The pronunciation of Old Japanese follows a very simple scheme. There are the five vowels, a, e, i, o, u, and no diphthongs, and the following consonants and digraphs b, ch, d, dz, f, g, h, j, k, m, n, r, s, sh, t, ts, w, y, z, zh. The syllables are all open, and consist of
(1) The five vowels.
(2) b, k, m, n, r, followed by all the vowels.
(3) s, y, z, followed by a, e, o, u.
(4) h, w, followed by a, e, i, o.
(5) d, t, followed by a, e, o.
(6) f, followed by i, u.
(7) ch, j, sh, zh, followed by i.
(8) ts, dz, followed by u.
Sixty-four open syllables in all, out of 105 possible ones, of which and their various agglutinations the whole language is made up.