Southwestern Mandarin
A number of features distinguish the Nanjing dialect from other Mandarin varieties. It maintains the glottal stop final and the entering tone, which Northern Mandarin or Southwestern Mandarin likely also had until recently. Like Northern Mandarin, it has preserved the retroflex initials of Middle Chinese. As with other Jianghuai Mandarin dialects, Nanjing dialect has lost syllable-initial , which have all become . The opposite has occurred in Southwestern Mandarin, where has changed to . Northern Mandarin, on the other hand, retains distinct and initials.