Oqomur

The southwesternmost Persian' language, Oqomur has one of the longest written histories on Earth'. Archaic Oqomur emerges near the Persian Gulf around -4.4ka (for long attested only in Tsonboran records). Middle Oqomur is a stage with a considerable corpus, when the language expands both north and west starting around -2.9ka and flourishing around -2.2ka to -1.7ka. The western dialect ends up substratal to Åzuli; the central dialect enjoys wide currency as a lingua franca in Indic seatrade, and has exerted much influence on the native languages of the Arabic peninsula, in particular. Its descendant New Oqomur goes finally extinct around -1ka under its distant East Persian' relatives.

Proto-Tsonboid to Archaic Oqomur

• *ɸ *β → h w
• *θ *ð → h j
• *hF, *Fh → *Fː → ːF
  • *xs *χs → *Xː → ːX
  • (*ɸθ *θɸ →) *hh → *xː → ːx
• *z → j / _F (counterfeeds retroflexion)
• *z → *ʐ → ɣ / _u_ (also *s → x, if medial [s] has re-risen somehow)
• *kʷ *gʷ *xʷ → p b f

Archaic to Old Oqomur

• *tj dj → t d, *tr dr → t d, (etc.)
• Frication contrasts among voiced consonants collapse for good: *ɣ → g, *ɢ → ʁ
  • This would leaves *ʀ phonemic; → r
• Rise of nasal vowels

Old Oqomur is left with these consonants:

/m n              /
/b d dɮ    dʒ g ʁ  /
/p t tɬ ts tʃ k q  /
/f    ɬ  s  ʃ x χ h/
/w    l  r  j     /

[z], though rare by now, remains analyzable as the intervocalic allophone of /s/. /f ɬ/ also do not occur intervocally.

Old to Middle Oqomur

• Nʁ → ŋ
• z → *ð → ɦ (allophonic with /h/)
• tʃ dʒ ʃ → ts z s
• m n ŋ → ɓ ɗ ɠ / _V[-NAS]