Gng. (for Ginang)
Hen. (for Heneral)
J.P. Rizal (for Jose Protacio Rizal)
Pang. (for Pangulo)

Initialisms are written without periods.

BP (for batas pambansa)
BRP (for Barko ng Republika ng Pilipinas)
BSP (for Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas)
KSP (for kulang sa pansin)
UP (for Unibersidad ng Pilipinas)

Abbreviations with more than three letters of all other words are also written with periods.

atbp. (for at iba pa)
Brgy. (for baranggay)
blg. (for bilang)
Ene. (for Enero)
pam. (for pamahalaan)

Capitalization

The following are capitalized in Tagalog:

Proper nouns and derived terms
- Personal names, except de, de la, dela, de los, delos in surnames (unless at the beginning of a sentence).
- Names of God, deities, and religious figures (e.g. Diyos, Bathala, Hesus, Allah)
- Names of organizations (e.g. Nagkakaisang Mga Bansa)
Names of religions and religious texts (e.g. Kristiyanismo, Islam, Bibliya, Quran)
Nationalities, ethnicities and races (except names of food, clothes, and the like derived from those) (e.g. Pilipino, Amerikano, Tagalog, Bisaya, Puti but not barong-tagalog, kamisa de tsino, papel de hapon)
Names of historical events, holidays, and festivities (e.g. Ikalawang Digmaang Pandaigdig, Araw ng Kasarinlan, Pasko, Sinulog)
Place names, except ng
Names of academic concepts (e.g. ideologies, art styles or movements, especially where derived from a proper noun) and scientific ideas
Names of days and months (e.g. Enero, Linggo)