title: Budu language
text: # Budu language
  
  Budu (Ɨbʉdhʉ) is a Bantu language spoken by the Budu people in the Wamba Territory in the Orientale Province of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Its orthography uses the special characters ɨ, ʉ, ɛ and ɔ, as well as modifier letters colon ꞉ and equal sign ꞊ for grammatical tone, marking past and future tense, respectively.
  
  A variety of this language is called Matta and is spoken locally both north and south of Maboma.
  
  ## Phonology
  
  ### Consonants
  
  | | | Labial | Alveolar | (Alveolo-) palatal | Velar | Labio- velar | Glottal |
  | - | - | - | - | - | - | - | - |
  | Plosive | voiceless | p | t | c | k | | |
  | Plosive | voiced | b | d | ɟ | ɡ | | |
  | Plosive | prenasal | ᵐb | ⁿd | ᶮɟ | ᵑɡ | | |
  | Plosive | implosive | ɓ | ɗ | ʄ | | | |
  | Affricate | voiceless | | | t͡ɕ | | k͡p | |
  | Affricate | voiced | | | d͡ʑ | | ɡ͡b | |
  | Affricate | prenasal | | | ᶮd͡ʑ | | ᵑᵐɡ͡b | |
  | Fricative | voiceless | f | s | | | | h |
  | Fricative | voiced | v | z | | | | h |
  | Fricative | prenasal | ᶬv | | | | | |
  | Nasal | Nasal | m | n | ɲ | | | |
  | Approximant | Approximant | | (l) | j | | w | |
  
  * [z] only occurs in the Koya dialect of Budu.
  * /h/ can be heard as either a voiced [ɦ] or voiceless [h] among different speakers.
  * /ɗ/ can be heard as [l] or a tap [ɾ] in free variation.
  
  ### Vowels
  
  | | Front | Central | Back |
  | - | - | - | - |
  | Close | i | | u |
  | Near-close | ɪ | | ʊ |
  | Close-mid | e | | o |
  | Open-mid | ɛ | | ɔ |
  | Open | | a | |
  