Khanty
Spoken in Western Siberia, Khanty (also: Khanti, Xanti) forms the eastern half of the Ob-Ugric languages. In several ways it appears more distant from Hungarian than Mansi does, possibly due to influence from neighboring Samoyedic languages. It has usually been treated as a single language divided in many dialects, tho a division into a small family of 3 languages (Eastern Khanty, Southern Khanty, Northern Khanty) may be more appropriate. The dialectal developments tend to be shared with adjacent Mansi or Selkup dialects.
The historical phonology of Khanty has been problematic in Uralistics. Among the Uralic languages Eastern Khanty is particularly notorious for several "ablaut" vowel alternations (probably from Proto-Khanty, though only small traces of this are found in Southern and Northern).
Dialect division
- Eastern Khanty
- Far Eastern
- Vakh
- Vasjugan
- Central Eastern
- Tremjugan
- Pim
- Jugan
- Western Khanty
- Southern (Irtysh) Khanty
- Upper Demjanka
- Lower Demjanka
- Konda
- Krasnoyarsk
- Northern Khanty
- Sherkal
- Kazym
- Synja
- Nizjam
- Atlym
- Obdorsk (Salekhard)
Consonants
Consonants common to all Khanty dialects are the basic stops /p t k/, the nasals /m n ń ŋ/, the plain sibilant /s/, and the resonants /w r j/. All also have a palatal(ized) stop /ť/ and the plain lateral /l/, though of varying origin.
- Affricates
- *ć is reflected as *ś [ɕ] in Northern Khanty (as in Core Mansi), *ť [tʲ] in Eastern and Southern Khanty.
- *č remains in East, but is deaffricated to *š in North (as in all of Mansi), as well as / V_# in South. It is further fronted to merge with /s/ in the Obdorsk dialect (as in Northern Mansi).
The phonetic values are characteristically somewhat retroflexed [ʈʂ], [ʂ] rathern than neutral postalveolar [ṯʃ], [ʃ].
- Velars
- As in Mansi, original medial *w *k *x all have become *ɣ in *ə-stems. Velars occurring after a coronal (*ɬk *ɬɣ *rɣ *rk) are metathesized (again only in *ə-stems).
- *ɣ remains only in East, merging into /w/ in West.
- Eastern /ɣ/ also results from lenition of postvocalic /k/ in back-vocalic words.
- Next to original back vowels, *k yields *x (probably via → *q → *χ) in Western Khanty. (This is phonemicized by the fronting of *ɯɯ and further cemented by the Northern backing of *ææ.)
- Central East Khanty (Tremjugan-Jugan) has innovated labialized velars, /kʷ ŋʷ ɣʷ/, via loss of front rounded vowels (as in Core Mansi) and other cheshirization changes.
- Laterals
- Original PU *s and *š have developed into *ɬ unconditionally, while *ś has depalatalized to *s (common Ugric-Samoyedic developments).
- *ɬ has assimilated to *s if the word contains another *s as well (*sükśɜ → #ɬüɣs → *söɣəs "autumn", *sopśə → #ɬåps → *saapəs "net needle"; Ugr. #ɬås → *soˑs- "to dry"). (*ć has no effect in #saŋśɜ- → *ɬɯɯnć- "to stand"; #śosra → *ćorəs "1000" could be a later loan)
- In all dialects but that of Vasjugan (where initial *ɬ → /j/), *ɬ merges with *l (including that from *ð). The core dialects' reflex is /t/ (as in Mansi and Samoyedic); Central-East and Kazym retain /ɬ/; the Far East and Obdorsk 'lects have /l/. *-ɬ- and *-l- probably still contrasted in Proto-Khanty, but the contrast is irrecoverable; the cover symbol *-L- can be used.
- *d₂ has become /j/ (as in Samoyedic), possibly thru an intermediate *ĺ (as in Mansi and Permic). Regardless, an apparent separate *ĺ is also found, emerging from who knows where. This is treated the same as *l, modulo palatalization.
- Retroflexes
Retroflex *ɭ *ɳ sometimes appear for PU *l *n (the former, interestingly, not for PU *ð). The conditioning is not entirely clear but at least the presence of the pre-existing retroflex *č triggers this (*nč → *ɳč).
Of note is that *ɭ does not fortite; rather, in the dialects where *l → ɬ/t, this becomes a new /l/. *ɳ is retained in all Eastern dialects as well as in the Kazym and Berzovo dialects of the Northern group (i.e. somewhat wider than *ɭ).
Vowels
Khanty dialects generally have a distinction between full and overshort vowels. This correlates with the long-short distinction of Mansi, and is transcribed here as geminate vs. single.
Long back vowels develop in Southern Khanty differently near to velar consonant, which is mark'd by <Vˠ>. Some dialects trigger labialization in following velars, markd by <Vʷ>.
Several paradigmatic vowel alternations (generally in height or length, such as *ɑɑ ~ *uu, or *e ~ *ee) occur in some varieties, that are generally thought to result from umlaut at a stage when there was a richer system of non-initial syllable vowels.
| East | South | North | vs. Mansi | Notes | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Vax-Vasjugan | Tremjugan-Jugan | Demj-Konda | Nizjam | Kazym | Obdorsk | |||
| *uu₁ | uu | yy, uuˠ | u | uu | *uu ([oo]?) | |||
| *ɯɯ | ɯɯ | ii, eeˠ | i | ii | *ɤɤ, *a | |||
| *ii₁ | ii | ii | *ii ([ee]?) | |||||
| *yy | yy | iiʷ | Mainly from ii₁ / _ɣ, sometimes *k_ | |||||
| *oo | oo | o, a | uu, ooˠ | uu | (w)oo | oo | *aa, *a, *å | Živlov: *a |
| *uu₂ | uu | Živlov: *oo | ||||||
| *ɔɔ | ɔɔ | oo | ||||||
| *ɑɑ | ɑɑ | ɒɒ | oo, ɑɑˠ | ɔɔ | ɑɑ | *ɤɤ, *ɑɑ | might have to be *ɤɤ to make space for *a → VVj & West *oo | |
| *ee | ee, øøˠ | aa | ee | ee | ee | *ää, *ä | Živlov: *ä | |
| *ii₂ | ii | Živlov: *ii; N&K (j)ee | ||||||
| *øø | øø | aa, ø | Živlov: Split from *ee₁ | |||||
| *ææ | ææ | aa | aa | ɑɑ | aa | *ii | Sammallahti: TJ /ɒɒ/ ? (typo å for ȧ?) | |
| *ɶɶ | œœ | eeʷ | Živlov: Konda & O. /oo/ / _k | |||||
| *o | o | ɑ | o | ɑ | *a, *å | |||
| *ɑ | ɑ | *aa | Živlov: *ï (?! better *ë maybe) | |||||
| *e | e | e | ɑ | a | *i | |||
| *ɵ | ø | ɵ, eʷ | ɵ | u | uu | *ü | ||
There is an interesting anomaly in the treatment of the Proto-Uralic close vowels:
- *i → *ee₁; possibly *e before a cluster (barely any examples of the latter though)
- *u → *oo₁; *o before a cluster
- but: *ü → *ɵ uniformly (never **øø)
Isoglosses
| This article is one of quite a few pages about Natlangs. Indo-european natlangs:
Uralic Natlangs: Finnish * Khanty * Mansi * Mordvinic * Proto-Uralic
Isolate Natlangs: Basque * * |
