Proto-Utaıjen

Proto-Utājen Utājen
Spoken in:	The Middle East
Timeline/Universe:	Earth, alternate universe
Total speakers:	???
Genealogical classification:	Proto-Ōšqʷiť  Proto-Utājen
Basic word order:	SOV
Morphological type:	Inflecting
Morphosyntactic alignment:	Nominative-Accusative
Created by:
maailmaniag	June 18th 2008

Proto-Utājen (/u.ta:.jen/) emerged from the most conservative dialect of Proto-Ōšqʷiť. Therefore, many of the phonological features in Proto-Ōšqʷiť have been retained, including the three-way plain/palatized/labialized distinction, as well as many morphological features. Like Proto-Ōšqʷiť, we do not know exactly what Proto-Utājen sounded like; however, this is the first of the daughter languages to actually be written down, dating back to 1,500 BC, and therefore one of the more accurate "reconstructions" of Proto-Ōšqʷiť's daughter languages. Because it is also one of the more conservative dialects, and because it was written down, we can get a feeling of what Proto-Ōšqʷiť was like, and what it would have looked like written down.

Phonology

Although there are written records of Proto-Utājen, the exact phonology is not as certain, and assumes that the writing system (an alphabet) was largely phonemic

Consonants

As mentioned earlier, Proto-Utājen shares a significant portion of its with it's predecessor, and therefore, not much is different. However, one significant change is the merging of the aspirated stops with the voiceless stops, one of the first reconstructed sound changes from Proto-Ōšqʷiť to Proto-Utājen. This gives a consonant inventory that looks something like this:

Consonants
	Bilabial		Labiodent.		Dental		Alveolar		Post-alv.		Velar		Uvular		Glottal
Nasal		m mʲ mʷ						n nʲ nʷ			ŋ ŋʲ ŋʷ
Plosive-voiced		b bʲ bʷ						d dʲ dʷ			g gʲ gʷ
Plosive-unvoiced		p pʲ pʷ						t tʲ tʷ			k kʲ kʷ			q qʲ qʷ
Fricative-voiced						ð ðʲ ðʷ		z zʲ zʷ						ʁ ʁʲ ʁʷ
Fricative-unvoiced			f fʲ fʷ			θ θʲ θʷ		s sʲ sʷ		ʃ ʃʲ ʃʷ				χ χʲ χʷ		h hʲ hʷ
Affricate-voiced								d͡z d͡zʲ d͡zʷ
Affricate-unvoiced								t͡s t͡sʲ t͡sʷ		͡ʧ ͡ʧʲ ͡ʧʷ
Trill								r
Lateral Approximant								l lʲ lʷ

Sound Changes

Here is a compilation of the sound changes from Proto-Ōšqʷiť to Proto-Utājen (listed as PŌ > PU):

Stress

"V.CV > V.C"V / C=aspirated consonant Stress, which was usually on the first syllable in Proto-Ōšqwiť, shifted to any syllable in the word that contained an aspirated consonant, usually the final syllable that contained one, in the case that there were two or more.

Consonants

p pʷʰ pʲʰ > p pʷ pʲ t tʷʰ tʲʰ > t tʷ tʲ k kʷʰ kʲʰ > k kʷ kʲ

Vowels

ə ə: > ə ae > əi / _C[+voice] ae > e: / closed syllables ae ai > Ae aə > o: ao > o: / open syllables ao > Ao / closed syllables au > Ao ea eə > eə eo eu > Eu oe > oi / open syllables oe > e / closed syllables oa oə > Oə əa > a: / open syllables, _C[-voice] əa > ə / other closed syllables əe əi > əi əo əu > əu

Syllable Structure

There was also a change in syllable structure, where there was a preference for open syllables.
C1C2 > C2 / _# Cʷ Cʲ > 0 / _# VC > CV / _# when C = fricative, /r/, /R/, VC > V: / _# when C = stop, liquid
CVC.CV > CV.CCV (note: not applicable when the second C is a nasal) C1C2C3 > :C2C3 / syllable boundaries, when C1 not nasal, and all 3 are different POAs
Clusters of 4 or more consonants were extremely rare to begin with, but in general, consonants would be lost at the end of the cluster, so the string C1C2C3C4 would become :C2C3.