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Transcriptions of Mandarin into the Latin script often do not distinguish between the critical tonal differences employed in the Mandarin language, using words such as this one without indication of tone.
This word was borrowed at a stage when the Sinitic word still retained the preinitial, thus causing lenition: *-t- > Middle Vietnamese dĕao > modern . The Sino-Vietnamese reading đao, on the other hand, derived from Middle Chinese 刀 (MC taw) when the onset already simplified and resulted in a stop. The North Central đao, although formally identical to the more recent Sino-Vietnamese reading, belongs to the same stratum as dao, as indicated by the meaning "knife", due to the fact that these dialects did not undergo lenition to as large an extent.