Mường language

Muong
Thiếng Mươ̒ng
Native toVietnam
RegionHòa Bình Province, Thanh Hóa Province, Phú Thọ Province, Sơn La Province
EthnicityMuong
Native speakers
1.5 million (2019 census)
Austroasiatic
Latin (modified Chữ Quốc ngữ)
Lao script (historical)
Language codes
ISO 639-3mtq
Glottologmuon1246

Mường (thiếng Mươ̒ng; Vietnamese: tiếng Mường) is a group of dialects spoken by the Mường people of Vietnam. They are in the Austroasiatic language family and closely related to Vietnamese. According to Phan (2012), the Mường dialects are not a single language, or even most closely related to each other, but rather are an ethnically defined and paraphyletic taxon.

Mường dialects are primarily spoken in mountainous regions of the northern Vietnamese provinces of Hòa Bình, Thanh Hóa, Vĩnh Phúc, Yên Bái, Sơn La, and Ninh Bình.

Mường has all six tones of Vietnamese; however, the nặng (heavy) tone is present only in Phú Thọ and Thanh Hóa provinces while in Hòa Bình Province, it is merged with the sắc (sharp) tone.