Occitan phonology
This article describes the phonology of the Occitan language. Consonants 
Below is a consonant chart that covers multiple dialects. Where symbols for consonants occur in pairs, the left represents a voiceless consonant and the right represents a voiced consonant. Notes
 The phoneme  is mostly found in Southern Occitan (written  in Gascon,  in Provençal, and  in Languedocien). The distinction between   and   is general in Provençal, Vivaro-Alpine, Auvergnat and Limousin. However, in Languedocien and Gascon, the phonemes  and  are neutralized as  (thus  has disappeared). In Languedocien:
 the phonemes  indicate three kinds of sounds, depending on what surrounds them:
 a voiced plosive sound  by default
 devoiced to  phrase-finally or before a voiceless sound
 a voiced fricative  when both preceded and followed by voiced continuants (i.e., vowels or ) within the same phrase. the phonemes  and  and the sequences  are neutralized as  (thus ,  and  have disappeared). In Auvergnat and Limousin, and locally in other dialects,
 the phonemes  and  are neutralized as  (thus  has disappeared). the phonemes  and  are neutralized as  (thus  has disappeared). In Auvergnat, most of the consonants, except , can have a palatalized sound before i and u. Consequently, the consonant phonemes have two kinds of sounds, one being not palatal (by default) and the other being palatal (before i and u):  → ;  → ;  → ;  → ;  → ;  → ;  → ;  → ;  → ;  → ;  → ;  → ;  → ;  → ;  → . In one part (and only one part) of Limousin, a transphonologization has occurred:
 The old phonemes ,  have now become , , less frequently , . The old phonemes ,  have now become , , less frequently , . In the Provençal in general, and partially in other dialects, the phonemes  and  are neutralized as  (thus  has disappeared). The original rhotic consonants,  (tapped) and  (trilled), have shown important evolutions:
 In Provençal and partially in other dialects, there is now an opposition between  (tapped) and  (uvular) (whereas  has disappeared). This feature is shared with Portuguese. In the cases when the opposition is impossible between the two phonemes, the default realization is  (it was  in the original pattern). In most of Limousin, Auvergne, Vivarais and Niçard, the phonemes  and  are neutralized as  (or even ). Gascon consonants 
 Gascon shares some traits with Languedocien:
 The phonemes  have the same realization as described above for Languedocien. The phonemes  and  of the general pattern are neutralized as . It seems possible, however, that the phoneme  never existed in Gascon. Gascon and Southern Languedocien do not have the semivowel  (Gascon has , SL has ) and have the same distribution for the phonemes   and  . A glottal fricative sound  is recognized among the dialects of Gascon. In one part of Gascon, the palatal affiricates   become plosive palatal consonants: . Vowels

Vowel pronunciation according to position 
{| class="wikitable"
! rowspan="2" | Spelling
! colspan="2" | Stressed
! colspan="2" | Unstressed but not final
! colspan="2" | Unstressed and final
|- style="text-align: center;"
! Pronunciation
! Examples
! Pronunciation
! Examples
! Pronunciation
! Examples
|- style="text-align: center;"
| a
|  or 
| bala, cantaràs, occitan  
veniá  
| | 
| partir 
| 
| companhia 
|- style="text-align: center;"
| e|  or 
| pel  (skin)pèl   (hair)
| 
| esfòrç 
| 
| autre 
|- style="text-align: center;"
| o|  or 
| rascós, informacion esfòrç 
| 
| portal 
| 
| basco 
|}

Note:
 The grapheme , when in final position and after the word's stress, is pronounced  in general (locally: , ). The grapheme  is pronounced  in general (locally: , ). Final  is generally used in loanwords, especially from Catalan, Spanish and Italian. General ablaut 
In an unstressed position, some vowels cannot be realized and become more closed vowels:
 The stressed vowel   becomes the unstressed vowel  . For instance (stress underlined): tèrra  → terrassa . The stressed vowel   becomes the unstressed vowel  . For instance (stress underlined): còde  → codificar . In some local dialects, especially in the Languedocien variety of Guyenne, the stressed vowel   becomes the unstressed vowel  . For instance (stress underlined): bala  → balon . Also in Guyenne, the vowel , when stressed, is pronounced  when followed by a nasal consonant such as   or a final  that is silent: montanha, pan  (instead of ). Javanese also similarly has such vowel rounding, although the penultimate vowel  (< ) could occur before any consonant. In Limousin, Auvernhat, Vivaro-Alpine and in most of Provençal (though not in Niçard), the stressed diphthong   becomes the unstressed diphthong  . For instance (stress underlined): sauta  → sautar . In Limousin, Auvernhat, Vivaro-Alpine and in most of Provençal (though not in Niçard), the stressed diphthong   becomes the unstressed diphthong  . For instance (stress underlined): laissa  → laissar . Vowel changes in Auvergnat 
One typical characteristic of Auvergnat (also a feature of some neighbouring dialects of Vivaro-Alpine) is the transformation of the following phonemes:
 The old phoneme  has become . The old phoneme  has become  or . In an unstressed position, some vowels cannot be realized and become more closed vowels:
 The stressed vowel   becomes the unstressed vowel  . For instance (stress underlined): tèrra  → terrassa . The stressed vowel   becomes the unstressed vowel  . For instance (stress underlined): còde  → codificar . In the northern part of Auvergne, the stressed vowel   (unrounded) becomes the unstressed vowel   (rounded). For instance (stress underlined): bala  → balon . The stressed diphthong   becomes the unstressed diphthong  . For instance (stress underlined): sauta  → sautar . The stressed diphthong   becomes the unstressed diphthong  . For instance (stress underlined): laissa  → laissar . Vowel changes in Limousin 
A strong characteristic of Limousin (also a feature of some neighbouring dialects of Vivaro-Alpine) is the neutralization of the phonemes  and  in one single phoneme , that can have various degrees of opening. In words of popular formation, the sequences  , when at the end of a syllable, first became  and have now become long vowels, , which tends to create new phonemes with a relevant opposition between short vowels and long vowels. The same phenomenon exists in one part of Vivarais, and also occurred in the transition from Old to Middle French. In unstressed positions, vowels  become lax sounds . In an unstressed position, some vowels cannot be realized and become more closed vowels:
 The stressed vowel   becomes the unstressed vowel  . For instance (stress underlined): còde  → codificar . The stressed vowel   (unrounded) becomes the unstressed vowel   (rounded). For instance (stress underlined): bala  → balon . The stressed diphthong   becomes the unstressed diphthong  . For instance (stress underlined): sauta  → sautar . The stressed diphthong   becomes the unstressed diphthong  . For instance (stress underlined): laissa  → laissar . Regional variation 

