Romanian has seven vowels. Five are the same vowels found in many language, but two are less common. One is the mid central unrounded vowel, which is written ă, and the other is the high mid unrounded vowel, which can be written â or î. The vowel ă is similar to the English schwa. Both vowels can occur in both stressed and unstressed syllables.
The mid central unrounded vowel occurs in the word casă (house), and the high mid unrounded vowel occurs in înger (angel). These two vowels did not occur in Latin. In fact, the high mid unrounded vowel does not occur in any other Romance language.
Romanian is a Romance language, and five of the vowels are common not only in Romance languages but in many languages of the world. Languages such as Spanish have a vowel system that is known as the five-vowel system. However, Romanian has two vowels that are less common.
