Proto-West Altaic'

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Revision as of 06:35, 15 September 2007 by Tropylium (talk | contribs) (→‎Erly to late Proto-West Altaic': dialect differences)
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Proto-Altaic' to Erly Proto-West Altaic'

  • /s ʂ/ → [ts tʂ] and /ɽ/ → [ɖ] when initial or prenasal
  • Conditional lenition of dorsal stops (before a certain subset of vowels maybe??) to fricativs
  • Retroflexes acquire velarization
  • /w/ is also possibly alreddy [βˠ] by this stage (areal influence? CF Proto-Betamax)

Erly to late Proto-West Altaic'

Late PWA' = ca. -3ka PWA' had three main dialects: Northern, spoken in the vicinity of the Aral Sea; and Southern, spoken across a wide area south of this, further broken down to West proper just south of the Caspian Sea, and Proto-Sadabax, spoken around where Samarkand exists in realisy.

  • /N/ drops before affricates and [ɖ], phonemicizing 'em
  • /x xʷ Nx Nxʷ χ χʷ Nχ Nχʷ/ → /h f ŋh ŋʷh ħ fˤ ŋħ ŋʷħ/
  • Retroflex stops → velars before front vowels, emphatics elsewhere; [ɽˠ] → /ɡ/ consistently
  • POA chain shift. The results differ a bit by the dialect:
    • 1) /kʷ ŋʷ qʷ/ → /p m pˤ/ (North), /pˠ m kʴ/ (South)
    • 2) /p f fˤ/ → /t̻ θ ??/ (North), /pʲ fʲ fˠ/ (South) (/m/ is not pushed due to distributional differences)
    • 3) /t tʂ s n/ → /ṯ ṯ s̱ ṉ/ (North only)
  • Associated approximant drift
    • /l/ → /n̻/
    • /j/ → /ɟ/ → /dʲ/ (South), /d̻/ (North)
    • /w/ → /βˠ/ → /bˠ/ (→ /bˤ/ in the North)
  • /ts/ → /θ/ (only in the West)
  • /q/ → /ʔ/ (North and Sadabax), /kʴ/ (West)
  • /θ/ → /s̻/ (→ /sʲ/ in the South)
  • Fricativ voicing
  • /d̻ ḏ ḏˤ/ → /l̻ ḻ ɫ/ conditionally (pretonic intervocalic maybe?)


Labial Lamino-
dental
Apico-
postalveolar
Velar Pharyngeal Glottal
Plain Emphatic Plain Emphatic
Voiceless stops p ṯˤ k ʔ
Voiced stops b ḏˤ ɡ
Voiceless fricativs ʂˣ ħ h
Voiced fricativs ʐˠ ʕ
Nasals m ŋ
Laterals ɫ

Depending on the font, the laminality signs (subsc. square) may look like dentality sings (subsc. bridge), but since they're dental anyway, that's no problem.

/ṯ ḏ s̱ ẕ ṯˤ ḏˤ/ → [ʧ ʤ ʃ ʒ k ɡ] before front vowels