 In Limousin and Auvergnat, final consonants, except for  and , are generally muted when not directly followed by a word with a vocalic initial: filh , potz , fach , limon  but estelum , estanh , un fach ancian . In Limousin and Auvergnat, when a diphthong starts in  or , it is always a rising diphthong: boisson  (Auvergnat) and  (Limousin) versus  (Languedocien) or  (Provençal). In all dialects but Languedocien, final  is heavily velarized ("dark l") and therefore usually spelled : especial  / especiau  but especiala  in the feminine (except in Gascon where it stays as especiau). Word stress 
Word stress has limited mobility. It can only fall on:
 the last syllable (oxytones or mots aguts 'acute words')
 the penultimate syllable (paroxytones or mots plans 'plain words'). However, in Niçard, and less commonly in the Cisaupenc dialect of the Occitan Valleys, the stress can also fall on the antepenultimate (third from last) syllable (proparoxytones or mots esdrúchols 'slip words'). These were regarded as irregular stress in the orthography and they marked by diacritics (see below). These proparoxytones are equivalent to paroxytones in all other dialects. For instance (stress underlined):

The stress is oxytone if the last syllable ending in a consonant or a diphthong ending in -u or -i (occitan /utsiˈta/, verai); while the stress is penultimate if the last syllable ending in a vowel (or vowel + -s) and vowel + -n when in the case of third-person plural verb forms (libre, libres, parlan), the stress is also penultimate when the syllable ending in two different vowels (estatua). Irregular stresses is normally marked orthographically by acutes (á, é, í, ó, ú) and graves (à, è, ò). Historical development 
As a Romance language, Occitan developed from Vulgar Latin. Old Occitan (around the eighth through the fourteenth centuries) had a similar pronunciation to present-day Occitan; the major differences were:
 Before the 13th century,  had softened before front vowels to , not yet to . In the early Middle Ages,  between vowels represented the affricate , not yet . In early Old Occitan,  represented  in final position. In the late Middle Ages, the letter  went from  to  in unaccented position and in stressed syllables followed by a nasal consonant. When not part of a diphthong, the vowel spelled  was probably pronounced as , not yet . Between vowels, the letter  or  represented, for most speech in Occitania, . However, this could become , especially down south: it later became , which, in turn, would locally depalatalize to  in Middle Occitan. In words where  was preceded by a diphthong whose second element was , it was sometimes palatalized to . In earlier times, some dialects used  instead of the more common : despite their similarity, this often led to contrasting spellings ( or   vs.  ;  or   vs.  ) before it became  commonly across the language ( ,  ).Société pour l'Étude des Langues Romanes, Revue des langues romanes, 1877, p. 17: 
 In the pre-literary period of early Old Occitan  had not been fronted to , although strong doubts exist as to when the change actually happened. When between vowels,  lenited to , though this is still true for only Gascon and Languedocien dialects; elsewhere, it eventually turned to  or was deleted. In Gascon, there was one voiced labial phoneme that was  in the beginning of a word and  between vowels. This still happens today and has spread to the neighbouring Languedocien dialect. The phoneme  was exclusively pronounced  (it is now  in intervocalic or final position in some dialects). Old Occitan phonology 

 See also 
 Catalan phonology
 Occitan conjugation
 Occitan alphabet

 Notes 

 References 

Balaguer, Claudi & Patrici Pojada: Diccionari Català - Occità / Occitan - CatalanBlanchet, Philippe. (1999). Parlons Provençal. Paris: L'Harmattan
Fettuciari, Jòrgi, Guiu Martin & Jaume Pietri: Diccionari Provençau - Francés Bèc, Pèire. (1973). Manuel pratique d’occitan moderne, coll. Connaissance des langues, Paris: Picard. Bianchi, Andriu & Alan Viaut. (1995). Fiches de grammaire d’occitan gascon normé, vol. 1. Bordeaux: Presses Universitaires de Bordeaux
 Oliviéri, Michèle, and Patrick Sauzet. (2016). Southern Gallo-Romance (Occitan), in Adam Ledgeway, and Martin Maiden (eds), The Oxford Guide to the Romance Languages. Romieu, Maurici & Andriu Bianchi. (2005). Gramatica de l’occitan gascon contemporanèu, Bordèu: Presses Universitaires de Bordeaux. Ronjat, Juli. (1930–1941). Grammaire istorique [sic] des parlers provençaux modernes, 4 vol. [reprint, 1980, Marselha: Laffitte Reprints, 2 vol.]. Further reading 
Lavalade, Yves. Dictionnaire Occitan - FrançaisOmelhièr, Cristian. Petiòt diccionari Occitan d'Auvèrnhe - Francés''

Occitan language
Languages of France
Italic phonologies

it:Pronuncia dell'occitano