Language vs. Dialects continued The modern Mandarin syllable consists, at the least, of a so-called final element, namely, a vowel (a, e) or semivowel (i, u) or some combination of these (a diphthong or triphthong), with a tone (level, rising, dipping, or falling) and sometimes a final consonant which, however, can only be an n, ng, or r. Old Chinese, however, had in addition a final p, t, k, b, d, g, and m. The final element may be preceded by an initial consonant but never by a consonant cluster; Old Chinese probably had clusters, as at the beginning of klam and glam. As sonic distinctions became fewer for example, as final n absorbed final m, so that syllables such as lam and lan became simply lan the number of Mandarin syllables different from one another in sound fell to about 1300.

No fewer words existed, but more words were homonyms. Thus, the words for poetry, bestow, moist, lose, corpse, and louse had all been pronounced differently from one another in Middle Chinese; in Mandarin they all become shi in the level tone. In fact, so many homonyms came to exist that ambiguity would have become intolerable if compound words had not simultaneously developed. Thus, poetry, became shi-ge, "poetry-song"; teacher became shi-zhang, "teacher-elder." Although a modern Chinese dictionary contains many more such compounds than one-syllable expressions, most of the compounds still break down into independently meaningful syllables.