Talk:Kijeb (Sohlob)

Pre-Kiijeb shortening/monophthongization

Note to self:

Monophthongization

In fact only rising diphthongs were monophthongized:

• {i,e} > y / _V
• {u,o} > w / _V

Syncope/Apocope

Later short unstressed vowels in fully unstressed syllables were lost, possibly subject to some restrictions:

Possible restrictions

• Final vowels were preserved in the first round.
• Only odd-numbered vowels counting from the stressed vowel were lost. However this happens in the transition from K to the later langs, and I don't want to have this same pattern twice!
• Final vowels were lost only if the preceding syllable was unstressed,
  • i.e. proparoxytone words were made paroxytone by losing the last syllable if that was short,
  • possibly by losing the penultimate if that was short and the ultimate long.
• Clitics were always unstressed.
  • This included clitic pronouns on verbs (aargh so Quenya-like, I know! :-/).
  • The nominal inversion marker was a clitic but must originally have had a long vowel: *yaa.
• Were PK words root-stressed or something else?
  • A Latin-like stress rule?
  • Perhaps the fourth from last was stressed if all the three last were short? (The rule falsely attributed to Sanskrit!)
    • How long could verbal complexes be?
      • Perhaps an pro-proparoxytone rule will cover them?
      • In any case the final vowel of a verbal complex was lost while a nominal in the absolutive always ended up ending in a vowel.
        • Was there an absolutive ending "vowel-length"?
        • Beware of inversely copying the Mærik pattern were pre-form nominals ended in short vowels or consonants while pre-form verbs stems ended in long vowels!
  • Distinctive stress?
• Did the language tend towards penultimate stress by losing short vowels in syllables after the one after the stressed one?
  • What about nominals with derivational suffixes?
    • These may show up as derivation by different final vowels in K.
    • I will have to assume there are nominal absolutives ending in (dental) consonants.

Shortening

Later still remaining VV were shortened by losing the first V, e.g.

• aa > a
• ae > e
• ai > i
• ao > o
• au > u

N.B. there could arise new diphthongs when unstressed {w,y}V syllables lost their vowels in the previous stage, unless yCV > CyV and wCV > CwV already at this stage.

Loss of mid vowels

Lastly e > ya and o > wa.